First Impressions of Topaz Studio v1.0.8

Topaz Products Product Technical Support
1

I decided to uninstall then reinstall Topaz Studio with the release of version 1.0.8 of the product. The following are my observations (so far) of this newest release.

Uninstall – Reinstall

While the process appeared to completely remove the older version, it appears that some elements and data remained. For example, the program remembered who I was and also remembered the list of previous images opened in a program that was (supposedly) completely removed from my system.

Post-installation and Connection to Community

It seems, to me at least, counter-intuitive that a list of my adjustments and plug-ins are not available until after I have opened an image. You apparently already know who I am and you are retaining data from previous installations (see above), so why not show which adjustments and plug-ins are available to me .

Open Recent Menu Item

Despite uninstalling the previous version and “all files”, according to the uninstaller, a list of recently opened files remains (see below). There is no method, either as a preference or sub-menu item, to remove any or all files from the recent file list. This, for me, has been an issue since public beta release of Topaz Studio.

Selecting a file from the recent list that no longer exists at a location from which it was previously opened (it was manually deleted from the HDD and the original folder location was also removed) causes Topaz Studio to fall into an infinite loop of trying to open the file that no longer exists (see below). There does not appear to be a time-out function for the process.

You are apparently allowed to try opening a second image from the recent file list, which does in fact open in Topaz Studio. However, the program exhibits reduced luminosity, and it is still stuck in trying to load an image that does not exist. Also, the program allows selection of adjustments for the loaded image but will not allow those adjustments to be made. (See below.)

TS - After Existing File Selection.jpg1408×1034 457 KB

This condition persists until Topaz Studio processes are terminated (program closed). However, the missing file still remains in the list of recently opened files and at the risk of redundancy, there appears to be no way to remove it from the list.

Help Menu

Selecting “Sync Adjustments” from the help menu apparently tries to synchronize adjustments despite no images being open. (See below.)

TS - Sync Adjustments.jpg1227×1004 124 KB

Community Menu

Again, you already know who I am, so why do I have to login to the discussion forum after selecting “Forum” from the “Community” menu?

1 Like
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To completely remove Studio from your system you will need to remove AppData and Registry entries.

As in any pixel editor nothing is available to be applied to an image unless an image is open.

You will need to raise a technical support request.

Synch does that just to the database held in your AppData.

There are 4 distinct communities for different products. Also it is not wise to transmit your login details across open communication lines to a Public Forum.

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Allow me to elaborate on this process a bit. This is the mechanism used to license the Pro version of Adjustments, in Topaz Studio. The Sync Adjustments process replaces our license key system, which has been a long time coming. We’re working on making the interaction in this area more robust, so you fully understand what is happening, even if you’ve never used our software before.

The Topaz Discussion Forum (here) is a separate entity from the Topaz Studio ecosystem. However, the forums use your login information from your My Account Page, to validate you here. This means you only need to use one account, the same account. Just login once, and we’ll retain that information for you.

I am going to talk to the developers about potentially adding a “Complete Uninstall” option to the installer. As of now, we are doing what we’ve always done, which is save some “convenience” options:

  • Preset information and databases
  • Login token/license information
  • Position of the application window

All of this information above is ~38MB in size. Assets, which take up ~1.4GB of space, should be removed when you uninstall.

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@JoeFedric-TL, this sounds like it may create problems down the road if you include Preset information in the Complete Uninstall. I would hate to lose my Saved presets… this has happened with other plugin programs in the past with updates?

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I get that. My point is that if I’m already using the same login and password for Topaz Studio, Topaz Labs, and the Topaz Discussion Forum then why not enable TS to pass some type of encrypted token whenever a user selects “Forum” from the “Community” menu?

Also, thank you @JoeFedric-TL and @AiDon for your replies. My point here is that I’ve raised the issue of the program hanging after selecting a file from the recent files list that no longer exists, as well as the inability to remove the file from the list or to clear the list, several times during the public beta and after the initial release of Topaz Studio. I’ve even provided some screen captures this time so that Topaz Labs could take the provided information and run with it. Whether it’s fixed or not is irrelevant to me since I know how to remove the errant data.

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I can relate to the frustration of losing presets having done so at least once in my IT career. However, my personal belief is that installed software should be responsible for cleaning up after itself when it has been removed from a machine. Not everyone does it. You’d be surprised at the “droppings” left behind that contribute to reduced space on a system disk (or wherever they install programs).

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This is how the Wordpress (web site) to Discourse (forums) login already works. Unfortunately, implementing SSO from within an application is a bit tricky, and has to be done mostly from scratch. The priority on this task is relatively low, so it’s not likely to be implemented for a while. We’re going after the biggest and worst problems, first, while trying to improve the usefulness of the entire application by providing new features (healing), and interface changes.

Our customers have trouble agreeing on what “should be”. This is why I think a complete uninstall option would be useful for all customers :slight_smile:

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As long as you are talking to them, you might also mention that an incorrect version of Topaz Studio is listed under Windows’ “Program and Features”. Despite having uninstalled version 1.0.5 and installing version 1.0.8 version 1.0.5 is still listed, and yes, I’ve rebooted at least once since the uninstall/reinstall.

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haha - I talk to all of them every single day. I’ll add the version number update to their task list :slight_smile:

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:smile: :wink:

One more thing, if I may. There is a “user” table in the Topaz Studio database on my machine, and there are 191 “username” entries, including many that are blank, in that table. Apparently, my name (unless it’s one of the blanks) is not among them. As a now-retired data analyst, database architect, and production database administrator at an enterprise level it is my personal opinion that this table should be stripped of non-essential entries before being installed on or copied to a user’s machine. I would be more than happy to provide you with a CSV file or Excel spreadsheet with the entries.

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These usernames are tied to the Community (shared) presets that are available in the application. The blank entries you see are actually blank because we do not return email addresses to the client - other users’ email addresses are never stored on yours or anyone’s local machine. Without the entries in the user table, we cannot display who actually created the effect. If a user does not have a username, and only an email address, then we opt to not display who created the effect. This was a tradeoff made for security reasons.

We will eventually be addressing the users that have not chosen a username on our Studio site, yet, but for now, blank “Author” fields have been deemed acceptable. We use a similar approach to applications like Facebook and Steam, wherein only publicly available information is stored (username).

We have already taken the sanitization steps we feel are adequate, but if you have found some vulnerability in our database that you feel can be exploited, I would be extremely interested in a private chat on that topic.

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If I find one I would certainly let you know. Also, thank you for the explanation. :smile:

3 Likes
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@JoeFedric-TL
Recently on my Mac, I have noticed when I open Studio it does not tell me there is an update? No Update Available window opens, I usually find out on the forum or I just check for them on the top menu bar. I’ve also read where some members get emails about updates, I have never received one?
Thanks