[NOACTION] Attribute Panel trigger to begin updates

[JohnZeman]

I'm having a real love/hate relationship with the way the attribute panel chooses just when to start updating.  I like the way it will begin the update if I click on an unselected image, but I hate the way it also begins the update just by

1.  Temporarily switching to another program to look up something.  When I come back to IMatch the attribute updating is going on even though I wasn't finished editing the attributes for the selected images.

2.  Likewise if I make a change to the text of one set, then switch to another set and make a change to it, then if I need to go back to the first set again to make a correction, too late.  The updating process has already begun.

This isn't a problem when I have just a few images selected, but when I have over 1000 selected I have to wait an hour or two for the updating to finish before I can go back to finish editing what I was trying to do in the first place.  And once I finally get my edits done, I have to wait another hour or two for the updating process to complete.

So FWIW I would like to see the trigger that begins the update process limited to an image selection change, not the program focus or set change.

[Mario]

For data safety, the Attributes panel is committing changes when the Attribute panel grid loses the focus. This is the only proper way to do it.

But this is not the real problem. Your problem is that updating Attributes takes so long in your database. Usually Attribute updates are a sub-second operation, or maybe a few seconds when you change the Attributes for a few hundred files. Nothing that really gets in the way.

I had no time yet to analyze your specific Attribute set to determine why it is so slow. Attributes are really fast usually. I think your combination of multiple Sets and references causes the slow performance during the updates. From a cursory glance at your log file I reckon that the problem are the bazillion of lookups to reference Attribute Sets required when writing your changes. This is a hint for where to optimize.

The typical time for updating one set for 1000 files is maybe 5 seconds. Not minutes or even hours.

[JohnZeman]

Ok thanks Mario.  For me the attributes aren't something I'd change very often anyway, and I do have them finally up to date now.  I'm just thinking someone else may have a similar issue some day.

[Mario]

Attributes should be quick. Always.
Execution times of minutes or even hours (Yikes!) are a bug.
I'll check that and fix it.