PrusaSlicer 2.4.0-alpha2

Summary

This is the second alpha release of PrusaSlicer 2.4.0, following 2.4.0-alpha1. This alpha adds several new features and improvements and it fixes bugs found in the first alpha. The most important change is significant speed-up of the G-Code generator.

To let you enjoy the alpha without worries, the alpha builds save their profiles into PrusaSlicer-alpha directory, so you may use the alpha side by side with the current release without ruining your production configuration.

Improvements with respect to PrusaSlicer 2.4.0-alpha1

• G-Code export was parallelized and optimized. This results in significant improvement of performance: The total slicing time is now 2x to 4x shorter, higher speed up is achieved on high-end CPUs #2263.
• The G-Code coordinates are newly exported without emitting the leading and trailing zeros, which makes the G-code a bit smaller. While the new G-code conforms to standard, it may not be consumed by some non-conforming applications #6996.
• 3MFs, AMFs and OBJs are loaded considerably faster, models imported from them are no longer repaired automatically (see 'Architecture and infrastructure' below for further details)
• Mesh repair statistics used to be confusing: It was not quite clear which errors were fixed during import and whether there are any errors remaining after the mesh import and repair. This has been improved: The fixed / remaining errors are newly shown clearly at the side panel and the "exclamation mark" icon is shown with white color for a completely fixed mesh, while an orange color is used for a not fully fixed mesh.
• Bottom status bar was removed and replaced by notifications showing progress of slicing and the "abort slicing" button. This also solves the Windows 10 dark mode issue, where we were not able to adjust status bar colors #6860.
• Windows specific: InnoCielo Meridian injects AMHook.dll into PrusaSlicer, which makes PrusaSlicer to crash. We added AMHook.dll to a blacklist so a warning dialog will be shown on startup when that DLLs is injected into PrusaSlicer #2939. This is a similar issue to the dreaded Nahimic OSD issue #6864 which we blacklisted in PrusaSlicer 2.4.0-alpha1.
• OSX specific: The PrusaSlicer and G-code viewer application icons were updated with the new rectangular background to match the new OSX icon style #6874 thanks @xarbit.
• Windows specific: Several function calls that might have been considered suspicious by anti-virus software were replaced by alternatives. This should lower the probability that PrusaSlicer will be reported as a potential threat. #6914, thanks @jschuh
• Windows specific: Selected mode button (Simple/Advanced/Expert) has now an orange background to make the active mode more distinct #6860.
• The G-code preview settings at the bottom of the Preview screen are no longer resetted to their defaults after each slicing #5471.
• Windows specific: 'Fix by Netfabb' can now be used on several objects at once.
• Place on face no longer unifies rotation of multiple instances around their Z axes to the same angle.
• The new "Tip of the day" notifications can now reference menu items. We use it to activate the "Configuration Snapshots" dialog from a "tip of the day".
• When navigating to a configuration option from the Search dialog, the option's input field gets focus automatically #6941.
• The dialog asking about unsaved changes is now shown in all scenarios when some changes in presets would be lost #6991.
• The placeholder {version} (denoting current PrusaSlicer version) can newly be used in output filename format template string #7002.
• When the "Reload from disk" action was called on an object for which only the source file name, not the full path to the source file name was known, PrusaSlicer used to always ask the user to look up the source file location manually, while newly PrusaSlicer searches for the source file next to the active project file before asking the user for help.

Bugs fixed with respect to PrusaSlicer 2.3.3

• Fixed crash when the bed texture was located in a directory that user had no permission to access #6873.
• The 'Entering SLA support points' undo/redo snapshot is now taken before the gizmo is opened, not after. This bug was introduced between 2.2.0 and 2.3.0 and resulted in two identical snapshots on the undo/redo stack.
• It is now possible to use Backspace to delete selected items at the object list. Delete and Backspace should now be equivalent in all contexts. The reason that Backspace is used as an alternative to Delete is that some laptops do not have the Delete key at all (some Macs, Chromebooks).
• Fixed handling of "N/A" config options under some translations #6921.
• Fixed a rare error preventing slicing of specific models #6933.
• Fixed color of objects in preview for SLA printers. Until now, the color of the last filament selected in FDM mode was used.
• When printing with a wipe tower, all objects are required to have the same variable layer height profile. The test for this constraint was buggy and it sometimes allowed incorrectly the slicing to continue, leading to cryptic error messages later on. This is now fixed.
• When slicing was finished while the user was moving the object in the scene, it would reset the object's location. This was happening mainly with the background processing enabled #6898.
• Selection rectangle in SLA support points editing mode did not work reliably when the object was rotated or scaled #4666.
• The view settings combo boxes had incorrect layout the first time they were opened.
• OSX specific: The items in the dialog with selection of object-specific settings to show was incorrectly stretched #6926
• Linux specific: Flatpak package did not allow to export to external devices because of insufficient permission #6758, thanks @xarbit
• Linux specific: Fixed crash when $USER environment variable was not set #3969.
• Windows specific: Under certain circumstances, a system text edit box unintentionally appeared in the right panel.

Bugs fixed, reported for PrusaSlicer 2.4.0-alpha1

• Painted supports and seams did not work correctly on objects with multiple volumes #6863.
• Fixed possible crash in the new triangle mesh simplification tool when the required number of triangles was too small.
• Fixed a crash after deleting an object when simplification preview was shown.
• Plater was incorrectly cleared on New Project / Open Project after the "Do you want to save the changes to the current project" dialog was canceled #6866.
• Painted seam was broken on vertical surfaces, while it worked in PrusaSlicer 2.3.3.
• 'Replace by stl' is no more allowed when some gizmo is active, which may have lead to a crash in some scenarios.
• Fixed crash when enabling visualization of tool change markers in preview
• Fixed crash when importing gcode generated with Simplify3D and switching to tool view.
• Ajusted the wording of "Compare presets" pop-up windows showing differences in multi-line texts #6903.
• Toolpath width in G-code Preview was clamped to 1 mm, which did not work for large nozzle diameters. The width is newly clamped to 2 mm or 4 * layer height, whatever is bigger #6828.
• Fixed several drag and drop issues in object list, which appeared when some of the new rows informing about painted supports, painted seems etc. were shown.
• Fixed inconsistencies of selection in scene and the object list.
• Fixed deleting volumes through the right panel with the new "Paint-on supports", etc. items visible.
• When supports are turned on with 'Detect bridging perimeters' disabled, a dialog box offering to turn it on is opened. From now on, this dialog does not have a 'Cancel' button (which was confusing) and requires strictly 'Yes' or 'No'.
• When using a painting gizmo (supports/seam/multimaterial painting) with objects with modifiers, one could see inside the modifier when it was partly below the bed, which clips the bottom of it.
• Print setting changes were not applied to all instances if one of the instances was rotated #6971.
• Extra bridging layers were sometimes generated when the new thick_bridges option was off. #6957, thanks @jschuh for the fix.
• Fixed crash when support patern spacing was set to zero #6989.
• With the settings shown in a floating window, the Search did not bring back the Settings floating window if it was was minimized #6958.
• Windows specific: Combo-box with preset names was too narrow with the new "Settings tab as menu items" enabled #6993.
• G-code Preview did not update when switching to the G-code viewer for the first time after automatic background processing completed slicing #6983.
• Windows-specific: Cycling through tabs using Ctrl+PageUp/PageDown was not implemented for the new custom Notebook control #6938.
• Double slider was sometimes captured after certain mouse click combinations and could be moved even after the pointer no more over it.
• Fixed endless loop in raft generator, which was broken for certain parameter combinations newly available in 2.4.0-alpha1.
• New project was sometimes incorrectly marked as unsaved.
• Retractions, deretractions and similar markers were placed at a wrong z in the gcode preview.

Architecture, infrastructure

• Removed support of PRUSA files, which used to be produced by PrusaControl. PrusaControl was discontinued many years ago.
• Slic3r, Slic3rPE and PrusaSlicer extensively used admesh library for internal storage and manipulation of triangle meshes. The admesh library was designed with the purpose of importing and fixing errors in STL files, while in Slic3r / PrusaSlicer admesh was also misused as a heavy weight general triangle mesh representation and the same triangle mesh was also kept in memory using a simpler redundant "Indexed triangle set" representation. Starting with this release, PrusaSlicer only uses admesh for loading and fixing STL files, thus the triangle meshes are only kept using the "Indexed triangle set" structure, which reduces memory consumption. Triangle meshes imported from 3MFs, AMFs and OBJs are no longer repaired by admesh. For PrusaSlicer generated 3MFs it means that the triangle meshes will be loaded exactly the same way they were stored, while earlier PrusaSlicer may have modified a mesh with non-manifold edges slightly by trying to repair it each time a 3MF was loaded. For 3MFs not produced by PrusaSlicer and for AMFs and OBJs it may mean that model errors will not be fixed, however in contrary to the STL file format, the 3MF, AMF and OBJ file formats are indexed triangle sets with triangle neighborship clearly expressed by shared vertex indices, thus cracks in triangle meshes are less likely. Not repairing 3MFs through admesh considerably speeds up loading of PrusaSlicer project files.