When I first saw the “Use fast feedback” option all those years ago I imagine it was referring to some under the hood feedback, e.g. between the the graphic cards and central processor. However it struck me when seeing it again that feedback probably refers to what is drawn on the screen for the user to see.
While I guess you could call almost any information coming out if a computer towards the user feedback, the term is usually used for something that is a direct result of what was just done, to tell you you just did something. I typically wouldn’t refer to drawing a model to screen as feedback as it doesn’t relate to any specific user action.
Perhaps it would make more sense to call this option “Use graphics acceleration” which clearly has to do with graphics, and is a phrase already used e.g. in web browsers.
Based on a bit of web searching, I think this terminology has to do with whether SketchUp should use certain OpenGL optimizations that some graphics (particularly integrated graphics) do not support well or correctly. But the specific wording has essentially no meaning to almost all users and would benefit from clarification. Even better would be if SketchUp could test whether the card handles it correctly and set the flag automatically (I’m not an OpenGL expert - I have no idea whether that is possible).
And in general, when compuwizzards also has to design the UI…
I agree totally, SketchUp could be great if it had some sort of testing for graphic capabilities and adjust automatically unless specifically overruled by the user.
There are test suites that exercise your graphics to see what OpenGL capabilities are or are not supported. I wonder if the SketchUp installation process (or maybe first time launched) could run such and set preferences based on the results? Not knowing exactly what “fast feedback” means, I don’t know whether such tests can trap it or not.
I was under the impression it toggles whether to use the external graphic card, but this makes more sense.
In general I like how SketchUp uses simple down to earth phrasing but here some technical phrasing could be useful, like what OpenGL features it toggles, so you can easily google it.
Use Fast Feedback : Fast feedback improves SketchUp’s performance, especially if you’re working on a large model. When you start SketchUp, it checks whether your graphics card supports fast feedback combined with multi-sample anti-aliasing. If so, this option is selected by default.
it is but reporting to support skills doesn’t mean to be fully capable to provide the claimed functionality… or maybe depending on the implementation of the used application only.
To go slightly OT: My pet peeve is the “Use high-accuracy HLR” printing option on the PC. What the hell does that mean? I know that it switches to pure vector printing. On the Mac it is named, perversely, “Vector printing”…
Thanks. Even Wikipedia’s disambiguation page didn’t know that. It makes some sense, but I think “Vector printing” is to the average user what the option really is about.
