Synergy 1.6 is out

  1. Greg Hurrell

    https://wincent.dev/a/news/archives/2004/12/synergy_16.php

    This is a maintenance release. The next release will be a feature release, and most of the work is already done, so expect to see it in early January.

    Enjoy!

  2. anonymous

    I am having a few problems with the new release mate, it seems to be a lot less responsive than 1.5 and i when i try to skip to songs swiftly after each other it takes a 2-3 second pause. And when doing general key commands it sometimes also lags, especially if i try to do one swiftly after another. 

    Is everyone experiencing this?

    btw i LOVE using Synergy and imo it is one of the best little apps available - keep up the good work!

  3. Greg Hurrell

    If you look at the changelog:

    https://wincent.dev/a/products/synergy-classic/history/

    You'll see no changes where made to the communications engine with iTunes. So performance should be identical. (Or even better if memory were an issue, because leaks were fixed; but the truth is the number of leaks fixed was small and the size of each individual leak was small too so the amount of memory saved is not likely to have any impact on performance.)

    1.6 is a bugfix release, and the bugs in question have nothing to do with communicating with iTunes.

    If performance has changed then, it looks like something has changed in the environment of the software, not in the software itself.

  4. anonymous

    Is there any chance i could download 1.5 again? because 1.6 is becoming a bit annoying (whether it is my imac or the release i dunno), every few songs it stops responding and gives me a beechball for about 30 secs. 

    1.5 worked perfectly before, i have tried reinstalling 1.6 but no help
  5. PeterH

    I'm seeing the same thing. Synergy will be fine for hours, but then I'll notice I'm not getting the floater, and if I hit the key-combo I use for pause (Ctrl-Opt-Cmd-Space), nothing will happen for up to 10 seconds, then I get the Pause bezel, and iTunes pauses.

    This happens 2 or 3 times a day, and I think it started with 1.6... The keyboard works fine with everything else, so it's not a keyboard problem.

    I wouldn't mind downloading version 1.5 again, just to see if the problem is with me...

  6. anonymous

    I get exactly the same as you said, 3/4 times a day or sometimes more i get the beachball and none of the command work for like 10-15 seconds. Then they all work, it is a peculiar problem am i am 100% sure this is a problem after i installed 1.6 because i never experienced this with 1.5.

  7. PeterH

    The bad news is... I downloaded and installed 1.5 last night, and a minute ago I had the same problem.

    I don't get a spinning ball, though, everything's OK except that Synergy doesn't respond for a few seconds. Then it rapidly runs through all the commands I keyed in while it was stuck, and then it's back to normal again.

    Like you, I thought it might be to do with 1.6, as it's only been happening recently, but I guess something else on my machine must be broken.

    Wonder what....?

  8. anonymous

    Is anyone else experiencing this?!

    I swear i never had this with my imac (G5 1.8 20") with 1.5,  i can't think of anything that is causing these freezes. Where did you reinstall 1.5 as i could see if it helps?
  9. PeterH

    1.5 is here.

    I'm considering going back to 1.4, to before the new iTunes communication protocol, to see if that helps. Since iTunes 4.7.1 came out quite recently, I'm wondering if that could be the problem.

  10. anonymous

    Wow, I'm behind... 1.3 represent!! Haha... To 1.6 I go.

  11. PeterH

    The very bad news is... I still have the problem with Synergy 1.4.

    I've tried doing an archive & install of 10.3, followed by the 10.3.7 combo update, so I guess the next stage is an erase & install.

    This isn't the only strange thing going on (I'm having intermittent bluetooth problems, too), so a fresh install may help there as well.

    Bummer

  12. anonymous

    Do you think it could be a problem Bluetooth connected then? 

    What mac do you have?
I dunno though because i am sure i didn't get this problem with 1.5, maybe bluetooth can only handle a set number of skips at once but then how would that explan Synergy itself not responding. Hmm
  13. anonymous

    I'm having simaler issues. I get the beachball for hours. I eventullay have to use kill on the command line to kill Synergy, then find another app to do my keyboard combos until this get's fixed.

  14. PeterH

    I'm not sure it's related to BlueTooth, I was just saying that there seems to be some low-level problem with my Mac that a fresh install may cure.

    I'm not actually using BlueTooth any more, because of the problems I've been having. And come to think of it, I haven't noticed the delay in Synergy recently... maybe coincidental, or I've been too busy. I think I might go back to 1.6 and see what happens.

    My Mac is a Dual-G5 1.8GHz (unbelievable increase in performance over my Cube, once I'd added a couple of Gb of memory )

  15. Greg Hurrell

    These kind of problems are fairly hard to trouble-shoot, and as you've seen, they don't seem to be related to any specific version of Synergy, despite the different communications engines.

    Thousands of people are happily using Synergy without any problems, so I don't actually think this is a bug in Synergy.

    What I do think is that there is a complex interaction occurring here between iTunes, Synergy, and the system. Because Synergy relies on AppleScript/Apple Events to communicate with iTunes, if there's a problem on the AppleScript level, then Synergy can end up waiting indefinitely for a reply it will never receive (hence the beach ball).

    You can see this knowledge base article for info on how to collect a sample at the time you see a beachball:

    https://wincent.dev/a/knowledge-base/archives/2004/11/how_to_file_a_g.php

    It's also interesting to know what iTunes is doing at the time of the lock. What is the SystemUIServer doing? (this is the process which Synergy runs "inside of"). What are other applications that might be communicating with iTunes be doing?

    In the past, as Apple makes improvements to its AppleScript handling in iTunes, performance has improved. For example, Synergy used to get starved for updates whenever the visualizer was being shown, but Apple's fixed that. The number of circumstances under which iTunes will block AppleScript communications is getting fewer with time. Times when you'll still see it now include when the info window is being displayed, or when the iTunes Music Store is being accessed.

    One thing I am doing in Synergy Advance is splitting the communications off into a separate process, so the UI should never, ever beachball. But the underlying problem (the breakdown in communication) is still there, then the app still won't be receiving any updates.

  16. PeterH

    Hi Wincent, thanks for your input.

    I agree with pretty much everything you've said. I seriously doubt it's a bug in Synergy, too. I'm still looking out for anything that may be the cause.

    One thing that doesn't seem to agree, at least on my system, is your statement about Synergy running inside SystemUIServer. On my system, the Synergy process is a child of loginwindow - is that what you'd expect?

    The problem I have is that the delay is usually only about 4 or 5 seconds, and that's not enough time, once I've realised that there is a delay, to do any investigation.

    Hopefully something will turn up, given time...

  17. anonymous

    I just did a clean install of Panther on my imac (i was the first one to point out the issue) and Synergy seems to be working perfectly again! 

     i thought it was a problem with Synergy but it is all working great now so i assume it had nothing to do with Synergy and perhaps a conflicting program or something.

    anyways all sorted, and again this is my fav Mac app and i recommend it to everyone

  18. PeterH

    Glad you're back to normal!

    I must find the time to do the same...

  19. Greg Hurrell

    Quote: One thing that doesn't seem to agree, at least on my system, is your statement about Synergy running inside SystemUIServer. On my system, the Synergy process is a child of loginwindow - is that what you'd expect?

    What I actually meant is that the SystemUIServer is responsible for managing the right side of the menu bar where all the menu extras and apps like Synergy go.

  20. PeterH

    OK, I hadn't thought of that. But that may be because I don't have the Synergy buttons enabled in the menu bar. I only use the floater and the keyboard controls. Much quicker to hit Ctrl-Opt-Cmd-Space to Play/Pause than moving the mouse to a button.

Reply

This topic is now closed.

topic index