gSender Edge - 1.5.0-Edge-8 - All New UI!

[gwilki]

@chrismakesstuff OK, I just ran most of the shortcuts. To remind you, I am running a Mk1 with the SLB connected via ethernet.
Connection was good. GUI worked fine.

1. all the “zero” and “got to zero” shortcuts worked. Note that the heading for Go XY needs to be fixed.
2. Jog X and Y in both directions does not work. The movement starts with a series of jerky movements,then it runs smoothly. However, releasing the keys does not stop the jog. It continues until the gantry hits the stops or the GUI Stop button is clicked.
3. There are no Jog Z shortcuts.
4. Pressing shift+1 to jog A+ does not jog. It puts the machine into Hold.
5. Pressing shift+2 to jog A- does nothing at all.
6. All the speed shortcuts work.
7. Load and unload job work.
8. Start, Pause, Stop and Outline do nothing.
9. All the F key commands to open pages work.

That’s as far as I got. I didn’t test the others yet.

[chrismakesstuff]

That’s great progress so far, thanks Grant!

[Mattydboom]

Everything seems to be really coming together in Edge 5 . Tested on my machine last night as thoroughly as possible… all is working for me with exception of the Tool change ‘helper’ dialog. I mentioned this previously as was not working correctly in Edge 3 & 4 and is still having the same issue… that is:

I have ‘Fixed Tool Setter’ selected in the Tool Changing settings, which always has (and continues to) work in 1.4.12 just fine. But in the Edge versions, after the job has started, it just pauses at 0% & nothing more happens (as if wating for the dialogue to appear - see screen shot below). I can click the Start button again at this point and the carve will continue, but this is effectively just skipping the Tool change. Also doesn’t seem possible to cancel the job at this stage (stop button greyed out) so everything just hangs and I have to reset/rehome etc.

[spcnc]

Would you consider adding a (small) row of buttons to the interface that we could choose which shortcuts/macros to assign to them? Same thought as the three buttons on the emergency stop pendant but now on the screen for us without the altmill. Could save milliseconds from having to switch back to the macros tab or keyboard if the action was already linked to a button always accessible on the main screen. Thanks for considering.

[JohnOCFII]

I did miss one font/spacing issue in the firmware description area. Screenshot attached.

[gwilki]

@chrismakesstuff OK, I just finished looking at the remaining shortcuts.

1. I locked the machine with the etop. Unlocked the estop. GUI showed locked. Shortcut $ did nothing to unlock it.
2. I’m not sure what a soft reset is, but % appears to do nothing.
3. The cut, copy, paste and undo shortcuts are the same as the standard windows shortcuts. I didn’t test them in gSender as it was not clear to me what I was supposed to be working with. Meaning, how does one select something in gSender on which to perform these action?
4. I don’t know what the shortcut key for toggle shortcuts is.
5. Realtime report does nothing.
6. Clear errors does nothing.
7. Acknowledge tool change is irrelevant for my setup.
8. I don’t understand what toggle virtual stop means.
9. Switch workspace mode seems to do something, but I’m not sure when or why I would ever use it.
10. As I reported previously, the shortcuts for selecting speed modes work well. However, even though the screen display changes from mode to mode, the actual jogging speed does not. So, with precise selected and the jog rate of precise showing on screen, the machine actually moves at the same speed as when selecting normal or rapid. FWIW, this makes using Edge5 a non-starter for me, since, when trying to slowly lower the bit to get it close to touch plate, I use precise mode. However, in Edge5, there really is no precise mode.

[JdotPo]

I like the new design! I spent some time clicking around but haven’t run any jobs yet, will post if I find any issues doing so.

Longmill MkII 48x30 with USB SLB connection and Closed Loop Stepper Vortex plugged in

Issues seen in 1.5.0-Edge-5:

• Config > Spindle/Laser, Advanced Motors, More Settings heading highlights
  • Right side menus change but heading highlights do not go to selection
  • Highlighting animation stops prior to actual selection, depending on direction
    • On Probe > click Spindle, highlighting stops on Homing Limits
    • On Automation > click Spindle, highlighting stops on Jogging
• gSender does not reconnect automatically on startup if SLB is already powered up
• Vortex is attached, have not tried disconnected yet:
  • “Rotary” tab was already enabled, disable does not hide tab
  • “New” tab is a duplicate of “Rotary”
• “Spindle” tab was correctly hidden by default, but subsequent disabling does not hide
• Rotary GCode visualization looks different/minimal vs. gSender standard release
  
  
  
  
  

Not sure if this is the right place to put a wish list, but…

• A disable option for Coolant tab
• A way to customize the order of tabs
• Ability to swap the Zero and Go columns on the DRO
  • This would better align the Go buttons with the Jog UI (at least for me)
• A confirmation prompt for the Vortex Y Alignment/Z Probe
  • Yes, you can’t 100% verify a person puts the magnet on the bit/collet, but at least they touched the probe leads and probably plugged in the banana clip and touched the magnet to the chuck. I admit to spacing out and clicking one of the buttons expecting a prompt and needed to hit the E-Stop

I might have missed an option covering one of the above items so please let me know if that’s the case and I’ll update.

I appreciate the hard work and look forward to what’s next.

[KGN]

Thanks for the feedback everyone, we’re continuing to turn it all into actionable tickets and will continue to address them in the next release.

As a morsel, here’s a preview of a few upcoming features:

Darkmode (WiP):

Update prompt now has patchnotes for the next version before you update:

You can configure a park location to move your router to consistently at the click of a button:

Big focus is going to be on shortcuts and jogging behaviour, but we have a large number of fixes that should be in the next release as well.

[Jens]

Parking position is a nice touch!

[webbit_NJ]

Hello again,

Seeing so much great feedback, tests results and upcoming stuff in this thread had me going back to Edge 1.5.1 EDGE 5 this morning for an additional overview.

I noticed the “Quick load” buttons (Not sure of the actual Trademark name) …

Do actually load the job, but the visualizer is not updated with the file design.

Also, I did not see any feedback on my question about “Test Run” Button (Where is it or is it now integrated into the loading process) and where is the “Outline” Button? (Or is it me being blind again)

[chrismakesstuff]

@webbit_NJ you can see the outline button above the play/pause/stop buttons once a file is loaded (you can see this in the picture on the post above gSender Edge - 1.5.0-Edge-5 - All New UI! - #53 by JdotPo)

Regarding the check mode, we’re still trying to decide how we want to handle it. From our understanding most people don’t use it, so we might turn it into a setting you can turn on that automatically checks the file on load or something like that. How often do you tend to find yourself using it?

[chrismakesstuff]

We’ve now got buttons in Edge 5 that allow for zooming in and out you’ll see them in the visualizer. Orbit is still good to go with one finger, and panning works with 2

[Mattydboom]

Dark mode, and park button… you really do know how to spoil us! Exciting…thank you!

[JdotPo]

Forgot to mention in my previous post that I’m running the AutoSquaring FW, so that could be a factor…

A couple more things I ran in to this morning:

• Connecting over USB went into grbl. Disconnecting and reconnecting went into grblHAL, but I think that may have automatically swapped my A and Y axis settings as I had to go in and fix the values. (Possibly due to 4-Axis vs Rotary?)
  • I eventually enabled Ethernet to avoid any issues, but still doesn’t auto-connect
• Single click jogging is fine at any speed setting, but press & hold seems to move at Rapid - even on Precise. Quite a surprise when trying to fine tune the bit for Z-Probe on the Vortex!
  • That may be what gwilki was seeing and KGN was referring to as being a focus
• Searching in Config immediately locks up the whole application once you start typing in the box, forcing a quit and restart.

Running a rotary job had no issues. If I get a chance/reason, I’ll try a normal carve.

[webbit_NJ]

Hello!
Thanks for the “Outline” Button location! Indeed, i think i was looking when i had no file loaded.
A long time ago, with old Gsender versions, i had a few project cut mid-jog with a “toast” telling me a G-Code line was no good. It was weird because when i would re-use this G-Code file, the line(s) were no longer trowing errors. So since GSender has offerred the “Test RUN” button, i would always do it (for 1st run of the file) manually. Since then it never found anything, but most of the job i do are not that complex, the Check is less than a minute, so i “Test RUN” when i am getting the CNC Bed ready, so i do no waste time. So in my view i prefer a “on-demand” button instead of an automated (but configurable is always nice)

[DocRM]

Running Edge 5 - when I press and hold the x,y, or z jog button the continous move is using the RAPID speeds, regaredless of what speed I have selected. This is especially jarring when moving the z axis. I can see broken bits in the future.

[Doylee]

Firstly I’d like to say great job, the new look and functionality looks fantastic.
I’ve read through the bugs that others have posted and tested on my setup.
I homed the unit, loaded a small profile cutout job, secured my material and set XYZ, hit the outline button…obviously the safe Z clearance was set too high, and and triggered a hard limit, no error was reported and no unlock button was available, console commands were not non responsive as well. My test ended with ALT F4. (Windows-64Bit)
I see a few people posting about the jog speed, the buttons do actually work but only for jogging, momentary pressing will allow precise, normal & rapid increments, continuous pressing will result in rapid movement only.
A function that I would like to see added, is to be able to pause the current job, move the tool head away and then to be able to resume the job. I have had components come loose and paused the batch job to try and free the precarious part, but have been unable to do so without destroying the part or moving the tool head (using a down-cut to pack sawdust can really save some time cleaning up tabs)
I have had issues with Gamepad analog joysticks, not recognizing Y axis but it’s a generic device and trivial to the overall functionality of the software.
Surfacing label for Spindle RPM" shows “Cut Depth & Max”, “Feedrate” & “Stepover” are missing labels as well.
Many thanks to the team at Sienci.

[FBWoodcraft]

I was excited to try Edge 5, and was able to run a test toolpath.
I’m using an SLB with gControl panel and the jog controls are good.
I’m not sure why, by Jog speed isn’t controllable, regardless of jog speed selection it runs at Max rate making it hard to set X/Y 0 positions. The jog speed buttons do change the displayed rates but it doesn’t change movement speed when jogging.

I haven’t seen any others mention this, but I would love to see the work space selection to be changed from a drop down list to a Radio button control across the top of the display screen. Even though I’ve been training myself to check the current WS setting before starting a run, sometimes it’s missed and has gone back to G54 which more often than not crashes and/or ruins a work piece. Also, it would be nice to be able to change the G54-G59 text to help remember what work space I set them for, i.e.: G54 - Home, G55- Primary WS, G56- Mortise/Tenon, G57- , G58-, G59.

I’d love to play with it some more, but until the jog speed issue mentioned above has been corrected, it’s hard to use safely.

[Cmcustom]

Just installed this version. Surface tool has several unnamed boxes, does not change to inches from mm even when selected in configuration settings. Configuration summary does not display correct information, none of it is correct. How can I transfer my job stats from my previous version of edge? This does not port over automatically. These issues, especially the surfacing tool issues is gonna keep me from using this version, which sucks cause I have been looking forward to this version. if anyone has any fixes, please let me know, otherwise I guess I am going back to the older version..

[KGN]

Hey folks, we’re back again with another Edge release.

We’re pretty happy with the pace we’ve made over the past 2 weeks in terms of feature completeness and starting to focus on reported issues and in-person testing. It’s very likely that future builds will largely be focused on fixing any behaviour problems and fine tuning the look and feel.

As always, there’s a large number of new features and fixes in this version so we’ll start with some highlights and dive into it.

Warning: There may be flash bangs ahead

Park Mode

We’ve added a new functionality for machines with limit switches and homing enabled called Park. This function lets you configure a set location, and pressing the new UI button will safely move the router to that location. There’s a number of possible use cases (for example, setting the location close to the front for bit changes or near the back to move the router out of the way to clear your workpiece) and we’re hoping it’s a nice convenience for most users.

You can find the functionality on the main UI near the rapid position buttons if you have homing enabled. The behaviour is to move just below Z max height, move to the configured X and Y, and then finally move down to the configured Z location.

The park location itself is set in Config (Basics → Park Location) and has convenient buttons to both grab the current location and go to the set location to verify it’s accuracy.

Dark Mode

Let there be light dark!

Long asked for, we’ve added Dark mode to the gSender UI.

You can toggle it on with the click of a switch in Config (Customize UI → Enabled Dark Mode).

While there’s still a number of readability tweaks we’re planning to make, we’re very happy with the look and feel of this and hope it becomes a popular addition to the software.

Shortcuts

A large effort was undertaken by a couple members of the team to both verify parity of shortcuts between main and Edge and verify they are working as expected. We’re reasonably certain we’ve added in all the missing shortcut functionalities and fixed some broken/different behaviours (such as continuous jogging).

Settings Import in Config should let you import your old configuration from main gSender for testing (this was also true in the last build, but there was a bit of a miscommunication between team members - oopsies).

Gamepad default profiles have also returned, and editing gamepad shortcuts should be more functional in this build.

Lightweight mode alterations

Lightweight mode behaviour has been updated. Rather than individual toggles, we’ve added presets which govern behaviour. Everything is the default behaviour, with full animations and visualization. Lighter swaps out for the SVG visualizer. Off turns the visualizer off.

Lightweight mode is toggled using the feather icon location on the Visualizer.

gSender Update - more info available

We’ve made some tweaks to how gSender informs the user when an update is available. On top of our beautiful bouncing boy on the logo informing you when a new version is available, clicking that now takes you to the about page, which now includes Patch notes from the new version so you can check what’s changing before you update.

On top of that, we’ve added a percentage indicator when downloading so you know how long you have left.

Everything else

• Macros running state and animation returned. Editing and adding macros should behave the same, closing the modal.
• Added numerous missing config options
• Updated some config behaviour to hide options based on other selections
• Added Default Firmware, which is used as the fallback controller option in cases where connection cannot determine which firmware it is connecting to.
• Numerous jogging behaviour and jogging area look/feel changes.
• Jog values again editable
• Added missing jog config feedrate options.
• CW, CCW for spindle commands have been renamed to For and Rev in several places for consistency with most VFD labelling.
• Consistent look/feel on units in Config area.
• Stats tool - numerous look/feel changes and functionality fixes for maintenance tasks
• Various look/feel changes across UI
• Numerous other bug fixes.

Download

gSender Edge can be found on Github.

Release v1.5.0-Edge-6 · Sienci-Labs/gsender