I’m using the portable apps versions of RT. Different versions are used depending on whether the computer is 32bit or 64bit. I think Version 5.0… (RT50) is the last 32bit version and Version 5.3… (RT53) is what I now have for 64bit.
I’m pretty new to both RT and raw image editing and still trying to understand profiles. When I start RT50 and select a raw file that has never been processed by RT (i.e., there is no associated .pp3 file) the editor indicates that the applicable profile being used is the “Default” profile. This makes some sense even though I’m still trying to figure out how profiles work and what “Default” does. However, when I do the same thing using RT53 (i.e., raw file never processed by any version of RT and there is no associated .pp3 file) it indicates that the applicable profile is the “Last Saved” profile. Since I never did anything to save a profile this doesn’t make much sense even though I am having a hard time figuring out what causes the initial associated .pp3 file (i.e. profile) to be created.
Even though I don’t know much about them I noticed that these profiles are text files and therefore could be compared to each other. Here is a link which shows the differences in the case of the above described experiment.
Therefore I ask, why does the initial profile say “Last Saved”?
This also causes me to speculate that I could have problems switching back and forth between RT50 & RT53. What about that?
to summarise: the last saved thing is just a (minor?) glitch, the default profile is being applied. you can control what this profile does, please see rawpedia for that.
regarding switching between different versions, RT tries to maintain backward compatibility, so you can open a profile generated with version 5.0 in 5.3 just fine, but there’s no guarantee that the opposite is true…
It looks like instead of saying “Here is a link which shows …” I should have said “Here is a link to a file which shows …”. The point being you need to download that file to your own system which can then be opened in a browser to display the intended report.
I’m not sure who might find the report interesting but it looks to me like it is the definitive statement about what was done in a particular editing session. In that compare previous profile to new profile. However, to be useful it becomes necessary to have reference documentation that describes each of the keywords used in these profiles. Does such reference material exist?
I hadn’t thought to much about this prior to now but based on some further investigation I’m thinking that the processing done on any particular image needs to be done with the same version of RT. Insofar as RT, as is normal with software in general, will always be changing the way it works this adds a consideration to workflow that hadn’t yet occurred to me. In that keeping track of what software was used in the development of a specific image needs to be readily apparent.
Also, it looks like there is a significant problem with the way Portable Apps has packaged RT. I posted my concern to their forum and would welcome validation by anyone more knowledgeable than myself. However, this causes me to ask "what would I need to do to make the version distributed by RT portable? I’d like to have both a 32bit version (e.g., RT50) and 64bit version (e.g., RT53) but I want to choose which one I’m using rather than have that done by the Portable Apps Platform based on the computer architecture.
@ajax I won’t create an account on Portable App, so I’ll answer here.
For a given version, RT produce the same output image, would it use the 32 bit or 64 bits version. However, as you noticed, the output might be different between RT’s versions. That’s why it is highly recommended to keep your previous install if you want to edit your work again. The pp3 files can also evolve from version to version, so going back to a previous version may lead to discard some parameters introduced by new versions, but this is common to all software’s evolution. The difference is that we’re not guaranteeing backward compatibility when it comes to output rendering. This would require too much coding effort and would not allow us to refine our algorithm. I don’t know if this is clearly stated in Rawpedia, but it should.
I guess you’ll have to find someone that can build a 32 bit version for you (@Morgan_Hardwood correct me if I’m wrong, but it is still possible !?), or build it yourself.
For the portable versions, you can create your own portable install yourself (RT has all the mechanism to do that), but using Portable Apps make things probably easier.
I have now determined that RT ?appears? to be inherently portable. I did install it on an old system and was able to copy the files to a thumb drive and it seems to run fine on my 64bit computer. While I really like portable apps and would love for them to make their distribution such that both versions are available, there are other packages that they don’t offer but my own portable versions appear to be working. Things like ExifTool and XnViewMP even though the older version called XnView is a portable app. Interestingly, I think the “MP” stands for multi-platform which means the author is certainly seeking portability. I’m expecting that XnViewMP will eventually become a portable app. Maybe they are debating whether or not it should be thought of as an upgrade for XnView?
Support for 32-bit builds of RawTherapee on x86 has been officially dropped… kinda sorta. It still compiles (at least in Linux), it still runs, but its not tested properly meaning things might not work correctly or might crash, and it still has the memory limitations which come with 32-bit OSes and hardware.
I do get the rationale for abandoning 32bit support. I am also working on migration to 64bit. I also use GIMP which hasn’t quite gotten to 64bit. I am also anxious for that to happen.
Just checked! The current stable release is 2.8 which I’ve been using on my 32bit computer. They’ve been working on 2.10 for quite a long while now but it is supposed to be close. The current development versions (2.9) are only available in 64bit.