Song Scripture or Text Slides Media Control thumbnails are slow to load when there is a lot of text included - Ensure Consistent size

Applicable SongShow Plus Versions: 
This article applies to SongShow Plus 9.x and Later

 * Updates correcting this issue may be available. Ensure that you are using the most current build of SongShow Plus from the Download page before proceeding. *

Symptom:

Slides and slide sets (here the term "slide" is generic and may refer to Song, Scripture or Slide text content) with a large amount of text are slow to load in the Media Control window and may cause SongShow Plus to temporarily stop responding. (1071)

Possible Cause:
NOTE: It is Expected Behavior that there will be some difference in the amount of time it takes to populate the Media Control thumbnails depending on the amount of content that is being displayed.  The resource emphasis is on rendering the projected output before the thumbnails. 

It appears that the Ensure Consistent size text control may cause SSP to stop responding when displaying or generating a large amount of text or text slides.  This setting will scan all existing text slides in the object and adjust the font size on the fly to make sure the screen is filled, no text is clipped and that all the slides have text that is the same size.  There is a large overhead for this when there is a lot of text slides to be scanned. This can be similarly caused by other text treatments such as font size or the presence of other related content groups such as Title, Author, Copyright, etc.

Scriptures are the most common text type that users may encounter this due to the volume of text available but it can occur with Songs and Slide text as well.

Possible Solution:
There are two possible solutions:

• Use the global Slide Properties (Main tool bar > Slide Properties) to adjust various settings and treatments to minimize the overhead when generating the thumbnails.  Some options include:
  • Un-check the Text Style > Size > Ensure Consistent Size option for the relevant object type (i.e. Songs).  While this may address the delay, it may also leave some slides with different font sizes and may not be exactly as desired.  Leaving the "shrink" option selected will still prevent text from being clipped at the edges.
  • Un-check the Text Style > Size option for the relevant object type (i.e. Songs).  This will avoid additional processing but may leave too much "white space" on the slide.
  • Adjust the Text Style > Size > Ensure Consistent Size option for the relevant object type (i.e. Songs).  Changing this from the default size to something closer to the necessary size (around 16 seems to be good for many text blocks) may prevent additional processing. Leaving the "shrink" option selected will still prevent text from being clipped at the edges.
  • Adjust the Text Layout > Build Options > Include options for the relevant object type (i.e. Songs).  Changing these from the defaults to settings that include less information (remove CCLI info and only show details on Title Slide only will eliminate redundant information that will add overhead to thumbnail generation.
• If the desire is to have all the font sizes equal and consistent, the user can manually adjust and verify the font size and position for all of the text slides individually.  This option is more cumbersome and less flexible.  Additional adjustments may be needed if other layout settings are changed. 

If this article does not resolve the issue, contact the Support Team.

(TS371)