First time subsurace usage surprises

[Lutz Vieweg]

Hi,

first of all thanks to all who contributed to subsurface - looks like I 
can finally get rid of SDM for good!

Just a few observations from my first use that I stumbled upon:

subsurface does not seem to have a "default" file where it stores dive 
data. I wonder how many people actually favour to manually open and save 
their dive data file upon every start / ending of the program.
(I will certainly apply a local patch for me to use a default data file 
name that is automatically opened / saved on start / exit.)

When saving data, subsurface did not suggest a certain file extension, 
so I used none. Next time I started subsurface and tried to open the 
file, I wondered why it wasn't displayed in the file browser. I actually 
had to look into the source code to find that ".xml" was one of the few 
opt-in filenames mandated by subsurface.

I miss a feature to change attributes of several dive logs at the same 
time. E.g., assigning a certain tank size or such is tedious if you have 
to do it individually for a hundred dives. I guess I'll rather 
work-around using my favourite text editor to manipulate the .xml file 
than clicking through all these dives... ;-)
The GUI looks a little like it could already support such a feature, as 
one can select multiple dives from the list - but any changes applied in 
the dialogs are applied to only one dive.

While reading data from my D9 I got some "failed to receive the answer" 
messages. From looking at the mailing list archive, I understand this 
phenomenon is not really understood as of today. I'll do my best trying 
to figure out what it's about. My knowledge of serial communication 
lines, though, is from the time when "kermit" was a new protocol, so I 
wonder whether this knowledge is still applicable in the USB-3.0 era.
(And actually, USB drivers of all kinds are amongst the least stable 
drivers I have ever experienced under any OS... *shudder*... ;-)

The print-feature looks really good - but I miss a feature to print a 
much more simplistic one-line-per-dive list that I would like to carry 
in my luggage (I don't want to waste precious air luggage weight by 
printing a thick book of details on all my dives... :-)
But I guess such a list I can easily derive such a list from the .xml 
file, using some more or less primitive script and a2ps / TeX or alike.

Regards,

Lutz Vieweg