Preferences page too large for screen

Hi,

I'm using windows 10 on a Toshiba NB505 notebook with Arduino 1.6.10. Everything seems to be working well except for the File>Preferences page. The Preferences page is too large to fit in the computer screen. I can drag the page to the top of the screen, but the bottom of the page is cut off so that I'm unable to see any OK or update buttons. In an attempt to fix the problem, I uninstalled and reloaded 1.6.10, but still got the same results. I've come across a few other people who've had this problem, so I know it's not unique to me.

Can someone off a solution to the problem?

Thanks,
Anne

You can set any of the preferences on that page and a few more by editing a file:

The location of the file is:

On Mac OS X:
/Users/(username)/Library/Arduino15

On Windows:
Arduino IDE 1.6.5r5 and previous:
C:\Users(username)\AppData\Roaming\Arduino15
Arduino IDE 1.6.6 and later:
C:\Users(username)\AppData\Local\Arduino15

On Linux:
/home/(username)/.arduino15 (a.k.a. ~/.arduino15)

Note that it might be a hidden folder.

  • Close the Arduino IDE
  • Open the file preferences.txt in a text editor
  • Edit the preferences
  • Save the file
  • Open the Arduino IDE

They seem to have added a huge extra space at the bottom of the preferences page some time after Arduino IDE 1.6.5-r5 so you might try that version to see if the preferences page fits on your screen. It's a bit old but was a good version.

Thanks for the response, pert.

I found C:\Users(username)\AppData\Local\Arduino15, but the preferences file opened to a blank page in Notebook. Any other suggestions, other than going back to an earlier version? Seems sort of odd that I haven't come across more people on the web and forums with this problem. Oh well, I'll try 1.6.5r5 and see what happens.

Anne

Yup, it's 650 pixels high. So 800x600 pixel people are screwed.

Made an issue for them to ignore (as there are definitely more pressing matters right now) Preferences screen is 650 pixels high, so people with 800x600 resolution can't click OK · Issue #5292 · arduino/Arduino · GitHub

That's strange the preferences.txt file is blank. Are you using the Arduino IDE in portable mode? This is done by creating a folder named portable inside the Arduino IDE installation folder. If so, the preferences.txt location is {Arduino IDE installation folder}\portable\preferences.txt.

Thanks for reporting the issue DrAzzy! I put it on my list of issues to report but that list is 355 lines long(make that 354!).

DrAzzy, that's sort of a drag about the 650 pixels high! My display is set to 1024 x 600 and I don't believe I can set it any higher. There is a 1.6.11 version now that I might try again, otherwise I'll go back to an earlier version.

pert, I don't know if I'm in portable mode or not - just downloaded the 1.6.10 from the Arduino website and don't recall specifying any options during the download. I'll look around and see what I can find.

Anne

Well, I tried 1.6.11 (hope springs eternal LOL), but same problem, so I went ahead and downloaded 1.6.5-5r as suggested and I can now access the entire Preferences page!!

Thanks very much pert and DrAzzy!
Anne