Why can't we minimize the editor during heavy operation?

Unity Engine
1

Hi,

Many of us don’t like the time editor sometime take to reload / recompile, that’s one thing.

The other thing I don’t like is the fact that during these loading times, we can’t minimize the editor, to access our desktop (talking about windows, idk for Mac/Linux). This is also true for all in editor heavy operation such as building the game, building navmesh, import textures…

Is there a technical reason why we can’t minimize the editor and let it run in the background during long “Hold on” time?
I already know the shortcuts to access other apps while waiting, but having the editor blocking a screen is anoying for multiple reasons.
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(Edited the post to avoid some misunderstanding)

2

Because this behaviour is built into the OS? It would also be annoying AF if the editor minimized every time it does something for a few seconds.

Press Win+D to access your desktop, and press it again to go back to the previous state. :wink:

3

Alt-Tab never stopped existing.

4

I’m talking of a user input on the minimize window button.

Thank for the tip, but it doesn’t work on my computer (other apps don’t minimize too, so maybe my company disabled this shortcut).

5

I always do this, but your desktop icons arn’t accessible because Unity still hide them.

6

Man, who has shortcuts on their desktop in 2024? Windows is so good at searching for stuff, I just slap the Windows button and search up what I need. Can leave my desktop completely bare (save for some cool art spread across two screens).

Regardless, use Win+E to open explorer, and you can access the folder for your desktop from there. But that’s so Windows XP.

1 Like
7

To answer the actual question: the Editor wasn’t designed for it. The “single thread” that drives all the execution of all the C# code in your scripts and editor tools is the SAME single thread that the OS is trying to communicate with about clicks, window painting, and other app-level concerns. So if the C# code is rockin’, the OS can’t come a-knockin’.

It should have been designed with a working thread and a service thread, but the time to architect that into the app was about twenty years ago, and would be nigh impossible to refactor it in now.

2 Likes
8

Wait, my heavy export just finished, and the Win+D I did 50 minutes ago executed right now!
So your tip doesn’t work (Windows 10), and Unity also prevent the other windows to be minimized with the shortcut!

9

To stay on the actual question, thanks halley, that is what I imagined.

Question for Unity’s dev: is it something you are looking to change in the future?

10

This isn’t what you want to hear but I just got a second build machine and I push / pull code over to it (git source control FTW) when it is time to build my app… otherwise I just work in the Unity editor without building.

If you’re doing your own long-running thing there is an Editor Coroutines package you can do that keeps your editor nice and responsive while you’re doing long-timeframe tasks.

1 Like