I'm going through all of the official Inkscape tutorials and I've had no problem so far - that is, until I got to the Tracing Tutorial: http://inkscape.org/doc/tracing/tutorial-tracing.html. So I've followed all of the steps and I'm getting very odd results. Sometimes I get a tracing, others not. I've searched Google and this forum for awhile, but I'm not finding an answer. So, my issues are:

1) Preview isn't reflecting outcome (that is, when I get any outcome at all - sometimes it gives me a preview, I click ok, and the window remains open - nothing happens)
2) I can't make multiple selections in the Trace Bitmap Box - i.e., I can't choose brightness, edge, color settings all at one time, only one at a time. Then I have to open it again.
3) Once I trace an image and try to trace again, nothing works - Trace Bitmap Box is dead.
4) There is no way to set the Trace Bitmap levels back to their default. The levels always reflect the previous images tracing.

Thanks for any help! I'm starting to feel like this is a bug - too random acting.

1. Make sure you have actually selected the bitmap you are trying to trace.
2. You cannot select more than one mode of tracing at a time.
3. Make sure you have actually selected the bitmap you are trying to trace.
4. I don't know if you can reset to default selections or not.

In addition to llogg's comments:

onewoodenleg2 wrote:1) Preview isn't reflecting outcome (that is, when I get any outcome at all - sometimes it gives me a preview, I click ok, and the window remains open - nothing happens)

The dialog does not close when clicking on 'OK' (it is not a modal dialog). The 'OK' causes the traced paths to be created on-canvas right on top of the traced bitmap image. Depending on your settings, the size of the bitmap and its complexity this can take a while (keep an eye on the messages in the status line of the main window).

To update the preview with the current settings, click on 'Update'. The update of the preview might fail with certain options/bitmaps in the Windows port of Inkscape:

• Bug #631444 in Inkscape: “Trace bitmap preview broken”

onewoodenleg2 wrote:3) Once I trace an image and try to trace again, nothing works - Trace Bitmap Box is dead.

Make sure you have the bitmap image selected (verify the content of the current selection with the message displayed in the status line of the main window).

Depending on what "dead" actually means, it could also be

• Bug #241287 in Inkscape: “Trace bitmap dialog empty on second call”

Personally I haven't experienced this issue with the latest Inkscape versions - I do use the 'Trace Bitmap' dialog docked to the main window though.

onewoodenleg2 wrote:4) There is no way to set the Trace Bitmap levels back to their default. The levels always reflect the previous images tracing.

The settings are remembered during the current session. The next time you launch Inkscape they will be reset to the default values.

For more detailed information about tracing, see also the related chapter in the manual: Inkscape » Tracing Bitmaps

Thanks - I'll try to work with both of your suggestions and see if I have success.