How do you clear a document's history?

[PhotoJoseph]

I love the "save history with document" feature. But it certainly can balloon a file's size. How do you clear it? Just turn it off and back on? Or is there a more direct way?

[IanSG]

Under the NTFS file system, switching the save history off and then saving the file works. I'd expect other file systems to be the same, but I've been wrong before!  I don't believe there's any way of doing it "directly" (switching it off strikes me as being pretty direct ).

[R C-R]

17 hours ago, PhotoJoseph said:

How do you clear it? Just turn it off and back on?

Just turn it off & save the document. That removes any saved history from it. If you turn it back on after opening the file again, only the history steps recorded afterwards will be saved.

 

IOW, whenever you save the document, the save or don't save history setting in effect at that time will be applied to the file.

[PhotoJoseph]

Got it, thank you!

[PhotoJoseph]

3 hours ago, IanSG said:

 (switching it off strikes me as being pretty direct ).

Fair enough. I specific command "clear document history" would be welcome though, as that's explicit and not a workaround. And fewer steps. But yes, this works too!

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, PhotoJoseph said:

Fair enough. I specific command "clear document history" would be welcome though, as that's explicit and not a workaround. And fewer steps. But yes, this works too!

The history is saved in the document file only if & when "Save history with document" is enabled on the File menu. That menu item is not a workaround; in effect it is the specific command for this.

 

That is because unless you save the document with it enabled the history is not saved as a part of the document file -- it only exists in memory & uses no file space. So there is no point in a "clear document history" command. It would not do anything the existing menu item does not already do, other than to defeat the purpose of the History panel by deleting from memory the data that feature must access to function. 

[Alex W]

Clear history would still be really nice though, as it would allow clearing the history from memory whilst working on a doc to help performance.

[Jowday]

7 minutes ago, Alex W said:

Clear history would still be really nice though, as it would allow clearing the history from memory whilst working on a doc to help performance.

It is very useful in Photoshop - after gigantic operations you KNOW you wont need to undo. 

It is there in Photoshop for a purpose. Affinity doesn't use scratch disks so I don't know exactly how much purge history would benefit performance.  

Purge memory

You can improve system performance by freeing up unused memory and scratch disk space from Photoshop to make it available to other programs. To do so, choose one of these options:

• Edit > Purge > All
• Edit > Purge > Undo
• Hold down Option (macOS) or Alt (Windows) and choose About Photoshop

If other programs are actively trying to allocate or use the memory, freeing up memory in Photoshop will improve performance. Freeing up scratch disk space will be beneficial if you're out of space on a disk volume. If you free up significant memory or disk space, Photoshop will be slower the next time you open large files, while Photoshop allocates space.

If you want Photoshop to always use less memory, choose Edit > Preferences > Performance (Windows) or Photoshop > Preferences > Performance (macOS) and move the Memory Usage slider to the left.

[Graphic74]

Any news about clear history without close/open the file?