Question

I’m facing a problem with exporting files using Button. This piece of simple code just creates some data, namely a list of Graphics that I want to export as an animated .gif.

foo = Graphics /@
Table[{GrayLevel[RandomReal[]], Disk[{i, j}, 0.5]},
{k, 50}, {i, 10}, {j, 10}];

Now exporting foo using Export["foo.gif", foo] works as expected (even though it takes quite a while to do so).

However, when I create a Button, e.g. using Button["Export!", Export["foo.gif", foo]], clicking the button causes Mathematica to freeze for some time. Afterwards, the evaluation seems to have stopped, but nothing was exported.

I want to use the button for exporting a similarly complex list of graphics in a Manipulate environment.

Thanks for your help!

Answer 1

By default, button functions are evaluated on a preemptive link, which times out after 5 seconds

Use Method->"Queued" to evaluate button functions on the main link, which never times out:

Button["Export!", Export["c:\\test.gif", foo], Method -> "Queued"]