# Processing 4.5 beta is out!
**URL:** https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637
**Category:** Processing
**Created:** [December 19, 2025, 4:23pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637 "2025-12-19T16:23:10Z")
**Posts on this page:** 17
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@ProcessingOrg](https://discourse.processing.org/u/ProcessingOrg)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2025, 4:23pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/1 "2025-12-19T16:23:10Z")
The new Processing beta is out, right in time for your holiday sketching needs! It includes a brand new design for the Preferences and Welcome screens, plus a set of bug fixes (see the [release notes](https://github.com/processing/processing4/releases/tag/processing-1311-4.5.0) for details).
Download Processing 4.5 by selecting the beta on the [download page](https://processing.org/download). If you run into any issues, come by the [Processing Community Discord](http://discord.processing.org/) and let us know 💙
_Note: this release builds on a lot of behind-the-scenes work from the past two years. If you want more context, you can watch_ [this talk](https://media.ccc.de/v/lgm25-upstream-2025-83647-the-state-of-processing-how-we-re-bringing-a-creative-coding-icon-back-to-life) _from Libre Graphics Meeting 2025 or listen to_ [this interview](https://timrodenbroeker.de/the-future-of-processing-with-raphael-and-stef/) _on Tim Rodenbroeker’s podcast._
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### Author:  [@ProcessingOrg](https://discourse.processing.org/u/ProcessingOrg)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2025, 4:24pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/4 "2025-12-19T16:24:08Z")
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### Author:  [@ProcessingOrg](https://discourse.processing.org/u/ProcessingOrg)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2025, 4:24pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/5 "2025-12-19T16:24:39Z")
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### Author:  [@sterretje](https://discourse.processing.org/u/sterretje)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 6:12am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/6 "2025-12-23T06:12:55Z")
Some comments / observations
**Preferences**
1. No scrollbar
2. No “OK” button (possibly not a train smash if it works as expected)
**Preferences Appearance**
Can’t set dark mode.
1. No confirm message.
2. Enabled complex text input; prompts me to save so confirm.
3. Disable complex text input and confirm.
4. Close preferences
5. No dark theme.
**Preferences Advanced**
1. show experimental settings
2. can’t move through fields using tab key so not all fields are accessible
3. tab key inserts characters in field
4. So one can never get to the last fields.
===
This might be user error; please enlighten me.
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### Author:  [@stefterv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/stefterv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 6:37am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/7 "2025-12-23T06:37:46Z")
Hi @sterretje!
Thank you for the observations, the appearance bug was also observed before and a fix is in the works.
The tabbing issue is new to me and I will have a look!
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### Author:  [@stefterv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/stefterv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 7:17am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/8 "2025-12-23T07:17:37Z")
>
>
> Context:
> https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/6…
>
> Changes textfields to single lines so they don't capture the tab-indexing
Created a fix for the tabbing issue, thank you!
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### Author:  [@glv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/glv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 3:47pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/9 "2025-12-23T15:47:31Z")
Season’s Greetings!
Thanks for all the work from the Processing team!
My OS is Windows 10.
The scroll bar (right side) in the _opening window_ is working as expected.
The scroll bar (right side) in _Preferences_ is not behaving as expected:
- scroll bar resizes as I move from top to bottom.
- the mouse focus is lost (not on bar) as I scroll up and down.
- does not contrast well in _system mode_; a bit darker if possible.
I can’t see the scroll bar in _dark mode_!
Scrollbar at top:
Scrollbar at bottom:
The Preferences header:
- It is overlaying the content as I scroll down. Is this affecting scrollbar behavior?
- Takes up a lot of real estate. The large space on top could certainly be smaller.
`:)`
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### Author:  [@sterretje](https://discourse.processing.org/u/sterretje)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 4:25pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/10 "2025-12-23T16:25:36Z")
> [@glv](#):
>
> The scroll bar (right side) in the _opening window_ is working as expected.
You have a scrollbar 🫤
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### Author:  [@stefterv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/stefterv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 4:48pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/11 "2025-12-23T16:48:42Z")
In the dark mode the scrollbar is the same colour as the background 😅
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### Author:  [@stefterv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/stefterv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 4:50pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/12 "2025-12-23T16:50:12Z")
What is your Windows scaling set to? Everything seems quite zoomed in, especially if you compare it to the original screenshot
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### Author:  [@sterretje](https://discourse.processing.org/u/sterretje)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 7:01pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/13 "2025-12-23T19:01:59Z")
I’m not using dark mode (as far as I know). From the day I installed 4.5.0 the preferences screen was dark.
In 4.4.10 the preferences screen is white.
But the PDE editor itself is light in both.
Might be a windows setting, I know I fiddled with that last year.
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### Author:  [@glv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/glv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 10:24pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/14 "2025-12-23T22:24:01Z")
> [@stefterv](#):
>
> What is your Windows scaling set to?
With scaling at 100% :
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### Author:  [@glv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/glv)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2025, 10:33pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/15 "2025-12-23T22:33:29Z")
Hello,
I get this in the console when I open preferences:
This was available before and I found it useful to quickly open the _preferences.txt_ when required (rarely):
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### Author:  [@Aigars](https://discourse.processing.org/u/Aigars)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2025, 9:30am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/16 "2025-12-24T09:30:32Z")
Hi.Words in Russian are not displayed correctly
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### Author:  [@stefterv](https://discourse.processing.org/u/stefterv)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2025, 3:28pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/17 "2025-12-24T15:28:30Z")
Thanks! [Refactor locale resource loading logic by Stefterv · Pull Request #1364 · processing/processing4 · GitHub](https://github.com/processing/processing4/pull/1364) I already opened a PR to fix that one
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### Author:  [@sableraph](https://discourse.processing.org/u/sableraph)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2025, 4:20pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/19 "2025-12-24T16:20:31Z")
Hi @glv, the settings from `preferences.txt` are now directly editable in the “Advanced” tab in Preferences.
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### Author:  [@ProcessingOrg](https://discourse.processing.org/u/ProcessingOrg)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 9:45am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/processing-4-5-beta-is-out/47637/20 "2026-01-09T09:45:49Z")