I noticed that the beta does not produce file output "on the fly" anymore. So
until POV-ray has finished successfully, I have only the preview window for
accessing the image data.

I see that as a major drawback, because I can't use the preview window on my
Linux machine in any sensible way (X-Window server running on different
machine, crashing the POV-ray task when I close the X session unless I disable
preview).

With on-the-fly output as performed by POV 3.6, I still could have a look at the
output file to see how the render was progressing, whether everything was fine
so far etc. And if something went utterly wrong and the 48-hour render got
terminated prematurely, I could still "scavenge" the output created until then.

Technically it should be possible to re-enable it; I am aware that the
block-oriented rendering prohibits straightforward progressive output, but at
least whenever all the blocks of a "block row" have been rendered it should be
possible to write the corresponding data to file.


Alternatively: I guess that the POV-ray 3.7 status files include the image data
collected so far. If it was possible to "peep" into the status file of a
running (or aborted) render, that would be a great thing.

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