Gray fill trail when using eraser tool

Boldline

I don't know if it's intentional or not, but when I use the Eraser tool, it leaves a light gray fill in the path of the eraser. It goes away when I grab another tool or when I make another eraser path
I made a video of it. (Love the Recordit app - makes it soo easy to make an example video of what I am seeing and increases the odds I would post on here about it.)
eraser tool gray after-trail (https://recordit.co/TaFMUMmlOn)
On a different note - once I made these erasings into the vector shape, how would I break it apart? I like in a way, that it's still acting like a compound path, so I could move them around together; I also see how using the Shape editor tool, I can adjust the nodes individually of the parts inside the compound path.

b77

@Boldline Yes, the light gray path is intentional. I wouldn't say it's a problem.

You did break the shape apart with 'Break Apart' from the Object menu.

Is it failing to work there, or you want the shape to be automatically broken apart once the Eraser separates any shape from the big one?

VectorStyler

Yes, as explained by @b77 , the eraser tool paints a marker first.

This is a vector eraser, which means that first a new shape is create by painting, this is shown with a gray fill.
Then this shape is excluded from the selected shapes.

If a shape is cut into parts, it still remains a single object, with a combined shape.
The same occurs when the knife tool is used.
This can be separated with the Object -> Break Apart.

Boldline

@b77 @vectoradmin Thanks for the information. That helps a lot. I'm not opposed to the gray marker line in the eraser tool necessarily. It's not what I think of with erasers in other design apps, but I'm open to it being there. What was the benefit of the gray trail line in the dev's eyes? I'm very much interested in the why so I can apply it to my workflow.

I think I like the shape that has erased sections being a compound selection after erasing part of it. I can see benefits to the individual pieces being a compound shape of sorts. The "break apart" worked just fine for me.

VectorStyler

@Boldline The gray marker of the eraser tool shows the area that will be erased after the mouse is released.

The eraser tool uses the same curve smoothing as the pencil tool, and if this smoothness value is set to large, the whole erased paint may change slightly as the mouse is moved. This is indicated by the gray marker.

Erasing occurs only after the mouse is released, and it is all done as a vector operation.
And only the selected objects are affected (that is, the object that were selected when the erase tool was activated).
If no objects were selected, an object is selected (for erasure) when the mouse is pressed.

Other objects are not affected by the erase tool.