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Crashing on text edits

• To: mathgroup at yoda.physics.unc.edu
• Subject: Crashing on text edits
• From: mek at guinan.psu.edu (Mark E. Kotanchek)
• Date: Thu, 15 Jul 93 10:37:10 -0400

Hi folks,

One of the nice things about Mathematica is the ability to insert  
text for a running commentary in a notebook during a derivation.  
Alas, while running Mma 2.1 on my NeXTstation, I have just  
encountered a "feature" which caused Mathematica to crash in a most  
ungraceful and abrupt fashion and take along about an hour of work  
with it!

Upon a little investigation, I have determined that selecting text  
**inside** a text block and typing (intending to replace the selected  
text) causes the crash. The notebook in question is actually a  
package which I have converted back-and-forth from a *.ma file to a  
*.m file. (The *.m is so I can call it as a package). 


The symptoms are: If the text is includes the begining or the end of  
the block we don't get the crash. If I double-click a single word, I  
don't get the crash. If I save the file as soon as I open it, I don't  
get the crash. However, if I open the file in Edit and close it  
(without saving), and then open it in Mathematica, select some  
**internal** text and start typing, Mathematica exits stage left. As  
I've played around with this behavior, I see that sometimes it  
doesn't crash--but I haven't figured out the rules. It does seem that  
if I drag the mouse-- which prompts the initialization window then  
I'm guaranteed a crash.

Has anybody else seen this sort of behavior? Is it fixed in Mma 2.2?

Anyhow, I thought I'd give y'all a heads up that writing package  
notebooks (which seem to require a *.m suffix to be accessed via  
"Needs[...") may be a dangerous path.

Mark.

BTW, I had though Mma would just read in a notebook and execute the  
initialization fields so that on a NeXT or a Mac a notebook was  
functionally equivalent to a package. The requirement that the  
notebook have a *.m suffix rather than (the NeXT standard) *.ma means  
that I have to toggle back and forth and, thereby, wander into these  
sorts of problems. Is there an easier work around or am I just doing  
things the hard way?

Thanks.
---
Mark Kotanchek
Guidance & Control Dept - 363 ASB
Applied Research Lab/Penn State
P.O. Box 30
State College, PA 16804

e-mail:	mek at guinan.psu.edu (NeXTmail)
TEL:	(814)863-0682
FAX:	(814)863-7843