heya!

so in advance i do apologize for the lenghty post, but since i'm not particularly tech literate person please bear with me for a bit

ok so here are the details of the issue i can't properly formulate>

hardware/software/os and work details:

*i ran inkscape 0.48 and now run inkscape 0.48.2 (latest version atm)

*work with files that are not larger than 500kb, mainly linear black&white tracing and filling over 90dpi scans - not more that 3000 nodes per file, but usually around 100

*have core i7 processor, 8gb RAM and nvidia geforce gtx 670m under dreadful win 7 premium (x86) os

problem:

*repeated crashing in vide variety of situations (on start, drawing a line, making a pattern out of objects, on save...) - and i had virtually no problems for the past 5 months of work

*main issue being that when it crashes the inkscape pop-up window that is supposed to inform of the issue is blank and then another Windows pop-up window appears with a text "program not working properly and needs to be shut down" (paraphrasing but it's something equally vague) - and the troubleshooter starts and finds no issues. and when i try to printscreen this particular situation the printscreen does not work, and again it's working perfectly after inkscape is terminated


i tried:

*assuming that it might be c++ runtime error - deleted preferences.xml

*restarting (windows and inkscape), uninstalling and reinstalling about 20 times

*assuming that it's not connected to inkscape but maybe graphics or something (coz the screen just freezes and the pop-up is blank) running number of troubleshooting/antivirus/antispyware software with no results

*running inkscape in all of the troubleshoot compatibility modes

*browsing FAQ and inkscape launchpad site (as well as some other forums) but for the reasons listed above didn't get much out of it

*enabling crash log in preferences.xml but now after all this reinstalling i cannot find this file

*there is a similar problem in the archive but the user is working on large files, whereas i am not doing large complicated design


so can anybody please point me in the right direction? where/how can i approach this problem to see what it is? how do i formulate the issue without knowing to what it is definitely related? what am i missing?

sincerely grateful on any input

Welcome to InkscapeForum!

I don't really have the kind of knowledge to try to troubleshoot this problem. But one thing does come to mind...or 2. First is to try and remember if you installed anything new around the time the problem started. If so, try uninstalling it. And the other is the Windows' System Restore. I know you said you uninstalled and reinstalled, but I wasn't clear if that included Windows. I'm guessing not. And I know system restore is pretty much a last resort. But if it's only been a day or 2 (since the problem started), perhaps you wouldn't lose too much. Or if you have a full system backup, it might be useful.

Also, you mentioned a crash log that you can't find. This might sound silly, but some people might look around here and there, and not find it, and don't even think of actually running a search (with Windows Explorer). It sounds like you probably didn't overlook that, but I mention just in case

Oh, and also, your very last comment about the size of the files. I have seen one case where the person was working with average sized files, but had so many opened at once, they still had memory problems. (Not that I think it's memory problem. It could be, it could not be. It's just that memory issues can be a trigger for a crash -- happens to me a LOT!) Does this problem happen even in you just have one Inkscape file open? Does it happen every time you use Inkscape? Or does it sometimes work properly?

And no worries -- I expect others will post much more helpful comments

heya, hi and thanks ever so much for answering! i do think it is something rather small that i'm overlooking so i am very grateful for any input
at this point i'm fairly certain it's an inkscape thing, not a system or something else thing

so here are the answers

1. no, didn't install anything. and have no spyware installed without my knowledge as well. the thought of win reinstallation or sys restore did cross my mind but i was hoping to avoid going to that dark dark place ) what i did do in the last few days is make some vertical and horizontal linear patterns on 500x500px and 1000x1000px canvas with distance between two lines being 10px - making that 48/96 lines per canvas, that is to say 96/192 nodes. could that be too large for a object to pattern function? it probably is but still i did delete preferences.xml several times so those patterns are no longer saved as such - however they do exist in several other previously made files - can that be related?

2. it's not silly, usually such infuriating problems have super-simple solutions - but, anyways, i did run winE search. and ran it again few times prior to writing this - nope, no preferences.xml file that belongs to inkscape. (there are several adobe ones) - can this be an issue?

3. usually i work in only one and maybe two windows - one being the work file and the other being a file from which i copy stuff like lines or titles or objects (all linear black, no gradients, nothing complicated really - if anyone thinks it's important to be more specific about the work - i'll elaborate and post examples) - so to answer your question, yes it crashes even if i have only one window open and for the past few days it crashes every time i try working in inkscape (even after several reinstallations of Inkscape). sometimes it crashes on start, sometimes after second node in a bezier curve i'm drawing (which is the first part of my work in this case), sometimes after applying a fill and sometimes after i hit "save as" option. so it basically crashes whatever i try to do, every time. and each time there is no inkscape message to tell me what kind of error it is, because if i knew what's the error (like c++ runtime library error or divine intervention or capitalism conspiracy error#501) - there would probably be a way to fix it. or to figure out what i'm doing wrong.

anyways what i'm hoping to accomplish by this topic is not a fix solution (although i truly appreciate any hint) but just a tip how to formulate this problem and contact nice ppl from inkscape issue support forum - and if i ever find an answer i will post it instantly here as well. is it ok to write all of the previously mentioned and just forward it? is there something i should be more specific about?

Nothing that you mentioned sounds like anything I've seen reported in this forum, that could cause this kind of problem.

One point to clarify though, for #2. When I mentioned searching for a file. I didn't mean preferences.xml. Since you deleted it, I wouldn't expect you to be able to find it. But you said something about a enabling crash log in preferences.xml, and the crash log is what I thought you couldn't find. I actually haven't ever heard of a crash log. Is it actually in preferences.xml, or somewhere else? But it certainly would be helpful, or potentially could be, I guess. Having deleted the preferences.xml file, it will remain gone until you use Inkscape again. Then a new one will be created.

Oh, so you could try this. Uninstall Inkscape and delete preferences.xml. Do a fresh download and install. Then open a new blank Inkscape file (not a previously existing file), and try to save a file with just a simple...anything -- circle, rectangle, line, etc. If it doesn't crash, try to save the file. If it does crash, look to see if preferences.xml has been recreated. If it has, look for the crash log. If it hasn't been recreated, that could be a clue. Not that I would know what to do with that clue. But someone else might

I didn't ask this before, because it doesn't fit the other reports I've heard. But the files that are crashing, they aren't files that had previously been saved to a root directory, such as C or a flash drive, are they?

agreed - i haven't found anything similar so i resorted to registering and whining online :]] that happens almost never

ok i'll start from the end - no, files i'm creating and working with are in a completely separate directory, and for that matter, separate partition.

as for crash log - i found somewhere on inskcape wiki that under the option view>messages there should be a crash log report BUT if i remember correctly (and there is a fair chance i am not) that is needs to be enabled in preferences.xml setting an option from 0 to 1 in one of the line commands (if that's a proper term). where and what i cannot say because i can't find the article in 3000 inkscape related history tabs - but it's somewhere around SpecCrashRecovery and Debugging Inskape articles. will try to look it up again.

as for suggestion - i'll try it out first thing tomorrow morning! thanks :]]]

it's alive!

did the reinstallation and deletion - made some wicked squares and circles and even spirals. no crashes. also, did some new tracing files as well as edit old ones. no crashes.

so at this point one has to wonder why and what did i do differently (and am pretty certain that the answer to that one is nothing). what i might presume is that the large patterns i previously made could be the at the root of all these headaches. which kinda doesn't make sense - did delete preferences several times.

as for crash log, no it wasn't inkscape wiki it was inkscape itself - when one goes to view>messages one gets "Enable log display by setting dialogs.debug 'redirect' attribute to 1 in preferences.xml" notification. did that and am now about to try and recreate the conditions that lead to this misfortunate chain of events :]]] if by any chance i stumble upon some meaningful answer will be sure to post it. as for solution guess that repeated reinstallation cures all problems.

thank you so so much! :]]

Good news!
We'll do this for future