Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Matt]

Hi all,

I've gotten a couple reports of corrupted tabs via email.  The user starts the program and the tabs have changed.

I haven't been able to reproduce yet.  I open a pile of tabs, restart, and they just come back.

I'm wondering if some certain tab causes the problem?  Or something else?

Thanks for any clues.

[marko]

I'm only seeing this if the server is started first, without the UI. Then launch MC, either via the tray icon or pinned task bar icon...

Yesterday, this was crashing reliably
Today, it's not crashing, but reliably giving me messed up tabs each time.

Tomorrow it'll probably be all fine <shrug>

[Matt]

I opened 10 tabs, took a screenshot, relaunched, and they all came back the same.

[marko]

What happens with all those tabs if you start server only, then launch the GUI?

[Matt]

What happens with all those tabs if you start server only, then launch the GUI?

That also worked.

[leezer3]

Calculated field / view caching somewhere perhaps?

If multiple tabs are involved, this sounds like the users in question have complex tabs / view setups, and you might want to look a little deeper than just opening 10 tabs.

Another random thought based upon recent changes- is a playing now tab involved- try testing with both flipped / normal?

[marko]

I have a view here named D5000 - No People. If it matters, it's the first tab. The view has not changed in about fourteen years. It's a child view of Images. Since I created it, MC has never remembered that it was the last selected view under images. This morning, I renamed it to simply D5000 and the tab corruption stopped.

The jvi file for the view is here: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AufyzMZmgCYJmPJ_CwzhTTUSfxJXUA

I ran out of time, but after this, MC was crashing when choosing close MC + server from the tray icon. I'll test more tonight. Maybe there's a clue there?

[HPBEME]

It only happens maybe 1 out of 20 times when I start MC, but attached is a screenshot of tab corruption I recently saw.  I typically have 7 or 8 tabs open all the time, and when the tag corruption happens it's always opens with less than that - sometimes with only three tabs. On some occasions, the tabs get jumbled on top of each other (see pic).

That said, I do use a Segoe "headphone" character to designate my headphone zone (which I've been using for around a year). If that were the cause though, I wonder why it doesn't happen every time?  I definitely cannot reproduce this error at will, and doing what Marko suggested in his post didn't result in any tab corruption for me.

The only thing I can think of that might be similar when it happens, is I haven't used MC for several days? At least I think that's normally the case.

[markf2748]

I have seen corrupted tab behavior very similar to what @HPBEME reports in previous post:  one tab title overwritten (approximately the third tab) and displaying significantly fewer than my normal 10 tabs.  It happened only once so far and I have no idea what caused it.  Restoring tabs from View > Load /Save View menu fixed it.

Most tabs are locked and use a custom-located dot for their lock symbol.  First two tabs are a horiz Player and a vertical Player.  About half my views use List Style > Thumbnails for the Content Panel with nearly the same 3-line formatted thumbnail text which invokes a few fields.

BTW, I am baffled by what it means to "Close the Server" in the taskbar's tray icon menu for MC.  If I select that, then the MC tray icon disappears, but my CCA DLNA renderers remain under Playing Now and Tree > Services & Plugins > Media Network still shows 5 servers running.  In another test earlier today, the tray icon disappeared, the CCA DNLA renderers disappeared from PN, while the 5 servers remained active. ??

[HPBEME]

It's a weird one. I've had the tab corruption happen maybe a dozen or so times in the last year. One possible bit of useful info - I believe the first time I ever encountered it was around the time tab locking was introduced. I am not 100% sure on that timing, but it is definitely not a bug that's been around for years (for me at least).  So maybe that is a good starting place in the code to take a look.

Given the infrequency and the easy fix of simply reloading saved tab layout (and alternatively, MMB close to restart also works), it's really not that big a deal. That said, I imagine this is now a burr under Matt's saddle that he won't let go of until he solves it... Which is a good thing!

[JimH]

There could also be a pure Windows problem.  Here's a fragment of an email I was working on a couple days ago.  Image attached.  JRiver not involved in this one.

I've also seen some problems with focus where clicking on something in a program activated a desktop shortcut behind it.

[HPBEME]

I suppose that is true. Maybe even graphics card/driver related - you guys would know better than me. I certainly have not had any success in trying to reproduce it… Appears to be entirely random from my perspective.

[Matt]

Still haven't figured anything out here.  If you have any extra clues, let us know.  Thanks.

[HPBEME]

Will do.  But as yet, I am unable to discern any pattern.

[markf2748]

Still haven't figured anything out here.  If you have any extra clues, let us know.  Thanks.

I have not seen the corrupted and reduced number of tabs for many weeks, and altogether I may have seen them 2 or 3 times at most.

May or may not be related:   An event where all of my usual 10 tabs open on the Start page, instead of their various preset views.  This happens on the server under some relaunch condition(s) which I have not nailed down.  I've also seen it when a PC client loads a library from the server (not something I do very often).  Altogether this occurrence is relatively rare, but happens more often than the corrupted and reduced number of tabs discussed in this thread.  The desired default tabs are always restored by View > Load / Save View > ....

3/27/2024 Random thoughts.  One notable thing about these events is that MC does not crash or hang, it remains responsive, at least for me.
(1) I think that opens the possibility of adding a Help > Diagnostics > Tabs menu item which, when tapped by the user, would dump information about MC's underlying state info related to tabs.  That might help distinguish between corrupted data vs. corrupted function action.   But as I recall, hitting the tab Refresh button (my natural first reaction) did not correct the tab layout, so maybe there is already reason to believe it is corrupted tab data (?).
(2) Consider adding a Help > Diagnostics > State Dump option to create a more comprehensive user-initiated dump, if that would help, but it might be at risk for user abuse.
(3) Consider adding a tab layout history capability to the Tab Refresh button:  for example, <Shift><Tab Refresh> would cycle through the last five tab layouts.  Or a drop down tab layout history menu.  This would augment View > Load / Save View... by adding real time layout tracking.  Aside from being a new user feature, analysis of this history in a dump might provide a clue as to what is happening.   Note, the Back/Forward Arrows left of the Tab Refresh button cycle most recent history within a tab, they do not affect the overall tab layout.
(4) Has anyone reported this tab corruption in recent weeks, or is it now a thing of the past?

BTW, lately I always run with a 10 MB logging file limit, which is typically good for a few hours.  So next time I see a tab problem, I'll at least take a look at the log.

Server:  Win 11 Pro (64-bit) | Clients:  Win 10 Pro/Home (64-bit) | MC Beta Channel, currently 32.0.30

[Doof]

I only just skimmed this thread but does lock status on the tab make a difference? I've seen all sorts of funky behavior with locked tabs.

[HPBEME]

(4) Has anyone reported this tab corruption in recent weeks, or is it now a thing of the past?

Definitely not a thing of the past for me. I opened MC a couple of times to corrupted tabs just yesterday. I would estimate once every week or two I get corrupted tabs. It is so easy to just reload the tab layout or restart MC, which always fixes it, so not a big deal.  That said, it would be nice to solve this mystery.

I only just skimmed this thread but does lock status on the tab make a difference? I've seen all sorts of funky behavior with locked tabs.

I speculated in an earlier post that is when I think this started happening - right around the time locked tabs were introduced. It is definitely an issue that is relatively recent (< 1 - 2 years), at least for me.

I also don't use a NAS or DNLA, so I don't think it would be related to that.  I wish I could figure out a pattern for when it happens, but it eludes me.

[HPBEME]

My tabs just corrupted again. Tab corruption typically happens upon opening MC, but this time I had simply been browsing the internet and using other programs, and when I navigated back to MC, I saw the tabs were corrupted. I don't recall if it MC has ever done this in the middle of a session before.

The attached picture shows the tab corruption in the lower picture, and the upper picture is what they should look like (which I returned it to by running the load tab layout from the view menu).

The only thing I can think of that might have caused this, is I was deleting obsolete/redundant media files - TV shows to be exact. I was performing the operations within a file explorer program, not MC. So maybe this is somehow connected to auto import?

[Matt]

When they corrupt you could make a library backup and share it.  The backup might contain the corruption and a clue.  Thanks.

[HPBEME]

I will do that.  Seems to be happening more frequently for whatever reason in the last couple weeks, so hopefully I can get you that soon.

[HPBEME]

Just thought I would post an update about this issue.

I have not had corrupted tabs when opening MC since my last post in this thread. If you've done something to address it, it seems to have worked… or perhaps it's just coincidental?