[net.micro.amiga] --Bug report

dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (06/10/86)

Description:
	Disk cache fails to write it's buffers

Repeat-By:
	Only happens when you select 'save' from preferences.  I've tried
	using a different disk (thinking the disk might be causing the trouble),
	but the problem still seems to occur.

Fix:
	--

Possible_Cause:
	Since no other application causes this problem to happen, I would guess
	the problem lies somewhere in Preferences.

Misc:
	Would appreciate being told if this happens to other 1.2BII'ers

dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (06/10/86)

Description:
	Disk Fonts don't seem to be removed. 

Repeat-By:
	Go into some program which uses disk fonts, NotePad, for instance.
	Use several disk fonts.  When you exit NotePad, they are still around
	in memory.

Fix:
	--

Possible_Cause:
	It is definately NOT a bug in NotePad.  I wrote a program which opens
	and closes diskfonts, and the fonts were not removed from memory when
	I closed them.

Misc:
	Question: should they be removed automagically with the last close, or
	do they stick around until you begin to run out of memory (a senerio
	I have not tested)

dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (06/10/86)

Description:
	The BII AutoDocs disk does not contain complete documentation.  For 
	example, the console device, diskfont device (and probably more).

Repeat-By:
	looking at the disk and seeing what's there (I couldn't resist)

Fix:
	be sure future revisions Alpha's or Beta's have complete docs

Possible_Cause:
	Inept or rushed (deadline?) slap together of diskettes, or Amiga
	didn't think we needed the docs.

dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (06/10/86)

Description:
	Sizing gadget without borders, though it no longer crashes the system,
	still does not work properly.  When you size a window larger, the old
	position of the sizing gadget is not always cleared.  When you size a
	window smaller, the border area which exists due to the sizing gadget
	doesn't always get cleared (you had a lot of junk in the window when you
	sized it down).

Repeat-By:
	Open standard intuition window:
		Custom screen (640x200)
		Custom window (640x200.. doesn't matter) with sizing gadget,
		close gadget, NO borders

	Write some junk in it (say, with the console device)

	Fool around resizing the window.

Fix:
	shouldn't be too hard.  Just make your window code NOT dependant on the
	existance of borders.

Possible_Cause:
	programming error in resize routines.

Misc:

dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (06/10/86)

Description:
	memory masher, really strange stuff.  The program eventually crashes the
	machine.  Here is a list:

	(1)
		Select the 'Copy To'... this works fine, but sometimes when your in
		Copy-to mode, and you use the right menu button to get the menu,
		garbage appears on the screen when the pointer is over some of the
		headers.

	(2)
		Saving fonts always seems to work, but something in FontEd seems
		to permanently screw the machine.  After a while, when you try to
		load a font you've just saved (even by getting out of FontEd and 
		re-executing FontEd and THEN reloading the font), it comes up
		a previous version of the font???!!?  Rebooting the machine via
		ctl-A-A and re-executing FontEd and THEN reloading the font seems
		to work ok.

Repeat-By:
	In above description.  Specifically for #2:

		Get a font (topaz 8), resized to 7x7. cleared it, created a '!',
		saved it.  Added stuff alltheway up to 'K', saved it.  Reloaded
		the font (didn't work... got just the '!').  Rebooted the machine
		and reloaded the font (did work).

Possible_Cause:
	Something in FontEd is mashing memory, I would guess.

	

dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (06/10/86)

Description:
	If you say 'Load', and while it's reading the directory in you play with
	some of the gadgets, it will crash the program and machine.

Repeat-By:
	above 

louie@umd5.UUCP (Louis Mamakos) (06/11/86)

In article <8606101815.AA15352@pavepaws> dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) writes:
>Description:
>	Disk cache fails to write it's buffers
>
>Repeat-By:
>	Only happens when you select 'save' from preferences.  I've tried
>	using a different disk (thinking the disk might be causing the trouble),
>	but the problem still seems to occur.
>
>	Would appreciate being told if this happens to other 1.2BII'ers

This same thing happens to me.  With a rather full disk, it sure grinds on
it for a while recovering/rebuiding things.

-- 
Louis A. Mamakos WA3YMH   University of Maryland, Computer Science Center
 Internet: louie@trantor.umd.edu
 UUCP: {seismo!umcp-cs, ihnp4!rlgvax}!cvl!umd5!louie

higgin@cbmvax.UUCP (06/12/86)

In article <8606101837.AA15535@pavepaws> dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) writes:
>Description:
>(2)
>       Saving fonts always seems to work, but something in FontEd seems
>       to permanently screw the machine.  After a while, when you try to
>       load a font you've just saved (even by getting out of FontEd and
>       re-executing FontEd and THEN reloading the font), it comes up
>       a previous version of the font???!!?  Rebooting the machine via
>       ctl-A-A and re-executing FontEd and THEN reloading the font seems
>       to work ok.
>
>Repeat-By:
>       In above description.  Specifically for #2:
>
>       Get a font (topaz 8), resized to 7x7. cleared it, created a '!',
>       saved it.  Added stuff alltheway up to 'K', saved it.  Reloaded
>       the font (didn't work... got just the '!').  Rebooted the machine
>       and reloaded the font (did work).
>
>Possible_Cause:
>       Something in FontEd is mashing memory, I would guess.
>

I seem to recall talking with the author about this, and he said if you
save a font with the same name as it was loaded, you're going to get the
old one, because it's still loaded into the machine.

Which leads me to my next point.  Yes, I believe fonts do stick around
until no-one is using them and Exec needs the memory.

Fix to above "bug" - save the modified font under a different name than
you loaded it with.

        Regards,
                Paul Higginbottom

Note: please don't shoot me, I haven't verified the above.

Disclaimer: I might not know what I'm talking about, so only I'm responsible
        for this!

pariseau@well.UUCP (Robert S. Pariseau) (06/13/86)

This is not a bug.  The memory usage model in the Amiga keeps disk-loaded
items in memory until a request for free memory exceeds the size of the
largest available free chunk.  This eliminates unecessary reloads from the
disk when an item is frequently closed and re-opened.

Disk-loaded fonts will stay in memory until AllocMem() goes through its
Expunge algorithm.  When AllocMem() decides to Expunge, it will attempt
to remove any disk-loaded font which currently has zero "openers".

Note that the process of Expunging fonts was BUGGY in V1.1.  It should
work correctly under V1.2.

Some programs use the trick of attempting to allocate a chunk of memory
which is larger than can possibly be available in order to force AllocMem()
to Expunge things that happen to be lying around.  Note that if the
Expunge processing actually removes anything, then AvailMem() will return
a larger number after the fake AllocMem() call than before.

pariseau@well.UUCP (Robert S. Pariseau) (06/13/86)

Maybe if Commodore hired back some of the Los Gatos QA people...(grin!)

richr@pogo.UUCP (06/13/86)

In article <8606101821.AA15403@pavepaws> dillon@PAVEPAWS.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) writes:
>Description:
>	Disk Fonts don't seem to be removed. 
>
>	I have not tested)
Yes, but you should have.

This was discussed on the net earlier.  When a resource like this is brought
into RAM, it stays there unless a program asks for more RAM than is otherwise
available.  This makes a lot of sense.  I for one want to see as little disk
access as possible, even if I (** SEEM **) to have less memory than is 
actually available.
-- 
				Rich Rodgers

				tektronix!pogo!richr

mitsu@well.UUCP (06/17/86)

In re: disk fonts not being removed after a CloseFont()

	Disk fonts have never been removed after a CloseFont()
(see Best of BIX, sometime around April or May 1986 BYTE).  They
are supposed to hang around in the system in case another application
wants them, UNLESS a memory allocation is done, in which case the
fonts are closed and cleaned out automatically if the allocation
needs to use the font memory.  Unfortunately, there is a bug in
1.1 that causes this procedure to fail, and it would be nice if
someone tested 1.2 to determine whether this bug remains.  For
a description of the bug, please refer to the Best of BIX in BYTE
(same issue, sorry I don't have it with me so I can't tell you
the exact date---it was the first issue that carried Amiga BIX
conference notes.)  The bug essentially consists of AllocMem()
clearing out the font, but the font not being removed from the
list of fonts available in RAM, so that if another application opened
that font, it would think it is still in RAM (even though it has
been cleared out by AllocMem()) and the system would do something
nasty and unpleasant.
			-Mitsu (mitsu@well.UUCP)
**** I am not affiliated with C-A in any way ****