mj@cs.brown.edu (Mark Johnson) (02/05/90)
I'm having quite a few problems with the new version of MACL (i.e. 1.3.1) that I never had with the older version (1.2.2). The one that bothers me most is that 1.3.1 sometimes just dies when I do a context switch back to it under Multifinder - I get an "Application has unexpectedly quit" message. It doesn't seem to be reproducable, but does seem to happen when material is transfered via the clipboard. Anybody else seen these symptoms? Any suggestions for fixes? Oh yes, system 6.0.4, Mac IIcx with 8 Mb, MACL with 4 Mb, no fancy inits except Moire, Boomerang and Vaccine. Thanks, Mark Johnson
Hughes@ils.nwu.edu (Lucian Hughes) (02/07/90)
In article <28053@brunix.UUCP> mj@cs.brown.edu (Mark Johnson) writes: > that I never had with the older version (1.2.2). The one that bothers > me most is that 1.3.1 sometimes just dies when I do a context switch > back to it under Multifinder - I get an "Application has unexpectedly > quit" message. It doesn't seem to be reproducable, but does seem to > happen when material is transfered via the clipboard. > > Anybody else seen these symptoms? Any suggestions for fixes? I'm also having this problem, as are my colleagues. It does seem to be a quality of 1.3.1 more than 1.2.2. One way such crashes can occur in general is for a lisp pointer to something in the Mac heap to be left unnullified after that mac heap item (e.g., a pict) has been disposed of. Then in GCing the lisp ptr leads to a meaningless location in the heap, leading to disaster. However, I and others have systematically looked for any such code problems and resolving them has not resolved the overall problem. The crash can even occur as a result of doing something in a DIFFERENT application (i.e., it triggers a crash of the lisp while the lisp is in the background (and I'm doing something innocuous like word processing)). It is also frustratingly hard to isolate the conditions for the bug. It even continued to occur when we set the lisp to not run in the background. If someone from Mac Lisp would respond to this problem, that would be great. Lucian Hughes