Borked Document - SLA Validation Script?

[Derek]

I've just borked a document that, due to other issues (bedding in a new PC) is already past it's deadline. It's a monthly magazine.

I tried to copy some objects from a previous edition (something I have done many times in the past). It placed the object in the new edition, but that object is not selectable on any layer and cannot be moved, edited, or deleted. It shows in the preview mode so I'm self-confident it'll exist in a pdf too.

Undo does not do anything to back me out of the problem and the autosaved version will have been overwritten. I do not have a start-of-day isolated backup (that'll change from now on). The corrupt objects don't show up in the Preflight Verifier, nor do they appear in Greg Pittman's "extract_frames.py - Extracts the names of text and image frames."

Any fix will have to be quick and easy if I'm to dig my way out of this. Is there a script or utility that can help me dig through the SLA file and remove the corruption - or am I limited to Scribus and 'iBall' in a text editor?

Fixing the document is probably more important than identifying exactly how/why it got corrupted (at this stage) though they are, of course, likely to be interrelated.



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[utnik]

hi derek

you could select the object in the 'outline' window. (...and delete it there or move it to another layer...)

utnik

[Derek]

Thanks. In about 3 years of using Scribus I've never needed or used the Outline window!

I've had a look through the objects in that window. The 'nuisance' objects did not appear in it.

However, I then inserted a pair of new pages above the problem pair and moved the good objects to the new pages. The nuisance objects moved with one of the text frames.

I opened the Story Editor window for that text frame and found the nuisance objects embedded in the text frame (shown as a red '@'). In effect I had copied an image frame and a text frame into a text frame. It surprises me that this is the first time I've done that in about 3 years. Every day is a school day!

Thank you very much for your help. If this thread helps someone else get out of an unexpected hole it will have done some good. It's also prompted me to improve my backups and workflow (something that's been needed for far too long).