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Scribus => Layout Issues => Topic started by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 12:20:14 PM

Title: text boxes disappeared
Post by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 12:20:14 PM
Xubuntu 12.04
Scribus 1.5

I'm using 1.5 to make corrections on a book proof. It seems to have become increasingly buggy, but this one takes the cake. I just had hundreds of text boxes disappear, only on the left-hand pages. Undo did nothing, so in a panic, I closed before it autosaved, in hopes all would be right when I reopened the document. That wasn't the case. I have no hope anyone can help me but I don't know where else to turn. All that work lost. I'm devastated.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: leaf on April 14, 2014, 01:49:15 PM
This version 1.5 is rather only for testing, is unstable. For me is only to sight what will be new in future stable version.
For big and important projects better use 1.4.3 stable.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: GarryP on April 14, 2014, 02:08:42 PM
Did you try opening the last auto-saved document? It might contain what was lost, or at least quite a bit of it depending on when it auto-saved.

Either way, I'm very sorry to hear that you've lost a load of work. I know what that feels like.

However in 1.5's defence - and as leaf says above - it's still in development and there are plenty of warnings not to use it for production/important jobs.

On the other hand, the loss of hundreds of text frames does sound like a major bug that should really be looked at before 1.5 is officially released. Something like that getting into production code would be a disaster for Scribus' reputation.

If you have a Mantis logon I would suggest adding it as something to be looked at very soon. If not, you could try the Scribus IRC (irc://irc.freenode.net/#scribus) community and someone might post it for you if you can provide a "walk through" of what happened.

Again, I feel for your loss. You must be very angry and frustrated.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 02:31:24 PM
Quote from: leaf on April 14, 2014, 01:49:15 PM
This version 1.5 is rather only for testing, is unstable ... For big and important projects better use 1.4.3 stable.

Quote from: GarryP on April 14, 2014, 02:08:42 PM
However in 1.5's defence - and as leaf says above - it's still in development and there are plenty of warnings not to use it for production/important jobs.

That's true, but for print I need PDF/X1a, which only 1.5 can make. And, of course, once the most up to date (working) copy is saved in 1.5, it can't be re-opened in 1.4.

Quote from: GarryP on April 14, 2014, 02:08:42 PM
Did you try opening the last auto-saved document? It might contain what was lost, or at least quite a bit of it depending on when it auto-saved.

Yes, I was actually sane enough to do that. The odd thing was that the only auto-saved copy I could find appeared to be weeks old.

Quote from: GarryP on April 14, 2014, 02:08:42 PM
Either way, I'm very sorry to hear that you've lost a load of work. I know what that feels like.

On the other hand, the loss of hundreds of text frames does sound like a major bug that should really be looked at before 1.5 is officially released. Something like that getting into production code would be a disaster for Scribus' reputation.

If you have a Mantis logon I would suggest adding it as something to be looked at very soon. If not, you could try the Scribus IRC (irc://irc.freenode.net/#scribus) community and someone might post it for you if you can provide a "walk through" of what happened.

Again, I feel for your loss. You must be very angry and frustrated.

I appreciate the kind commiserations. I know using 1.5 is a risk, but this is the first time something like this has happened. I used 1.5 to make my PDF copy for my last book, also proof corrections and had no problems. This time really strange things are happening.  Undo has always gotten me out of jams in the past but today it was always greyed out.

Of the lost text frames, mostly it was all the left hand page headings and page numbers, which isn't too bad to fix. I lost one column in the index which will be a headache, also several random text frames. Hopefully I can salvage quite a bit of it from my last 1.4 copy.

I'm not familiar with Mantis or IRC, but I agree it should at least be brought to the attention of those who need to know.

Thank you for the responses. It's nice to at least know folks are listening.


Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: leaf on April 14, 2014, 05:23:32 PM
Quote from: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 02:31:24 PM
That's true, but for print I need PDF/X1a, which only 1.5 can make. And, of course, once the most up to date (working) copy is saved in 1.5, it can't be re-opened in 1.4.
Perhaps support of PDF/X-1a earlier, in 1.4.x.
More here:
http://bugs.scribus.net/view.php?id=12210
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: utnik on April 14, 2014, 05:29:27 PM
when i had to deal with .pdf/x-1a i used scribus1.5 too – but i always worked on a copy and kept the original .sla file untouched by 1.5!

utnik
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 06:17:15 PM
Quote from: leaf on April 14, 2014, 05:23:32 PM
Quote from: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 02:31:24 PM
That's true, but for print I need PDF/X1a, which only 1.5 can make. And, of course, once the most up to date (working) copy is saved in 1.5, it can't be re-opened in 1.4.
Perhaps support of PDF/X-1a earlier, in 1.4.x.
More here:
http://bugs.scribus.net/view.php?id=12210

That would be wonderful! Hopefully it will be cross-platform.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 06:19:43 PM
Quote from: utnik on April 14, 2014, 05:29:27 PM
when i had to deal with .pdf/x-1a i used scribus1.5 too – but i always worked on a copy and kept the original .sla file untouched by 1.5!

utnik

You know, I thought I did that. But my saved copy wouldn't open in 1.4. I confess I'm learning as I go and stumble around a lot. I've learned to deal with the quirks, but lately, it seems several things refuse to work well. A number of times undo was greyed out even after I'd been working on the document for awhile. Another is linespacing. I click to change, but nothing happens.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: utnik on April 14, 2014, 06:36:19 PM
Quote from: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 06:19:43 PM
Quote from: utnik on April 14, 2014, 05:29:27 PM...kept the original .sla file untouched by 1.5!

You know, I thought I did that. But my saved copy wouldn't open in 1.4.

a copy you saved with scribus 1.5 is not what i meant as i wrote 'untouched by 1.5'...
i hope, you're more careful in the future (at least while working with pre releases...)

utnik
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 07:30:20 PM
Quote from: utnik on April 14, 2014, 06:36:19 PM
a copy you saved with scribus 1.5 is not what i meant as i wrote 'untouched by 1.5'...
i hope, you're more careful in the future (at least while working with pre releases...)

utnik

What I did was, open the 1.4 created file in 1.5, then immediately "saved as" under another name. Obviously that wasn't correct. What should I have done?
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: utnik on April 14, 2014, 07:59:21 PM
as i wrote before, i would always keep the original file untouched by the developer version.
i duplicate my files with the file manager. you could save a copy out of scribus as well – but with the stable version!
in scribus 1.5, pressing 'ctrl'+'s' would be a real accident here...

utnik
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: rascalsmom on April 14, 2014, 08:59:07 PM
Quote from: utnik on April 14, 2014, 07:59:21 PM
as i wrote before, i would always keep the original file untouched by the developer version.
i duplicate my files with the file manager. you could save a copy out of scribus as well – but with the stable version!
in scribus 1.5, pressing 'ctrl'+'s' would be a real accident here...

utnik

Then let's call it an error in ignorance rather than carelessness. Sorry to be snippy, but it's frustrating enough to trying to do something properly and have it fail, then be told I should have been more careful when I try to get help. I actually did a test run with that method initially and found that if I "saved as" and then closed out the file immediately, it would open in 1.4.

It's a steep learning curve no matter what version one is using. Unfortunately, mistakes are too often the best teacher.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: utnik on April 14, 2014, 09:54:14 PM
my intention was never to blame you – sorry!
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: GarryP on April 15, 2014, 11:05:21 AM
Personally I create my own very basic "version control" system for each document I create.

I start off by naming the document with a numeric suffix, such as 'newsletter-version1', then, after any major change or set of changes, I "Save As" with an incremented suffix: e.g. 'newsletter-version2', 'newsletter-version3', etc.

This gives me a simple time-series where I can go back to a previous version for any reason when/if I need to. Old versions can simply be deleted when I know I'll not be needing them again.

It's not sophisticated by any means but the main thing is that it's not complicated and can be used in most applications. So once you're used to doing it the whole thing becomes second nature.

I know there are probably lots of ways to do this sort of thing much better but it works for me and I'm sure it will work for others.

The main thing is that it works almost everywhere with no special set-up or configuration and it's very easy and quick to do and you don't have to rely on backups or auto-saves.

This might sound dumb to some people, and others might think that it's a waste of time or that I'm "living in the past", but I've been doing this for many years - since I last lost a load of work because a file got corrupted - and it's served me well ever since.

One other suggestion I have - if you use developmental software, and this sort of mirrors what utnik said above - would be to do all you can in the stable version, then save the file with a suitable suffix - e.g. 'newsletter-final-stable' - then use "Save As" again to create another copy such as 'newsletter-dev' then load this into the developmental software and continue from there. The different suffixes will remind you that you're using developmental software and also that you've got a stable version to go back to.

Obviously this doesn't fix any problems that have happened but it could stop a lot of heartache and frustration in the future.

I realise this won't be everyone's cup of tea but I hope this helps someone reading this.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: Nermander on April 15, 2014, 12:10:25 PM
I've learned a few lessons the hard way too, not only with Scribus.

I usually make the versioned backup copies with a file manager, preferably Total Commander, to make sure the copies are save in the right place (I have more than once managed to do a Save as overwriting the wrong file because I was in the wrong folder). And I try to use folders, not just naming the copies of the file.

Opening and doing a Save as from the newer version is also dangerous because you just need to stumble a bit on the keyboard or sometimes just wait to long (so some kind of autosave is initiated) to trash your original file. (Not talking Scribus here but general precautions.)

Once I managed to overwrite 2 hours of work by simply forgetting to change the file name in the Save dialog.

I always make a backup whenever I have spent more than half an hour working on a file.

IMO user mistakes are more frequent than program errors, but the same precautions can be used against both.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: GarryP on April 15, 2014, 01:58:30 PM
Nermander, it sounds like you've got your own version control and backup situation well in hand. (I looked at Total Commander but it doesn't look like it's for OSX so I can't use it to see what I'm missing, but maybe others will like it.)

I agree that my very basic "Save As" solution isn't great and has its potential problems so I'd be interested in hearing what other people do for version control.

Basically I've been doing pretty much the same thing since reasonably high-density random access storage became available so there are probably many new methods I could try. (In the interests of trying to maintain a little dignity I won't go into what I used to do when saving the latest versions of my programs to cassette tape way back in the stone age!)

Maybe someone can suggest something that will convince me to drag myself kicking and screaming into the 21st Century. No promises though.
Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: Nermander on April 16, 2014, 12:24:17 PM
Yes, Total Commander is a Windows program, it's basically a clone of the old Norton Commander. There are probably clones for OS X too:)

Here's one http://themaninhat.com/mover.html (a quick google hit)

The advantage is that it works with two panels, copies and moves are always made from one of the open panels to the other.

But even though I try to make my backup copies I sometimes forget... As I said, user mistakes are more frequent than program errors:)

Title: Re: text boxes disappeared
Post by: GarryP on April 16, 2014, 01:45:45 PM
Thanks for the link to "Mover". I'll have to give it a try at some point.

I've been using muCommander for a while now, on and off, but I don't really like it because it's got no search facility. It does "punch through" all of the normal file visibility rules that OSX Finder uses though so it's useful every now and again (if you already know where to look for stuff).

[Aside: I remember using Norton Commander but preferred PC BOSS. Come to think of it I might still have a copy of that somewhere if I looked hard enough.]

A while ago I wondered whether I should be using some kind of Subversion/Git repository for version control but a quick look at them told me that they're probably too complicated for my simple needs.

I'm still open to suggestions though, even though we're quite off topic now - sorry rascalsmom.