Help! MoneyWell can't open my file!

[boz]

I'm almost sold on the program if you've been following the threads
I've posted. I just tried to launch the program again and it doesn't
open my document.

I tried creating a New Document so that works.

I've duplicated my document before I do anything else but I fear that
it's corrupted now. A quick inspection using Console reveals the
following message when I try to open my file.

2008-05-06 14:08:51.917 MoneyWell[22469] unresolved keypath:
repeatString

I didn't Force Quit it or do anything out of the ordinary.

Any advice on what to do? It leaves a pretty bad impression as I
wouldn't want to have all my data corrupted in the future.

Thanks.

Regards,

Bryan

[Blair Watkinson]

What version do you have of MoneyWell?

[boz]

Hi Blair,

I was using 1.3.2 (130).

I just tried using 1.3.3 (135) and the file opened. Is there any way
to verify the file's integrity?

[Blair Watkinson]

No, not if by "integrity" you mean that you want to verify that none
of the data has changed....

I don't know if this scenario applies... is it possible that you
opened your file with 1.3.3 and then later tried opening it with
1.3.2? Some of the updates to MoneyWell that Kevin puts out actually
change the file so that it is no longer compatible with previous
version of MoneyWell. I think this is necessary since documents used
on later versions have to keep track of additional configurations and
functionality as Kevin continues to add functionality. If this
happened, then I would expect that your file is probably all intact,
especially if you don't notice anything wrong right away.

To be candid, it is frustrating to update software and then have a
surprising effect while doing routine work. If you've looked much in
the forums, it's happened during the last couple of upgrades where
people would ask questions because some things didn't seem right
anymore.

However, you won't find support like you get from Kevin anywhere
else. He is very responsive within the forums, and from personal
experience, he's very responsive to e-mails sent directly to him at
anyone of the addresses he uses. He must be sending dozens of e-mails
a day, and you'll get a response anywhere from a few minutes to a
couple of hours, if you've sent a query in during a reasonable hour (I
think Kevin is somewhere in the US, since he's not as responsive when
its dark over North America). He's very competent, and he uses the
software himself, so the changes he makes are intended as
improvements, and generally, they are, but sometimes they can cause
surprising effects from how you were use to doing business if you're
not aware of the change.

So, what do you do? I think MoneyWell is great, and it's well worth
the money. However, I wouldn't automatically download updates every
time they come out unless there is something specific that you wanted
that's being provided in the update, or unless you were interested in
helping test and improve the software--many of the forum users are
involved in this aspect of the software development. Kevin has
adopted a habit of releasing the upgrade to forum users in case they
are interested in testing--I think this will reduce the surprises
during full release updates. If you just want to use the program,
don't download the updates, instead, give the update a few days and
see if there are any problems. I'd also backup your document often.
Are you comfortable with AppleScript? If so, you could write a script
to backup automatically. If not, I may be able to help you with some
small information regarding your file/folder structure.

Blair

[boz]

Hi Blair,

The scenario you mentioned does not apply. I only downloaded the
1.3.3RC version just to try and see if it can open the file *after*
this problem manifested itself. I was happily using 1.3.2 until this
happened.

I'd like to hear what Kevin has to say with regards to that error
message in Console I posted. I vaguely remember doing a cmd+S to save
the file before I quit.

Doing a search on the issue found a possibly related topic from the
Apple Mailing List http://lists.apple.com/archives/Cocoa-dev/2006/Jul/msg01951.html.
It describes an issue with newly saved files in CoreData having
unresolved keypath errors.

That said, I think I'm holding off from purchasing until this issue is
clarified. It might not even be something that Kevin has control over
if the bug is ultimately caused by CoreData.

[Kevin Hoctor]

On May 6, 2008, at 2:11 AM, boz wrote:

> The scenario you mentioned does not apply. I only downloaded the
> 1.3.3RC version just to try and see if it can open the file *after*
> this problem manifested itself. I was happily using 1.3.2 until this
> happened.
>
> I'd like to hear what Kevin has to say with regards to that error
> message in Console I posted. I vaguely remember doing a cmd+S to save
> the file before I quit.
>

Bryan,

So you can't open your file with 1.3.2 but you can with 1.3.3RC? There
was no change to the database schema between those two versions so
there should be nothing stopping you from using 1.3.2 again to try
opening it.

> Doing a search on the issue found a possibly related topic from the
> Apple Mailing List http://lists.apple.com/archives/Cocoa-dev/2006/Jul/msg01951.html
> .
> It describes an issue with newly saved files in CoreData having
> unresolved keypath errors.
>
> That said, I think I'm holding off from purchasing until this issue is
> clarified. It might not even be something that Kevin has control over
> if the bug is ultimately caused by CoreData.

I'm not sure what's going on with some of the keypath errors I've
seen. They are not global (all users) and I highly doubt there is any
corruption going on. It's possible that there is a code glitch in
1.3.2 but I can't recreate any of the problems being reported.

Is it possible that you are using OS X Tiger? If so, what version?

Peace,

Kevin Hoctor
ke...@nothirst.com
No Thirst Software LLC
http://nothirst.com
http://kevinhoctor.blogspot.com

[boz]

> Bryan,
>
> So you can't open your file with 1.3.2 but you can with 1.3.3RC? There  
> was no change to the database schema between those two versions so  
> there should be nothing stopping you from using 1.3.2 again to try  
> opening it.
>

Yes, that is the case. I can send you a copy of the file in question
if that would help.

> I'm not sure what's going on with some of the keypath errors I've  
> seen. They are not global (all users) and I highly doubt there is any  
> corruption going on. It's possible that there is a code glitch in  
> 1.3.2 but I can't recreate any of the problems being reported.
>
> Is it possible that you are using OS X Tiger? If so, what version?

Yes, I am still running Tiger 10.4.11 which is fully updated.

I'll try to recreate the problem in a test file and report back on my
findings.

Thanks.

[Kevin Hoctor]

Bryan,

If you can use 1.3.3, then please do so. I've had other reports that
this new version has fixes this bug.

Peace,

Kevin Hoctor

No Thirst Software LLC
http://nothirst.com

Sent from my iPhone