How shall I add collection path?

[Don Green]

For some reason, the collection directories below does not include the only collection directory that I use:

/home/don/.plt-scheme/4.2.1/collects

which I do have showing up in DrRacket's options: /Language/Choose Language/ Collection Paths: 

<<default collection paths>>

/home/don/.plt-scheme/4.2.1/collects

------------------

Error Msg:

standard-module-name-resolver: collection not found

  for module path: DG/all/copy-dir-without-subdirs
  collection: "DG/all"
  in collection directories:
   /home/don/.racket/8.1/collects
   /home/don/racket/collects/
   ... [175 additional linked and package directories]
  context...:
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/scribble-lib/scribble/search.rkt:69:5: loop
   [repeats 1 more time]
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/scribble-lib/scribble/xref.rkt:122:2: xref-binding-tag
   .../private/coroutine.rkt:20:33
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/framework/private/coroutine.rkt:47:20
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/framework/private/coroutine.rkt:56:0: coroutine-run
   /home/don/racket/collects/racket/contract/private/arrow-val-first.rkt:486:18
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/drracket/drracket/private/syncheck/blueboxes-gui.rkt:457:4: update-the-strs method in docs-text-gui-mixin
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/framework/private/logging-timer.rkt:41:0: log-timeline/proc
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/mred/private/wx/common/timer.rkt:34:38
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/mred/private/wx/common/queue.rkt:435:6
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/mred/private/wx/common/queue.rkt:486:32
   /home/don/racket/share/pkgs/gui-lib/mred/private/wx/common/queue.rkt:634:3

[Philip McGrath]

Hi,

It would be easier to help if you could keep you could keep your replies within a single thread.

This error message reveals that the update-the-strs method of docs-text-gui-mixin defined in <https://github.com/racket/drracket/blob/v8.1/drracket/drracket/private/syncheck/blueboxes-gui.rkt>, which seems to be part of how DrRacket displays "blue boxes" with documentation, is calling the Scribble function `find-racket-tag` defined at <https://github.com/racket/scribble/blob/v8.1/scribble-lib/scribble/search.rkt#L26>.

Could you explain what you are doing when you encounter this error? For example, are you hovering over an identifier in DrRacket? Is the error displayed in a dialog box saying "DrRacket Internal Error".

Also, it would help to know if you have made any changes to your Racket installation recently, such as changing to a new Racket version.

One possibility is that DrRacket may not communicate the collection paths set through the GUI to the functions that look up documentation. I'm not sure if DrRacket intends to support finding documentation for collections configured that way (though, even if not, it shouldn't cause an internal error).

More generally, it sounds like you have code in "/home/don/.plt-scheme/4.2.1/collects" that predates Racket's package system. You are of course free to continue to manage it using "collection links", but manipulating collection links directly is no longer recommended: it is difficult to do correctly, there are limited tools to assist you, and you may encounter bugs in tools that haven't thought about non-standard configurations. (Buggy tools should be fixed, of course! And I say this as someone who myself runs Racket in non-standard configurations that sometimes expose such bugs.)

But I think it would be much easier for you if you could structure the code in "/home/don/.plt-scheme/4.2.1/collects" as a package, as I suggested before: https://groups.google.com/g/racket-users/c/OtJV3yUDp2k/m/swka-AWXBwAJ

-Philip