[scintilla:bugs] #2504 Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

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[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li
Last Updated: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

• No-Check-Reload-On-Untitled-Files.patch (710 Bytes; text/plain)

SciTE will display the spurious error 'The file '<path to working directory>' has been deleted' in a message box after running a custom Lua function from the Tool menu if:

1. load.on.activate is set to 1.
2. The active tab contains an Untitled file.

Example Lua function:

function sort_text()
  local sel = editor:GetSelText()
  if #sel == 0 then return end
  local eol = string.match(sel, "\n$")
  local buf = lines(sel)
  --table.foreach(buf, print) --used for debugging
  table.sort(buf)
  local out = table.concat(buf, "\n")
  if eol then out = out.."\n" end
  editor:ReplaceSel(out)
end

Tool menu entry:

command.name.1.*=Sort Lines
command.subsystem.1.*=3
command.1.*=sort_text
command.save.before.1.*=2

Patch is attached that modifies CheckReload() to do nothing if the current filePath is an Untitled file.

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[Neil Hodgson]

This does not occur for me and the path through the code should not be possible.

newModTime will be 0 because there is a check for untitled in FilePath::ModifiedTimethat returns 0. Then there must be a non-0 value in CurrentBuffer()->fileModTime which shouldn't be possible since it is for an untitled buffer. Possibly something more complex is occurring.

The above example is missing a lines function.

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

Here's the lines() function:

function lines(str)
  local t = {}
  local i, lstr = 1, #str
  while i <= lstr do
    local x, y = string.find(str, "\r?\n", i)
    if x then t[#t + 1] = string.sub(str, i, x - 1)
    else break
    end
    i = y + 1
  end
  if i <= lstr then t[#t + 1] = string.sub(str, i) end
  return t
end

I tested with and without my change, and it definitely made the error dialog go away. I've attached an example of the error dialog for reference.

Attachments:

• Error Message.png (5.7 kB; image/png)

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Mon Mar 30, 2026 10:01 PM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

I added some logs, and what's happening is command.is.filter is being read as set by JobMode::JobMode(), so isFilter is set. Is that the default? I did not set it in my tool.

That causes SciTEBase::ToolsMenu() to set CurrentBuffer()->fileModTime to -1, which meets all the criteria for the conditional to hit for the error message on an Untitled buffer.

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Mon Mar 30, 2026 10:06 PM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Neil Hodgson]

Check for overlapping command patterns. If there are two patterns like *.java and *.cpp specifying properties, the priority is not obvious. The standard properties only specify a few filter properties for *.sol and command.is.filter.0.$(file.patterns.cpp) which is for command 0 so shouldn't interfere with your command 1. As well as command.is.filter, command.mode may set the filter state.

The filter code could be improved as the time hack to force reload isn't great.

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Mon Mar 30, 2026 10:44 PM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

Sure, but that still means that a command that is set as a filter (not that I know what that means) will produce this spurious error message?

And the code is absolutely setting the file mod time to -1, which based on the use of that value seems to mismatch the intent; the code that is checking if it's nonzero that displays the error message seems to imply that nonzero is a valid value for the mod time and zero perhaps implies no file?

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[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Tue Mar 31, 2026 01:33 AM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

Digging into my properties, I don't see any filter settings at all for any commands, nor any use of command.mode. I've attached all the options files and my Lua startup script to this comment. Note that I'm on Windows and I've seen this behavior on the latest in hg as of my report.

When the call is made to get the filter status of the command in the JobMode constructor, propName is command.is.filter.1., and fileNameExt is empty.

Attachments:

• SciTE State.zip (10.7 kB; application/zip)

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Tue Mar 31, 2026 01:39 AM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Neil Hodgson]

Wasn't able to reproduce with those files.

It's better to find the base cause of this bug instead of recovering in CheckReload as the bug may cause other problems.

When the call is made to get the filter status of the command in the JobMode constructor, propName is command.is.filter.1., and fileNameExt is empty.

The main things I'm imaging could be wrong are unexpected command properties or incorrect wildcard matching. There are other settings that include "filter" so a spurious match may be possible.

Is it producing a non-empty modeVal in JobMode::JobMode and what is its value if it is non-empty?

In the props.GetWild for "command.is.filter.", which return statement is hit and how many times did the main while (psf) { loop iterate? That will show which property set was responsible. If its the MatchWildSet that succeeds, what is the it->first and keyFile.

The user properties includes properties.directory.enable=1 so check what is in the directory options file and also local options.

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Tue Mar 31, 2026 10:14 PM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

Found it!

html.properties in C:\ProgramData\SciTE\, I think this is installed by default on Windows:

if PLAT_WIN

[...]

    command.is.filter.1.*=1
    ```


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**[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files**

**Status:** open
**Group:** Bug
**Created:** Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li
**Last Updated:** Wed Apr 01, 2026 12:13 AM UTC
**Owner:** nobody
**Attachments:**


- [No-Check-Reload-On-Untitled-Files.patch](https://sourceforge.net/p/scintilla/bugs/2504/attachment/No-Check-Reload-On-Untitled-Files.patch) (710 Bytes; text/plain)

SciTE will display the spurious error 'The file '<path to working directory\>' has been deleted' in a message box after running a custom Lua function from the Tool menu if:

1. `load.on.activate` is set to `1`.
2. The active tab contains an Untitled file.

Example Lua function:

function sort_text()
local sel = editor:GetSelText()
if #sel == 0 then return end
local eol = string.match(sel, "\n$")
local buf = lines(sel)
--table.foreach(buf, print) --used for debugging
table.sort(buf)
local out = table.concat(buf, "\n")
if eol then out = out.."\n" end
editor:ReplaceSel(out)
end

Tool menu entry:

command.name.1.=Sort Lines
command.subsystem.1.=3
command.1.=sort_text
command.save.before.1.=2
```

[Neil Hodgson]

That line isn't in the distributed html.properties. I have some recollection of setting up HTML Tidy to reformat HTML files so it may be in some other version of html.properties.

With that cleared up, it should be OK to stop the problem for untitled files by avoiding the decrement for invalid modification times. While there may be some benefit to running a filter like HTML Tidy on an untitled buffer, there would be the hassle of creating a temporary file and making sure to remove it later. The user can save the buffer into a real file if they want to do something with it.

diff -r 981c4a52abe7 src/SciTEBase.h
--- a/src/SciTEBase.h   Tue Mar 31 09:39:25 2026 +1100
+++ b/src/SciTEBase.h   Wed Apr 01 15:16:45 2026 +1100
@@ -123,6 +123,7 @@
    void SetTimeFromFile();

    void DocumentModified() noexcept;

+   void WantReload() noexcept;
    bool NeedsSave(int delayBeforeSave) const noexcept;

    void CompleteLoading() noexcept;
diff -r 981c4a52abe7 src/SciTEBuffers.cxx
--- a/src/SciTEBuffers.cxx  Tue Mar 31 09:39:25 2026 +1100
+++ b/src/SciTEBuffers.cxx  Wed Apr 01 15:16:45 2026 +1100
@@ -102,6 +102,14 @@
    documentModTime = time(nullptr);
 }

+void Buffer::WantReload() noexcept {

+   if (fileModTime) {
+       // Signal that the file should be reloaded by decreasing its modification time so file on
+       // disk appears newer. Only do this for a valid modification time.
+       fileModTime--;
+   }
+}
+
 bool Buffer::NeedsSave(int delayBeforeSave) const  noexcept {
    const time_t now = time(nullptr);
    return now && documentModTime && isDirty && !pFileWorker && (now-documentModTime > delayBeforeSave) && !file.IsUntitled() && !failedSave;
@@ -1576,7 +1584,7 @@
            return;
        if (jobMode.saveBefore == 2 || (jobMode.saveBefore == 1 && (!(CurrentBuffer()->isDirty) || Save())) || SaveIfUnsure() != SaveResult::cancelled) {
            if (jobMode.isFilter)
-               CurrentBuffer()->fileModTime -= 1;
+               CurrentBuffer()->WantReload();
            if (jobMode.jobType == JobSubsystem::immediate) {
                if (extender) {
                    extender->OnExecute(command.c_str());

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Wed Apr 01, 2026 03:10 AM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Mark W. Gabby-Li]

Thanks. For full clarity, I believe my Windows installs came from the old "SciTE for Windows" installers, which may have had different versions of the property files?

I see the Windows installers are no longer available. I seem to remember they were provided by a third party rather than the project itself? Perhaps there was some mistake when packaging them and they included user-customized property file by accident, or perhaps they had intentional customizations.

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Wed Apr 01, 2026 04:26 AM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

[Neil Hodgson]

Committed the above code with [1c0de1].

The installer appears to have been discontinued by its author. The customizations were part of the purpose of that project.

---

[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open
Group: Bug
Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Wed Apr 01, 2026 04:45 AM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

• No-Check-Reload-On-Untitled-Files.patch (sourceforge.net) (710 Bytes; text/plain)

[Neil Hodgson]

• labels: --> scite, reload, command, filter
• status: open --> open-fixed

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[bugs:#2504] Report and Fix for Spurious Error Message Checking Reload on Untitled Files

Status: open-fixed
Group: Bug
Labels: scite reload command filter

Created: Mon Mar 30, 2026 06:13 PM UTC by Mark W. Gabby-Li

Last Updated: Wed Apr 01, 2026 09:41 PM UTC
Owner: nobody
Attachments:

• No-Check-Reload-On-Untitled-Files.patch (sourceforge.net) (710 Bytes; text/plain)