Stack overflow at line: 1792 or 1788 when using the search function

[Guest]

Hello everyone,

My name is Thibault. I am a technical communications specialist. I've been using Robohelp html for a couple of years.

I am working on the user guide of the software application developed where I work.

This is a HUGE project, more than 6500 pages.

We're two technical writers on this project. (This is an inportant detail since my colleague doesn't get the problem).

I need your help because I have been having an annoying issue over the last couple of days.

After the project is generated, I open it in the software, clicking F1.

When I want to use the search function I have this error message displayed:

"Stack overflow at line: 1792" or "Stack overflow at line: 1788"

Do you know where this could come from?

Furthermore, I noticed that this stack overflow only occurs on some words.

I mean, it occurs for the most used words in this project.

We have customers all over the world and over the last week, we've been getting a lot of feedbacks about this error message.

I hope someone will be able to help me on this one!

Thanks in advance!

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

When you edit topics in your project, do you see little red sqares in the content in the RoboHelp Editor?

Cheers... Rick

[Guest]

Hello,

Thanks for the quick answer.

If this is what you meant, I dont see any red squares in robohelp when I edit my topics.

Cheers,

Thibault

[Peter Grainge]

For anyone else reading this thread, see http://forums.adobe.com/message/4784796#4784796 where there is other information about this.

Rick was asking about red squares in the source as they indicate that an output file has been imported. I think from reading the other thread that you understand that and are saying that you have no such topics. Are you sure as it would only take one? However, I would expect it to affect everyone.

You say you are both working on the project. Is that with source control? Please don't tell me your project is on a network drive.

Does this problem also occur if you generate WebHelp?

No worries about mixing the threads but can you please be careful about using the term "project" only when referring to your source files and use the term "output" for the help you generate.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

Alright.

Thanks Peter I think I'm starting to understand all your Robohelp vocabulary.

Rick was asking about red squares in the source as they indicate that an output file has been imported. I think from reading the other thread that you understand that and are saying that you have no such topics. Are you sure as it would only take one? However, I would expect it to affect everyone.

I don't see any red squares. But I'm pretty sure that there must be some somewhere, since, as I told you yesterday, our output is on a network drive.

You say you are both working on the project. Is that with source control? Please don't tell me your project is on a network drive.

Actually, our source files are set up locally on our machines and we generate the output on a network drive.

What do you mean by 'source control'?

Does this problem also occur if you generate WebHelp?

No, this problem doesn't occur when we generate WebHelp (search answers are ranked, this is really cool, can we do this with flashhelp?). I told that to my commercialization manager and he made it clear that this would involve too much work and adjustments.

We asked our customers to do the necessary changes to work with FlashHelp, we cannot ask them to just change again like that.

So, from all I told you, do you think there is a solution to fix this problem?

[RoboColum_n_]

Hi Coami.

I happen to know that Peter is more than likely away from an internet connection today so unable to respond. Unfortunately for you Rick, Peter and myself are not terribly familiar with FlashHelp output. We do understand what is is and how to generate it but that is about the limit of our Flash knowledge. That said, let me address some of your issues.

A source control application is software designed for use in teams required to share the same source files. In essence one team member "checks out" a file which places a lock on it thereby preventing any other team member from changing it until it has been "checked in". It always ensures people work on the latest source. It also means you have a backup and audit trail of what has changed.

If your source is only on your local machines, this begs the question how you ensure that you always have the latest version before you work on it. OK you don't actually need a source control application. You can backup to a network drive and copy and paste RH project files from there. The issue with this is that there is no control over two or more people working on the project at the same time.

As to your problem, the fact that it only seems to happen on some PCs and only with FlashHelp output seems to point to a Flash setting. Is there any difference to the Flash versions installed on your and your colleague's PC?

[Guest]

Hi RoboColum(n),

Thanks for your answer.

Is svn a source control application. We're using this tool to update and commit the modifications we daily bring to our output.

I think this is it because we always make sure that we dont work on the same topic, it allows us to download/update each others modifications and it provides us backup files.

As for the Flash versions installed, I'm currently working with:

Adobe Flash Player 11 ActiveX version 11.4.402.287 and Adobe Flash Player 11 Plugin version 11.3.300.265.

My colleague works with:

Adobe Flash Player 11 ActiveX version 11.3.300.265 and Adobe Flash Player 11 Plugin version 11.3.300.265.

Maybe the issue comes from there.

What do you guys think?

[RoboColum_n_]

Hi there. Yes SVN is a source control application so that covers that. However it does not stop (or warn) you that someone else has a file checked out until you check it back in. All it does is check that your local copy of the source is not different from the checked in version. There is a way you can lock files in SVN but I believe this is on an individual file basis. We tried locking the RH project's .XPJ file when we checked a project out. This places a visual flag on the file which we used to look for before checking out. This worked but actual verbal communication works arguably better As long as you are aware of that it is a perfectly good source control solution.

It maybe worth seeing if you can go back to the same Adobe Flash Player 11 ActiveX version as your colleague as see if that is the issue.

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

I would tend to agree with Colum on his suggestion to try and roll back your Flash Player/Plug-in version to the identical versiion and see if the issue goes away.

Another way to test for possible Flash Player/Plug-in issues is by testing with both Microsoft Internet Explorer and FireFox. Each of these browsers implements the Flash Player differently. (IE uses an ActiveX control while FireFox uses a helper add-in) And it's quite common to find that each browser has a different version of the obect. So I'd try in both browsers. I'd also check the version of the Flash Player object in each browser.

In addition to that, I'd be curious to know the following.

You said you and your colleague both share the editing tasks using SVN. What I'm curious to know is whether only one of you actually creates the FlashHelp and publishes or if sometimes it's you and sometimes it's your colleague.

If the former, do you see the same issue or does it only occur when one of you creates the output?

Knowing the answer to this may help identify what is happening.

Cheers... Rick

[Peter Grainge]

To downgrade Flash, there is a Flash uninstaller on Adobe's site.

[Guest]

About going back to a previous version:

I cannot find a way to download and install Adobe Flash Player 11 ActiveX 11.3.300.265.

All I get is the 11.3.300.265 plugin which is not the same thing. Everytime, I find something close to the activeX version, I end up with the last version... 11.4.402.287.

When I go to the adobe page: http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/archived-flash-player-versions.html#main_Archived_versions I get some mac archives and I'm working with a PC..

About the web browser:

My user guide opens from its software where users press F1 to access it.

When I try to open the .htm file in a web browser, I have a "Adobe Flash player has stopped a potentially unsafe operation..."

About the FlashHelp publishing:

My colleague is the only one to publish. The both of us used to publish but it generated big issued. MapId links didn't work anymore and we had to go back to a previous version of the output through svn to correct the issue.

Now, only my colleague generates the output and he doesn't get this stack overflow issue.

[Guest]

I finally made it to the previous version, cutting off my internet connection.

It doesn't fix the problem... and thats somewhat a good thing because we cant just call our customers worldwide and ask them to go back to a previous flash player version.

Robocolum(n) spoke about the XPJ file. Do you think that it might come from this file?

[RoboColum_n_]

Whilst I'm not denying that you had issues when you both used to publish, you shouldn't have been having these issues. I am tempted to ask you (not your colleague) to publish the output. Then tell me if you or your colleague have any issue. Make sure you have a backup first just in case. I am just wondering now whether location is an issue here. Is your colleaque located with you or in some other part of this vast place we call our world?

BTW I mentioned the XPJ file as a way to identify whether someone else was editing the RH project. We haven't entirely discounted source control as the cause of this issue but I doubt the XPL file is at the centre of it.

[Guest]

I tried to generate locally, on my computer, and I still have the stack overflow error message.

What do we need to do with the XPL file is the issue comes from it?

[Guest]

Hello,

Something 'silly' happened.

I use Google Chrome as a web browser and I don't know why but I downloaded Mozilla Firefox and TADA my problem was solved... No stack overflow anymore, the search tool worked fine!

The problem is. We can't tell our customers all over the world 'Please, download Firefox to use the search tool'. Sounds a little bit ridiculuous..

Given that, do you know how I could fix the stack overflow issue in Robohelp, and generate a user guide with a search tool that works without mozilla firefox?

Thanks in advance.

[RoboColum_n_]

If the problem is limited to Chrome then there is an issue with how that browser renders the content of the topics. This is not RoboHelp's fault. As a result the fix is to change the RoboHelp topic or tell your users not to use Chrome. I personally do not see an issue with telling users this. Software applications the world over tell users the specifications they support and a list of known issues. Why should your company be any different?

[Guest]

Simply because in some companies, employees are not free to download THE web browser they want. In most companies, they can only use IE for example. Besides, even when IE is set as default browser on my computer, the stack overflow occurs.

I thought that you could provide me some information about how firefox is able to get round this problem.

I'm not trying to give you a hard time or make you lose your time, I'm just trying to understand and to find the best solution possible here

[Guest]

Hello guys,

I'm coming back at you because I have more information about my stack overflow issue and I'm sure that you'll be able to help me.

I can't remember whether I told you that or no but we're developing software and we have two versions: 32-bit and 64-bit.

We just noticed that:

- Almost everyone in the company does have the stack overflow issue with the 64-bit version of the software.

- No one has the issue with the 32-bit version.

Problem: We're about to move away from the 32-bit version.

Do you think that the issue might come from the version of Flash Player installed on our computers ?

I noticed that the Flash Player 32-bit version is currently installed on my computer. Could it be the reason why I dont have a stack

overflow with the 32-bit version of the software ?

I tried to remove it and install the 64-bit version but it doesn't work.

I hope that these new information may help you to help me.

Thanks in advance,

Thibault

[RoboColum_n_]

I have been reading back through this thread and there are a couple of things that I don't think we have established:

• Is the problem only when you search for a topic that contains Flash output?
• At what point exactly does the stack overview occur?

I also wonder whether you can search on a project that contains no Flash output. Perhaps you could try for us?

[Guest]

First of all, thanks for your answer RoboColum(n).

• Is the problem only when you search for a topic that contains Flash output?

All my topics contain Flash outputs. I generate my output files on a folder that is embedded into the software.When in the software, I click F1 and the Flash User Guide opens.The search function works (or not) depending on the software version (32/64-bit).

• At what point exactly does the stack overview occur?

We have two versions of the software a 32-bit version and a 64-bit version.

The search function works fine with the 32-bit version.

The problem occurs when I use the 64-bit version. When I type in a word, for example "unit", the stack overflow message appears. See below:

As you can see, it looks like the search function freezes while the stack overflow message appears.

And I never get this error message with the 32-bit version of our software.

I also wonder whether you can search on a project that contains no Flash output. Perhaps you could try for us?

What do you mean by that?

As I told you previously, my Flash Player version is a 32-bit one.

Do you think that the issue might come from there?

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Try using one of the sample projects that RH provides – like Salesbuilder

[Guest]

I cannot open a sample project of RH in my company's software.

So I cannot test it.

[RoboColum_n_]

I think Jeff was trying to get to you to test this locally (i.e. not through your application). Or are you saying that the problem ONLY occurs when you run the help through the application. It would be good to know.

[Guest]

Alright. I understand that.

I only run the help through the application since my customers use the user guide like that.

Have you ever heard or read about cases where the version of flash player might stop the good working of a flash help user guide?

I'll explain it again: we have two products. A 32-bit one and a 64-bit one. We're about to move away from the 32-bit one, so this is a major/must-fix issue for us.

The search function works fine with the 32-bit version of our product.

The search functions generates a stack overflow message with the 64-bit version of our product.

[Anjaneai_Srivastava]

I recently came across a same issue, Can you please go to -- Tools -- Options -- Clear project Cache (.CPD) before opening any project.

Close and Re-open the project again.

Republish your project both as WebHelp/Flash Help and verify the results.

Thanks,

Anjaneai