With Version 3.2, I was hoping for less access violations, but it's still happening.
 

With the release of 3.2, I was hoping for less access violations, but alas, it is still happening.

I actually stopped using Version 3.1 for a while because of this.

It is a somewhat difficult thing for us to send the entire database over each time to be diagnosed each time we encounter such a problem because there would be confidential information in the database as well.

I think Kinook must find a solution to this problem as it does makes one feel uneasy that somewhere along the way, we may lose data without even knowing about it.

Is there a debug build for UltraRecall 3.2 ?

What does all these access violations mean anyway ?

Apart from one other program, I have never encountered such Access Violations with other application programs.

Perhaps such problems manifest in other ways, such as the famous BSOD for Windows and I do not have many of those each year.

The only thing I can say is that so far, I have not lost any data (as far as I can tell) due to an access violations.

This is may be not just a coincidence ...

I arrived here at the form today to vent out my frustration and this love-hate relationship with UR. I love it 99% of the time and I hate it when it just disappears or start throwing this AV errors.

I do not want to complain, but I do want to scream load enough for the kinook team to hear us and do something about it.

I had a presentation today I was given out for people at the company. For some reason (and it was a bad one) I decided to user UR to put most of my presentation references. In about 2 hours, it threw 3 AV errors and disappeared once. As much as I got conditioned to expect this, I always hit control+s obsessively since I know it will crash at some point or another. In one of these instances, it crashed before me hitting KB to save it. Even though I did not lose a lot, I just did not remember what is it that I was working on since my last save. It was a text addition/update somewhere, this is all I remember.

I do not remember the UR work flow that precipitated these crashes. it catches me while my attention is so much focused on something else. There is no way for me to be attentive to every click, event, move I perform in UR to tell something you can reproduce.

However, I can tell is almost most of my crashes, it was related to some of these maneuvers ...
- closing tabs.
- Multiple tabs containing web sites or pdf docs.
- Organizing a group of nodes in the tree, specially deletes.


So, kinook, please tell me something new this time. Do not tell me to send you anything because I can't...
- It is all private and corporate confidential stuff
- I can not tell you how to reproduce it.

Also, do not tell me that you have not experienced these crashes. And please DO NOT TELL me to keep number of tabs minimal. I can not believe for a moment that you are not aware or seen these issues.

I do not know what else to say... but let me make some suggestions...

- IMPROVE the Instrumentation of your code to better handle these unexpected exceptions. Truly, the VERY BARE minimum you can do is trap these exceptions as they occur and have UR generate an exception report that can be e-mailed to you. So many apps do this already. I know your time and resources are limited. But BELIEVE me, most if not all users will be fine if you freeze all new features. Take your time to write this and build it into UR.

- please open up you beta testing program to allow us to participate in it. At this point, I personally do not trust your existing beta program. It has proven to be insufficient.

- Freeze all new features. I do not want a single feature added to it. Focus on fixing these major stability issues.

- Hire a software QA person for a short-term contract, may be 6 months. Having work for you full time till it is fixed.

I share your sentiments on this Access Violations (AV) cnewtonne.

This issue should be given the highest priority or UR will just end up losing customers.

I figured that the more I use UR, the more these AVs will weigh on me as I would have to contend with an ever growing risk that I would lose a chunk of my critical data as I use UR more and more.

Despite having paid for UR, I would much rather not use it so long as Access Violations keep rearing their ugly head. I think UR owe it to its users to lick this problem.

I mean, you can give me the most beautiful and efficient aircraft flying at Mach 3, but if on every other flight it crashes, I would rather fly in a trusty old aircraft that gets me there in 3 times the time and rarely if ever crashes.

It's the same with databases.

Peace of mind that the program is stable is far more important than new features right now.

It crashes (definitely not on every other flight, my experience is in about 1 in 100 times I run it), but surprisingly, no ones hurt ... so you just carry on ... and you still get to your final point almost 3 times faster ... ;-)

Would I want these Access Violation disappear? Definitely YES! Am I really bothered that much, knowing that I NEVER ever lost any data when I experienced the crash? Definitely NO!

I gave up using Ask Sam to use Ultra Recall because UR had features in that I could use that Ask Sam did not, also that the authors of UR do listen to what is said on the forums.

Ask sam was as steady as a rock and on the whole Ultra Recall is but like others have, I do get error messages of one sort or another which is a shame.

Like others often I do not know what caused them and so far I have not lost any data, I have even had the program locked so I have to kill the program to restart it.

I also would like the option of UR generate a report to send to Kinook whenever the program has a problem.

Whether the problems are caused by the interaction of other running programs I do not know.

I have had other programs that have done this and either solved the problem myself, stopped using them or the offending software the company solved the problems for me. I use a lot of programs but these do not get the errors like UR does.

Ultra Recall is a fantastic program, I like it and use it allmost every single day, I believe striving for reliability and ease of use (however complicated a program is) should be of the highest priority, above the introduction of any new features.

Would I recommend Ultra Recall to others? YES, but with hesitations because of the intermittent error problem.

An auto generated error report send to Kinook maybe could help solve some of these problems.

this was requested by users some time ago, but Kinook replied that it's not that easy. But if Kinook uses UR as often as we do, they must have experienced the same access violation errors, and should be able to debug it.

Kinook, what's your point of view on this problem?

I completely agree and to all of the above I would add one additional observation. The registry tweaks have improved the speed somewhat, but not to the point where UR is competitive with some of its competition. The tweaks can only do so much and they do not fix the underlying problem that the database engine is so darned slow when it comes to importing and exporting items. Recently I imported an mbx file to a new database. 18,319 messages (with attachments) took 4 hours 47 minutes to import. This is outrageous. Please don't tell be about all the background activity going on in UR because the other programs I have in mind all index as well. Import times for these programs is less than 14 minutes and in one case, less than 5 minutes! It is not always practical for me to perform these time intensive operations when the computer is normally idle, which I should not have to do in any case. Work arounds for basic problems are not an answer.

I disagree with Quant about his take on access violations, and I have yet to experience one with any other program on my computer except those I am beta testing and FINAL RELEASES OF UR. With that in mind, why should anyone have to put up with access violations in 3.x final release of a product?

I also grow weary of these gripes. What has been discussed in this thread are fundamental issues which should be resolved before mucking about with new features.

Jon

just name the other programs, otherwise your post has little to no value ...

There must be something that underlies the extreme differences in importing time, ... but otoh how often do you import 19000 messages in one go? ;-) Anyway, the performance issues are not the main point of this thread ...

I do not think it proper to mention competitor's programs in a forum graciously hosted by Kinook. Suffice it to say that the programs are older, well established products. That is not to say that they are without flaws - every one that I have used (including UR) have been imperfect. But I was commenting on speed, that's all.

Jon

blaaaah ... not saying the names is worse in this case, cause you might be lying about those performance differences! There might be some aspect of the programs that directly affects the import speed, without specifying which programs it was, really your post had no value ...

You can read the terms when you signed to these forums, there is nothing like competitor soft cannot be mentioned or explicitly compared,

"By clicking the Agree button, you warrant that you will not post any messages that are obscene, vulgar, sexually-orientated, hateful, threatening, or otherwise violative of any laws."

One thing is "compare" the different aspect of various programs, another is criticize without backing your claims ...

Unfortunately we are not experiencing these Access Violations (or the app disappearing), and only a handful of users have reported encountering them, which makes them difficult to identify and resolve.

Does everyone agree that, as has been posited on this thread, the AVs being experienced seem to be tab related?

Could everyone who has posted (or reads the forum and experiences AVs with Ultra Recall) email to support@kinook.com) the info found at Help | About | Install Info? Also include your Internet Explorer version. Finally, please report if you are displaying the Database Toolbar.

Hopefully compiling that list will help identify a common denominator (windows version/SP number, IE version, settings, or some combination) and help us create a trace build focused on resolving these reported problems.

OK, I'll take the bait. Yes, I might be lying (offense taken) but I am not. The programs are askSam and InfoSelect. I have also developed a way to import to Ecco Pro, albeit without attachments. Finally, there is a way to convert a mbx file to dbf (with all attachments) and then import (almost instantly) into a database program such as FileMaker (which I use).

Jon

... meant purely hypothetically, huuuge difference ... no offense intended ...

thanks

Install Info

Ultra Recall Professional 3.2
Registered to: XXXXXXXX (1-user license)
Windows version: 5.1.2600.2.0
Install path: C:\Program Files\UltraRecall
EncryptPDF.dll version 3.0.0.2
mimepp.dll version 3.0.4
pdf2txt.dll version 3.1.0.4
PolarSpellChecker.dll version 4.0.5.4
riched20.dll version 5.50.99.2014
SftPrintPreview_IX86_U_10.dll version 1.05
SftTree_IX86_U_50.dll version 5.06
UltraRecall.exe version 3.2.0.1
unins000.exe version 51.46.0.0
Database filename: E:\datafiles\UltraRecall\NewWithTransfers.urd
Database version: 3.0.12

The AVs I faced are not tab related as currently I use UR to capture webpages and I did add some notes. The AV invariably happens when or during the process of saving the webpages from Firefox 2.0.0.6.

The database toolbar is turned off
I'm using a Toshiba Tecra M2 laptop running
Windows XP SP2 with 1GB of Ram
AVG Free
Windows Defender (Anti Spyware)

aaaah, two very competitively priced products :)

askSam $395 (the indexing version)
InfoSelect $250

but, of course, that's not an excuse for UR to be slow ...

Kinook, could it be the undo feature, or commit command, or some problem with indexing, ... ? The reported differences are of different orders of magnitudes! There must be something ...

Ultra Recall Professional 3.2
Registered to: Jon Polish (1-user license)
Windows version: 5.1.2600.2.0
Install path: C:\Program Files\Ultra Recall
EncryptPDF.dll version 3.0.0.2
mimepp.dll version 3.0.4
pdf2txt.dll version 3.1.0.4
PolarSpellChecker.dll version 4.0.5.4
riched20.dll version 5.50.99.2010
SftPrintPreview_IX86_U_10.dll version 1.05
SftTree_IX86_U_50.dll version 5.06
UltraRecall.exe version 3.2.0.3
unins000.exe version 51.46.0.0
Database filename: C:\Documents and Settings\Jon Polish\My Documents\Ultra Recall\JP.urd
Database version: 3.0.12

I display the database toolbar most of the time, but have gotten AVs without it. Using IE 6.0.

Jon

I'm seeing acces violations and other crashes regularly also. I've posted about these before, and now I've largely resigned myself to that fact. That and increasing anxiety about how UR will handle stored files as my dbs hit near 800MB has prompted me to shift out of UR except for passwords/etc. (I know folks have recommended just linking, but for me, that doesn't fit my workflow.)

I know that Kinook tried hard to debug--it just wasn't meant to be.

no AVs
 

I'd like to add my 2 cents: I'm *not* getting AVs in UR and I use it for hours at a time.

Now, I'm not bragging , but this must be a clue. I assume it's something about my setup/how I use UR.

I *know* it can't be clean living!

Here's my info:

Ultra Recall Professional 3.2
Registered to: Ralph Smith (1-user license)
Windows version: 5.1.2600.2.0
Install path: C:\Program Files\UltraRecall
EncryptPDF.dll version 3.0.0.2
mimepp.dll version 3.0.4
pdf2txt.dll version 3.1.0.4
PolarSpellChecker.dll version 4.0.5.4
SftPrintPreview_IX86_U_10.dll version 1.05
SftTree_IX86_U_50.dll version 5.06
UltraRecall.exe version 3.2.0.1
unins000.exe version 51.46.0.0
C:\WINDOWS\system32\MsftEdit.dll version 5.41.15.1514
C:\WINDOWS\system32\RichEd20.dll version 5.30.23.1228
Database filename: C:\Documents and Settings\ralf\My Documents\Ultra Recall Data\Work.urd
Database version: 3.0.12

Three things jump out at me compared to the users who've posted in this thread and are getting AVs:

- I never work with more than one tab open. I just forget! The other 2 pane PiMs I've used didn't have tabs, so I never use them.

- My Riched20.dll is 5.30. I notice ones in this thread of 5.50. On my system, the only riched20 5.50 is the one included with Office 2003. If the users with AVs are using the Office RTF control, that could be a factor...

- I use Inernet Explorer 7. Maybe it's not significant, but it's a difference.

Hope this helps...

R

So what are you using now?

Jon

As for the replacement, I'm looking into the following:

Zoot, which I used for a long time (for password like info). A 32bit beta is now circulating.

Onenote, for the more project support management that I was using UR.

As for embedding files, I'm trying to see if Onenote will behave well as a page holder for files. Since each onenote section is a separate physical file, less chance of size getting to be aproblem.

I know that it doesnt' search embedded files, which is a problem, although there's some hints that the next iteration will address this weakness.

I have used Web Research (formerly contentsaver) for web page saves, which works quite well. But I need to decrease the # of repositories, which is why I'm looking so hard into Onenote.

Evernote has some of the features of Zoot, but it overlaps too much with Onennote to justify another app. Also, as much as I hate to say this, banking on MS for long-term survival is a safe bet. The smaller shops are extremely innovative, but inevitably riskier.

Again, I wish I could get UR not to crash. And although I haven't lost data through crashes generally, if you're working on an embedded file when it crashes, you can easily lose the most recent changes. And mass imports of hundreds of files and trying to keep them in sync are tricky endeavors; I have lost data "importing" files, then deleting them off my hard drive, only to find that some of the imports didn't stick.

UR is an extraordinary proram, but for some of us, there are idiosyncratic conflicts that, at least for me, are serious enough to migrate out. Most seem to have no problem, so congrats and keep enjoying UR!

This was the instructions that Kinook emailed to us on 22 Aug.

1) Exit UR
2) Download and extract http://www.kinook.com/Download/test.zip to the UR
installation path
3) Start UR
4) Perform the step that results in the error / slow import
5) ZIP and send a screenshot of the error (if error condition) and
%TEMP%\ks_trace.txt
6) As much detail as possible on the steps that resulted in the error / slow
import

----------

Where may I find the file ks_trace.txt

it is in your %TEMP% directory, this depends on your setting of TEMP variable, default is somewhere in documents and setting/ your user name/ ...

I don't know exactly, cause when I install windows I always change to it C:/Temp ... go you control panel/system/advanced/environment variables

Thanks Quant

Found it.

More precisely the full path is

C:\Documents and Settings\YourUserName\Local Settings\Temp\ks_trace.txt

You can type %TEMP% into a Window Explorer address bar, Run dialog, File dialog, etc., to navigate there.

nice trick, I didn't know that ...

AV: No RTTI Data
 

Kinook,
I got this error twice today. It happened as I was moving a bunch of items from one node to another. This process required a frequent opening/closing of tabs. The error started when I closed one of the tabs.

AV from User Behavior
 

Running URp v.3.2.1

Last night I was working in a database that contained Folders for Artists and Albums. With focus on the Albums folder, individual Album Items were shown in the Child Pane. I would select the first Album for an Artist (in the Child Pane), hold Shift, and select the last Album for an Artist, then Alt-L for the Copy/Move/Link popup - Move selection to appropiate Artist Item.

The Album Item has a Form Assigned to it, and upon selecting the first Album Item if I did not wait for the associated Form to load in the Detail Pane before selecting the last Album for an Artist, I would get an Access Violation. This Violation was so servere that it would require a Closing UR.

Once I realized the user behavior that was triggering this event I was able to modify my behavior. I have seen similar behavior in other database programs - allowing one operation (loading the form for a record) to complete before beginning a new one is usually a good practice.

Just my two cents.

ashwken ...
good catch. Thanks for sharing

Access violation caused by right clicking on a link in the details pane of only tab and choosing Open in new Tab.

Ultra Recall Professional 3.2.1
Registered to: D--- (1-user license)
Windows version: 5.1.2600.2.0
Install path: C:\Program Files\UltraRecall
EncryptPDF.dll version 3.0.0.2
mimepp.dll version 3.0.4
pdf2txt.dll version 3.1.0.4
PolarSpellChecker.dll version 4.0.5.4
RICHED20.DLL version 5.50.99.2010
SftPrintPreview_IX86_U_10.dll version 1.05
SftTree_IX86_U_50.dll version 5.06
UltraRecall.exe version 3.2.1.0
unins000.exe version 51.46.0.0
Database filename: C:\Ultra Recall Data\DASNotes.urd
Database version: 3.0.12

Kevina: I emailed the info requested to your attention.

My personal opinion is that URp gets confused (AV's) when user has a # of tabs open & user updates the content in one of the windows & quickly switches to another tab window. The update of the first one is not necessarily completed by that point.

--
Jan Rifkinson
Ridgefield CT USA

AV with only two tabs open. Took my time with UR and treated it gently.

Ultra Recall Professional 3.2.1
Registered to: Jon Polish (1-user license)
Windows version: 5.1.2600.2.0
Install path: C:\Program Files\Ultra Recall
EncryptPDF.dll version 3.0.0.2
mimepp.dll version 3.0.4
pdf2txt.dll version 3.1.0.4
PolarSpellChecker.dll version 4.0.5.4
riched20.dll version 5.50.99.2010
SftPrintPreview_IX86_U_10.dll version 1.05
SftTree_IX86_U_50.dll version 5.06
UltraRecall.exe version 3.2.1.0
unins000.exe version 51.46.0.0
Database filename: C:\Documents and Settings\Jon Polish\My Documents\Ultra Recall\JP.urd
Database version: 3.0.12

guys, the pictures of the same AV errors won't help much, try to send the trace file ... :)

My Dear and lovely Kinook,
I have had 2 AV's today and once program disappearance. Even though I can not tell exactly what the procedure was, but I confirm the overall trend ...
- opening many tabs (7 on average).
- Selecting multiple items to move/copy
- closing tabs.

I can tell that it triggered almost always upon closing a tab. I had an older release of UR 3.1 with tracing enabled. Attached is the trace files and the AV error.

One last thing, triggering these kind of errors has been almost consistent for me in the general sense. That is, open a bunch of tabs, select multiple items, do something with them like move, go back and close tabs individually or in groups. At some point, you will greeted with these errors. I was able to produce them in these 2 times.

here is the other trace...

No access violation this time; just the UR has caused a problem and will be closed message. I had opened an info item that was a stored Word 2007 document in a third tab, right clicked on the URL attribute and chosen Open Shortcut.

After resisting for a while I'm afraid I have to join this AV band wagon.

Since I have started making use of new tabbed views, i.e. using multiple tabs, i am encountering these errors.

It appears to me that they occur if user finishes with one tabbed window & closes or jumps to another too fast.

IOW, while URp is saving / updating / digesting, it burps an AV.

A few times I have found that data entered did not take, that a tabbed item may be replaced by a different tabbed item. At one point URp selected all children of one item & for kicks I looked @ my user keywords to see if they had disappeared again & they were ALL selected... al kinds of weirdness.

It is a little un-nerving but except for the data not taking, no harm is done.

The thing is, that I got several AVs when no tabs were used. All we can do is to suply enough details + trace files to Kinook to investigate, hopefully they solve it for good, and move onto some nice new features :)

Can Kinook confirm that they're working on this? I'm getting a little worried by the frequency with which UR shuts down with some kind of error, although I must add that I haven't lost any data because of it. I do, though, use UR for taking notes and referring to information while I'm on the phone and it can cause a bit of a problem if it happens then!

Did anyone have a search start looping when closing tabs?

To explain:

Let's say I have 4-5 tabbed windows working.
I click on a favorite which is actually a saved search that starts automatically in a new tab

I find what I was looking for then shift to another tab or maybe close the search window

All of a sudden it comes back & then closes then comes back, etc. so it's looping.

I've also had this sort of behavior when working with an item derived from a URL -- local or external in similar circumstances.

I can't pinpoint steps to recreate it but it happens w enough frequency for me to know that there is a problem of some kind.

Exiting URp causes an AV & I have to manually remove UR from Task processes.

Edited 08/31/07 03:17 pm: just had the same thing happen again. agggggghhhhhhhhh.

Access violation again. 3 tabs open. Active one is a stored Word document. Clicked in the Explorer pain to view another info item and got Error loading item(s): Access violation.

Closed UR and opened it again. It had the same 3 tabs opened and immediately gave Error updating access date: Access violation.

Tried to close the errant tab after dismissing the error message and got a database is locked message. Then a reminder popped up. Had to close UR with task manager.

Now UR won't start. I see there is still an instance of it in task manager processes. Closed that and UR started and let me close the tab that was displaying the Word document.

These crashes are definitely occurring more frequently with the latest version of UR.