[CNfan]

Hello every body! I had a problem a few times while saving with the previous stable version. Now with the this new stable version (1.2.3766) I still encounter the same problem.
Here I describe: I can run different trains, I have many different players locomotives as well as a few static ones on the arizona route - which is a beautiful work by the way, thanks to the creator(s). They ar spread in every yards of the route as well as many consists of different wagons (or cars, I don't know how you call those in english). I have driven different trains leaving consist taking another one going back on my route leaving some and taking others and returning to Aguila where my player started. Back to Aguila, I jump to my switcher to manouver. Until now, I had made many savings with no problem during 9 days but yesterday and today I am having OR jumping out with a message that says the process cannot access the OpenRailsLog.txt (on the desktop) because it is being used by another process.
I have noticed by a search there've been something like that in the 2014 thread but without the line cannot access the file. Months ago I had that in Explorer in the Whitefish 10 route but now it is an activity. I thought my Avast antivirus was causing that so I put it in "game mode", OpenRails shortcut as well as all its exec files set in "Run this Program as an Administrator" but no change.
I've had corrupted saved with the previous stable version when that happens. I just resumed one now and it does work dispite the saved activity hasn't got its thumbnail. I just don't take chance and delete it and resume with a previous good save as I don't want to carry any problem in further save of the activity.
I attached the message and also included the log file.

I wrote everything that comes to mind but I'm sure someone will tell me what mignt be missing.
If any one has any idea for a solution, it will be very appreciated.
By the way, once the problem starts happening, by resuming to my previous save, I can play and save a few more time with no problem before it happens again.
Thank you!
P.S. I you're reading this line, it means you're patient. I'll try not to write a book next time!

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Attached File(s)

•  OpenRailsLog.txt (84.63K)
  Number of downloads: 553

[Jovet]

Since this error seems to happen a lot, I wonder if Open Rails can pull a "Handle" maneuver and actually get the Process ID or some info about what is holding the file. Similarly, instead of abending, maybe it should have the option to switch to a different filename, such as OpenRailsLog0.txt, and then OpenRailsLog1.txt, etc.

[CNfan]

Hello, I've taken many days before adding to this topic as I wanted to test further. Actualy, I noticed that this seems to happen when I'm running a loco at the start point of the route in my activity, in this case Aguila (Arizona). At the beginning of running in the activity, I can go to all the yards of the route, doing manouvers and come back to Aguila doing many saves on the way including at Aguila (start point where are many locos and rolling stock). Eventualy I go again and moving cars from one place to an other doing many saving with no problem, when returning to Aguila (start point) again I do some saving while moving cars and 1 on three will jump out with the message I mentioned previously. But, if I leave the yard in Aguila, I can make as many saves as I want no matter where I am on the whole route away from Aguila (starting point).
By the way Joseph, thank you for your suggestion. Actualy, I checked many time the processes and I downloaded from the "handle" link you put and did the search, no result, it seems there is no process holding the file "OpenRailsLog.txt" when I do a search, I kept it opened, did a search from time to time including just after each crash.

Now a second problem appeared, since I've done so many manouvers, traveled a few time along the route, then the saving time started to take longer to the point now that Open Rails is jumping out back to the menu with no message at all and that, away from Aguila. I tried to save three times while restarting from the previous good save. When it jump out to the menu, it does save but the save is no good despite it shows valid, it won't start from it and it gives this message, I attached.

Thank you.

Daniel

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[Jovet]

 CNfan, on 06 March 2017 - 02:04 PM, said:

By the way Joseph, thank you for your suggestion. Actualy, I checked many time the processes and I downloaded from the "handle" link you put and did the search, no result, it seems there is no process holding the file "OpenRailsLog.txt" when I do a search, I kept it opened, did a search from time to time including just after each crash.

I must confess that suggestion wasn't aimed really at you, but more at the OR Dev Team, since I still think it would be nice if OR would report what is holding the log file.

That utility won't do much good if the handle lock only exists for the few moments OR is trying to access the file. It also won't do much good if it's OR itself that has locked it, such as one thread writing to it and another trying to do the same thing.

[CNfan]

 Jovet, on 06 March 2017 - 09:07 PM, said:

I must confess that suggestion wasn't aimed really at you, but more at the OR Dev Team, since I still think it would be nice if OR would report what is holding the log file.

That utility won't do much good if the handle lock only exists for the few moments OR is trying to access the file. It also won't do much good if it's OR itself that has locked it, such as one thread writing to it and another trying to do the same thing.

Right, I was not sure I was understanding the correct way. I can now also understand your technical explanation. Nevertheless, thank you.

Daniel

[CNfan]

When I had a problem of "fatal error..." it suggested to report this error to the bug tracker. The thing is I'm not familiar with this yet so when I've seen the web page, it put me off as I didn't have much time to study how it works at the time.
Do you think I need to report these two problems or is it already reported by other people (as you wrote: this problem seems to happen a lot)?

I noticed all the save and replay files are saved in the user folder on the drive C (system), while my drive C isn't very big being a SSD, I put Open Rails and others on my HDD D:
I realised my SSD was filling up with open rails files so I had to delete my save file keeping the latest one and I manually deleted the replay files.
Is there a way I could set those files to be saved on my disk D instead? I haven't found a way.
If not, it would be nice to have an option to decide which disk where to save those files and, as I read in another post dated a couple years ago, having the option to save only the data of the snapshot instead of the whole cumulative. Each of my files.save were 1Gig at the end and I had over 20Gig of files (save, replay txt png).

Thank you for any commentary or help.

[cjakeman]

 CNfan, on 10 March 2017 - 03:36 PM, said:

Thank you for any commentary or help.

I sympathise with the limits which an SSD imposes.

Looking through the code, you can override the user's settings which are stored in the registry by creating an OpenRails.ini file in the same folder as OpenRails.exe. There is a comment in the code suggesting that, if an OpenRails.ini file was in use, then the Save and Replay files would be stored there instead of in your user area, which would solve your problem. This functionality is not yet implemented but it would be a small change.

Best wishes,

[Jovet]

 CNfan, on 10 March 2017 - 03:36 PM, said:

When I had a problem of "fatal error..." it suggested to report this error to the bug tracker. The thing is I'm not familiar with this yet so when I've seen the web page, it put me off as I didn't have much time to study how it works at the time.
Do you think I need to report these two problems or is it already reported by other people (as you wrote: this problem seems to happen a lot)?

It depends on what it is. I believe a user should be reasonably sure something is actually a bug when submitting a bug report. Frivolous bug reports help no one and can be aggravating to the limited amount of people who have to sort through them all. But it can be hard for users to know what is a bug and what isn't. That's what the Maybe It's a Bug forum here is for. You can post your log on there and describe what you were doing and what happened and wait to be advised on it.

 CNfan, on 10 March 2017 - 03:36 PM, said:

Is there a way I could set those files to be saved on my disk D instead? I haven't found a way.

You can employ a (NTFS) file system trick to do this, as long as the content is in a dedicated folder (which it is, for OR). You create the folder you want to use on your D: drive. You can copy the existing Open Rails files from your C: to your D: if you want, or just delete the existing ones on C:. Then you'll likely need to delete the folder on the C: drive. Finally, you can use a utility to create a junction on your C: drive which mimics the old folder in name and location but actually redirects that folder on to your D: drive. You can search to find one of several utilities which can do this. The effect is that Open Rails will see that folder on your C: drive and keep using it just like it has been. But, under the surface, that folder actually is stored on your D: drive. You can do this for many different folders and software, should you want to. For example, on systems where I've setup dedicated system partitions, I would re-locate the Outlook data files to another partition by changing the Outlook data folder to a junction that points to a folder on a different drive.

[CNfan]

 cjakeman, on 12 March 2017 - 07:40 AM, said:

I sympathise with the limits which an SSD imposes.

Looking through the code, you can override the user's settings which are stored in the registry by creating an OpenRails.ini file in the same folder as OpenRails.exe. There is a comment in the code suggesting that, if an OpenRails.ini file was in use, then the Save and Replay files would be stored there instead of in your user area, which would solve your problem. This functionality is not yet implemented but it would be a small change.

Best wishes,

Thank you very much for your reply, I will certainly look at this. Thanks for putting me on the right "track", most helpful!
Have a nice day!

[CNfan]

 Jovet, on 13 March 2017 - 01:47 PM, said:

It depends on what it is. I believe a user should be reasonably sure something is actually a bug when submitting a bug report. Frivolous bug reports help no one and can be aggravating to the limited amount of people who have to sort through them all. But it can be hard for users to know what is a bug and what isn't. That's what the Maybe It's a Bug forum here is for. You can post your log on there and describe what you were doing and what happened and wait to be advised on it.


You can employ a (NTFS) file system trick to do this, as long as the content is in a dedicated folder (which it is, for OR). You create the folder you want to use on your D: drive. You can copy the existing Open Rails files from your C: to your D: if you want, or just delete the existing ones on C:. Then you'll likely need to delete the folder on the C: drive. Finally, you can use a utility to create a junction on your C: drive which mimics the old folder in name and location but actually redirects that folder on to your D: drive. You can search to find one of several utilities which can do this. The effect is that Open Rails will see that folder on your C: drive and keep using it just like it has been. But, under the surface, that folder actually is stored on your D: drive. You can do this for many different folders and software, should you want to. For example, on systems where I've setup dedicated system partitions, I would re-locate the Outlook data files to another partition by changing the Outlook data folder to a junction that points to a folder on a different drive.

Thank you for your help, for the bug, it rings some bells, I vaguely remember seeing that part of the forum when I went around to familiarize myself. To you also, thank you for putting me on the right "track", I'll look at it.
Where the folder is concerned, I feel I'm going to learn something new through your suggestion. I've always sorted out my computer myself including the settings in the system, but I would admit I have never experimented this one before, having moved from Windows XP (with no SSD) directly to Windows 10, I never needed something this way.
Now with your suggestion and cjakeman's one, that gives me plenty to sort this out.
Thank you and have a nice day!