b29: SuperEdit can't be launched on my MacBook Air

[komouton]

This symptom has been found since b28.

SuperEdit can be launched on my iMac (late 2009), but can't on my MacBook Air (mid 2011).

When on MacBook Air, SuperEdit shows a dialog of "End of file error reported. This disk may be damaged."

I have tried various copies of SuperEdit on Air and iMac. The results are same: SuperEdit can't be launched only on Air.

Both computers have identical OS ( Sierra 10.12.6). Only suspected difference is that iMac uses SATA hard disk and Air uses flash storage.

Is there any people having the same experience?

[Scott]

Try logging into the Guest account and see if you can launch SuperEdit while logged into it.

[komouton]

I can't launch SuperEdit in Guest account, too.

[codegreen]

This error is (obviously) generated when SE tries to read past the end of a file (and the File Manager complains).

Normally this indicates a damaged project, resource, alias, or preference file. Unfortunately it's a generic sort of error that can be generated any of dozens of places in the code. It can also be a warning of disk corruption though, so (if you haven't already) before you do anything else you should probably first run Disk Utility on the Air.

If you launch Activity Monitor and use it to sample SE when the error dialog is open and then post the call stack from the main thread, it may be possible to get a better idea of where things are going into the weeds. This doesn't always work though, as the dialog typically only presents after return from whatever low-level function threw the error (so one can't always tell at that point what triggered it).

You can also compare the lists of open files AM shows for both the misbehaving copy and the good one on your other Mac right after successful launch. There's a decent chance that the problematic file will be either the last one in the bad copy's list or the one in the good copy's list that comes right after its equivalent to the last one in the bad copy's list (if you gather my drift).

Or you could just throw away everything (including SC's Application Support folder and SE's prefs files and recent items folder) and do a fresh install. If you don't care what the cause of the problem is and just want to fix it, that approach typically requires the smallest investment of time and tooth enamel.

HTH,
-Mark

[komouton]

Thank you for instructions.

I tried to read reports from Activity Monitor, but I don't know how to read them, so I couldn't comprehend.

Then I tried fresh-reinstallation and it was succeeded.

Although the underlying cause has been unrevealed, SE can be launched normally now.

Thanks.

[codegreen]

FWIW if you're reasonably comfortable in Terminal, it's easy to get this information from there:

Code: Select all

lsof -c SuperEdit

will return a chronological list of SuperEdit's open files, and

Code: Select all

sample SuperEdit 0 1 | grep "in SuperEdit"

will return a single sample, filtered to just the lines of interest.

If this happens again figuring out which file is damaged is something you'll have to do at your end, but if you post the output of sample here I may be able to give you some clues what to look for.

BTW if you want to start by filtering out most of the system frameworks to whittle the file list down to a more manageable size, try:

Code: Select all

lsof -c SuperEdit | grep -v "/System/Library/"

Those frameworks could still be the source of the problem of course, but it's likely this would affect SuperCard as well as SuperEdit (which you didn't mention happening).

In either case, start at the bottom and work up...

HTH,
-Mark