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anne-catherineb39500433
anne-catherineb39500433
Participant
May 7, 2015
Answered

FM11 crash on opening a book

  • May 7, 2015
  • 3 replies
  • 755 views

Hi,

FM11 frequently crashes on opening a book file, with the internal error 11004.

Even after having deleted the .lck (lock) file, we still cannot open the book and need to create a new one. Some book files contain many files, other only a few.

This is a major and blocking issue encountered by a few technical writers in our team.

Is anyone else experiencing the same issue?

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer Art_Campbell1

In addition to Jeff's questions...

On both your questions, are files local or on network drives? Network

timeouts or heavy traffic can delay transfer and opening of files by Frame,

especially if there are lots of files (not just frame files, but graphics

and text inserts and what have you). This can be aggravated by an

overzealous virus checker that that repeatedly checks each files one as it

is opened and/or accessed.

The fact that you're crashing then updating cross refs too would also point

to lots of file thrashing and churning because each of the target files has

to be opened to update the cross ref target.

You may try opening all files in the book, at least, if not all files that

are cross ref targets to see if that makes a difference.

Art Campbell

art.campbell@gmail.com

"... In my opinion, there's nothing in this world beats a '52 Vincent and

a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson

No disclaimers apply.

DoD 358

I support www.TheGrotonLine.com, hyperlocal news for Groton MA.

On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 5:21 AM, anne-catherineb39500433 <

3 replies

Arnis Gubins
Arnis Gubins
Inspiring
May 7, 2015

What's the history of the files being used in the book? Where they all created in FM11 or upgraded from an older version? Is any of the content in the files imported from Word? Sometimes updating the book file from older versions isn't a sure bet and you have to re-create the book. There may be some cruft in the files that is being encountered.

To ensure that there isn't any corruption in the files, you should use the BookMIFWash utility (once you get a new book file open) to do some internal house cleaning to the FM files.

anne-catherineb39500433
anne-catherineb39500433Author
Participant
May 11, 2015

Hi Arnis,

many thanks for your feedback. All the files are created with FM11. I will look into the BookMIWash utility as this could help, although according to Art, as all files are stored on a Network drive and most include imported graphics or text insets, this could explain the issues with crashes on book opening and Xreference solving.

Anne Catherine

A
Art_Campbell1Correct answer
Inspiring
May 7, 2015

In addition to Jeff's questions...

On both your questions, are files local or on network drives? Network

timeouts or heavy traffic can delay transfer and opening of files by Frame,

especially if there are lots of files (not just frame files, but graphics

and text inserts and what have you). This can be aggravated by an

overzealous virus checker that that repeatedly checks each files one as it

is opened and/or accessed.

The fact that you're crashing then updating cross refs too would also point

to lots of file thrashing and churning because each of the target files has

to be opened to update the cross ref target.

You may try opening all files in the book, at least, if not all files that

are cross ref targets to see if that makes a difference.

Art Campbell

art.campbell@gmail.com

"... In my opinion, there's nothing in this world beats a '52 Vincent and

a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson

No disclaimers apply.

DoD 358

I support www.TheGrotonLine.com, hyperlocal news for Groton MA.

On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 5:21 AM, anne-catherineb39500433 <

anne-catherineb39500433
anne-catherineb39500433Author
Participant
May 11, 2015

Hi Art,

many thanks for your feedback. The files are stored on a Network server and most include imported graphics. A slow traffic definitely affects the Xreference resolution and new cross reference setup.

Could this also affect the opening of a book that includes many files?

Anne Catherine

A
Art_Campbell1
Inspiring
May 11, 2015

​Yup. You're juggling both network traffic and lag and, probably,

additional lag caused by a virus checker. Workarounds would be to open all

files in the book or copying all files locally.

A potential solution (if you don't want to change your structure a lot)

would be to use a source control system such as CVS, so that when you check

out the book folder, you get a local copy of everything​. The advantage of

a source control system over manually copying is that you won't shut out

other people working on the same docs or chapters.

Art Campbell

art.campbell@gmail.com

"... In my opinion, there's nothing in this world beats a '52 Vincent and

a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson

No disclaimers apply.

DoD 358

I support www.TheGrotonLine.com, hyperlocal news for Groton MA.

On Mon, May 11, 2015 at 4:37 AM, anne-catherineb39500433 <

Jeff_Coatsworth
Community Expert
Jeff_CoatsworthCommunity Expert
Community Expert
May 7, 2015

First, are you all patched up? You don’t mention your version level. Next, have you been sending in your error logs when you crash? That helps get them on Adobe’s radar. Finally, have you tried doing a heroic open? How about MIF-washing your files? Any CMS at play in here?

anne-catherineb39500433
anne-catherineb39500433Author
Participant
May 11, 2015

Hi Jeff,

thanks for your feedback. We are using FM version 11.0.0.380 and have already sent some log files and screenshots to Adobe support team, whose feedback was not very relevant. All the files are stored on a server but not in any configuration management system nor CMS.

We haven't tried the MIF-washing technic yet. How would that work on a locked book file?

Jeff_Coatsworth
Community Expert
Jeff_CoatsworthCommunity Expert
Community Expert
May 11, 2015

I think the highest FM11 level right now is 11.0.2.384 so you’ve a bit of patching to do. You could try what’s called a “heroic open” (Fred Ridder offered this “"Heroic open" is an escape-key command that causes FrameMaker to ignore any of the conditions that normally cause warnings or messages during the open process, and therefore allows you to open files that have certain minor forms of corruption. You must have a blank .fm document open first. Then the command is Esc, o, H (meaning Escape, lower-case O, and capital H pressed in sequence rather than in combination).” on the Frameusers mailing list).

You might also try creating a fresh book and adding files to it to rebuild the damaged book.

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