A strong "last sttraw" - Heroic open

[K.Daube]

If there is a file open, you can open another "corrupted" file by using Heroic open (ESC o H). I have discovered a very very useful function of this command: open a file which is to high a level for the current FM.

I currently have severe problems with FM-16.0.0.754: as soon as the file explorer becomes involved, FM quits without further notice (no message, no dump, no sound, no grunt…). See bug FRMAKER-9277.

Hence I could not save my work done in FM-16 to the lower level to continue with FM-15.

But then...

I opened the FM-16 file in my text editor and changed the <MakerFile 16.0> at the very beginning of the file to <MakerFile 15.0>. Of course this violates the checksum - hence the file is considered corrupted.

But alas; it can be opened in FM-15 with Heroic Open!

Good save the Queen! - or better: the programmer who had programmed this feature!

[Bob_Niland]

Klaus,
Thanks for the report. Heroic Open hasn't been discussed in a while, and I'm glad to hear the feature is evidently being maintained.

It's not exactly well documented, so I expected there are cases where it won't work.

[K.Daube]

After a number of tests with various versions of FM creating files and trying to open them heroically in a lower version of FM: Heroic open is the last straw! But it may break also:

In the following table FMxx→yy means: created by FM xx, first bytes modfied to yy.

Current FM	Opening heroically	Result, message
15	SimpleFM16→15.fm	Correctly opened
15	SimpleFM16→14.fm	There was a problem reading this file. Please check your file system, disk, and network.
15	SimpleFM16→13.fm	There was a problem reading this file. Please check your file system, disk, and network.
14	SimpleFM15→14.fm	FM crashes after a while during open.
14	SimpleFM16→15.fm	Although …\Simple FM16—15.fm appears to be a FrameMaker document, it can’t be opened with this release of the product.
14	SimpleFM16→14.fm	There was a problem reading this file. Please check your file system, disk, and network.