AFPublisher "shuts-down" without notice or provacation

[Rowanfreemaker]

For whatever reason the software will simply shutdown or close. This happens randomly and without warning. Current actions after the last save and prior to this event are lost. Once this happens, I check the TASK-MANAGER to see if the software has any current processes' and there always appears to be none. This has happens with and without other programs running in the background. In addition, I've tried shutting down my anti-virus software. Note that is hasn't happened during a HD read or write cycle...yet
Since I haven't kept a formal record of how many times it's occurred so far; I would have to say it happens sometimes once or twice a month (with the software being used almost everyday).
It's doesn't happen that often, however when it does, it's extremely annoying, frustrating and disruptive.

WINDOWS10 HOME
NO HARDWARE ACCELERATION
LAPTOP'S RAM HAS BEEN UP GRADED from 8GB to 16GB (however, it's configured for shared memory -- video and OS share the RAM & cannot be altered)
 

[blackstone]

It seems, that the Publisher isn't save anymore.

[MikeTO]

Hi Rowan, welcome to the forum. What actions did you perform immediately before the application shut down? Is there any pattern that you're seeing?

[Rowanfreemaker]

2 hours ago, MikeTO said:

Hi Rowan, welcome to the forum. What actions did you perform immediately before the application shut down? Is there any pattern that you're seeing?

That truly doesn't matter. It's happened while moving or resizing an asset; while correcting or modifying type characters etc. I haven't noticed a pattern of any sort so far.

I've kept a record of just what I was doing at the time of "the crash" and there's no pattern. I can't list them here due to the size of the paragraphs. But trust me there's no pattern, again...as of yet. I failed to mention that it now happens with V2 of Publisher also.

I don't mind it so much, since (and please excuse my language "i f___kin' HATE adobe") as they won't allow me to register/activate my CS2 suite. (Purchased on disc, brand new sealed box, with license). They suck!!!!!

[MikeTO]

Hi Rowan, if there isn't a pattern and you're experiencing what seems like random crashes then that is a clue. If it was a pattern then it may be due to one specific bug but without a pattern it could be a performance settings issue.

Could you share a screenshot of your performance settings? I won't be of much help as a Mac user but perhaps one of the Windows experts might have some suggestions after reviewing your settings. It might also be helpful to share details on your graphics hardware.

Good luck.

[SrPx]

Yep, it would very helpful (Windows user here). Preferences -> Performance , Preferences -> tools , Preferences -> User interface screens, Preferences -> general. 

But the most useful thing is the crash report file (for devs. Link at the end of this post). You don't need to replicate again the crash, as it has been already generated, can post it as an attachment here (drag and drop the file from the folder, when creating a new post, over the light cyan-blue area at the end of the post where says "drag files here").

OP already mentioned the hardware acceleration- Open CL is off. That would have been my main suspect.

Some crashes can be too for a corrupt file of the system, or a corrupt file project, or a linked file  into it. Sometimes even a linked file's header that enters in conflict with Affinity (we've seen this, PNGs with certain headers, etc). About that, re-saving those linked files with any Affinity app, and re link again often solves the issue.

About the case of there being corrupt system files, it is highly recommended to run the command line (in the Windows terminal/console) SFC and DISM commands (It's not a good idea to do it without instructions). 

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/sfc-scannow-and-dismexe-online-cleanup-image/db3b24de-a261-403e-9d11-8141d13f7954

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/use-the-system-file-checker-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system-files-79aa86cb-ca52-166a-92a3-966e85d4094e

Other apps are less sensitive, but with these apps Windows has to be totally up to date, and the graphic drivers, the newest ones for your card. You don't have a dedicated card, so it must be the mother board, the chipset drivers being installed and up to date.

These are good measures in general to keep a pristine system, less tending to crashes, so, it's good overall, though. 

I understand that the system is  using an APU or iGPU, integrated graphics in the CPU (as it's using shared memory). If it has only 0.5 or less RAM dedicated to the graphics, I would change in BIOS (you mentioned that it can't be changed. BIOS's access is denied? It wouldn't be surprising...I think there's a trick, though...) to set around 2GB. Would never do this in a 8GB system, of course, but you have 16. It's decreasing quite the memory for a 16gb one, but I'd totally do it if you don't count on a dedicated card (which, by far, highly recommended. A cheap 1650 is tons better than any current integrated APU or iGPU, for Affinity and many apps).

If it is happening like twice a month it could be cases of memory for the graphics (working as "vram") getting filled only in certain rare occasions. I believe Open CL off does not mean that the graphics card or chip is doing nothing (unless you set WARP(render by software) in preferences, but that could be painfully slow).

Being so rare the crashes, I would really dig if I can find a pattern in the specific files I am linking, or the type of files that they are. Or, if I can find any sort of pattern in what I did (like MikeTO suggested, as there's hardly a better way), even if haven't figured out any till the moment, I'd run mentally what I did, sometimes stuff escape a first thought. Specially as you normally are not getting the crashes. Although an unstable system or installation can behave randomly like that, too.

It's useful to know the RAM (in Windows Settings-> System-> "About". Both the allocated and reserved, it tells it you there. The CPU (in some rare cases the CPU is extremely weak, while doing very complex projects). And the operating system and version (found as well in that Windows Settings, About area).

The link for how to find (to attach here in a post or etc) the crash reports in Windows :

 

 

[SrPx]

Maybe I am assuming too much in saying that you don't have a dedicated graphics card solely from knowing your system is sharing memory for graphics... it could be having both! It'd be very dumb then from the laptop vendor to waste system memory in that case, but I would not be too surprised.

RAM " has been upgraded". This... sometimes is not done the right way: The RAM brand/model, etc might not be fully compatible. Or a problem while setting the  timings, etc. Or mixing chips (latency, etc), etc, etc. Here's hoping is nothing of that... Way less of a probability when  installing anew a full 2x8 kit (two chips as a kit so to use ell dual channel memory, as is hugely important in AMD. Also assuming it's an AMD CPU, intel's graphic has its own special memory, if I remember well .

When trying to reuse the 8GB you had, together with a new one... that can bring problems.

[Rowanfreemaker]

Thank you

You make a lot of good points, however I failed to mention that this symptom has happened many times prior the the RAM upgrade. In addition, I've had no issues with PHOTO and DESIGNER (at least thus far). So I'm currently ruling out the ram upgrade being related to the symptom. Also, since I've no other issues (of this type at least) with any other software, I'm narrowing it down to publisher itself.

Krita, LightRoom & adobe CS2 not one "hiccup" (of this type). I'm thinking if it were a hardware (shared memory) problem, there should or would have been a noticeable problem. These run fine, as did (CS2) InDesign - Photoshop & Illustrator.

So with this additional info, you can see why I've narrowed it down to Publisher.

What do you think? And thanks for the help.

[SrPx]

The integrated card can be an issue... maybe if the Affinity apps are not really designed for other thing than dedicated cards, or at least not so much. Also, for having much less capability, it all adds up. And many apps can crash if  the VRAM (or shared memory in this case) is not enough. Blender is rock solid stable now, but till recently (don't know now, at the speed it evolves) it would crash if you tried to GPU render with Cycles a large scene that wouldn't fit in the VRAM memory. It would give you the feared red icon pop up window of 'insufficient memory', and usually not crash the entire app, but a crash (render lost), nontheless. Many other apps, too.

That crashes are not happening with other software doesn't mean  there can't be problems in an OS or drivers. I was of that idea, as am geeky too, and we tend to think we have our OS  under control (not that this is really possible with Windows) to realize after a DISM and SFC run that I, like many in this forum (and in the world, surely), had some corrupted system files (in my case, they weren't the culprit of the problems, but I for sure don't want to have the system so). It's super common, as Windows is anything but clean handling certain things, and some software installers do a really bad job, and worse the uninstallers or Windows doing that. There's also power outages (even micro cuts), which without an UPS, make a corrupted file quite a possibility, etc... many ways in which a system file could get wrecked. So, I recommend always (if the person is tech savvy, you clearly seem so already in the first post) to run SFC and DISM. Yes, the other thing, hardware, is very rarely the case. But I wanted to rule out a messy RAM installation, or even having got a bad RAM chip (it happens more often than people think). If that's out of question, I'd say then is surely the most common in all what we've seen lately: The new update, until several iterations (typical situation in the beginning of a new software or some very heavy revamps in it) it's going to be very picky if  the OS is not very pristine in everything (.NET, Windows Updates/Windows version, disk with no bad sectors, graphic card driver up to date, etc) . Often it is just that other apps are more "tolerant"; other times, that the other apps use less modern methods and tech, etc.

So, I mean, that "but this and that work..." does not necessarily mean that it has to be Publisher (it of course can be...but a lot of people run it without crashes, so, research in your side is always convenient) : very often there's something in the  user's system. Indeed, most of the times, even if it does not trigger other apps crashing or errors. The benefit I see in this complicated situation is that those of us that have applied this system "curation", end up with a much more stable system, which is a +1 overall for serious work.

I would really recommend to upload the crash reports files (folder path to find them, I pasted it in some post above). I don't do it (so, what am I doing recommending it to others, hehe), but also I have no issues now, and  the ones I had, I discovered workarounds myself (I shared them around here, tho). I mean, it's the safest bet if you want to get it solved. I like to fiddle and find my tricks and workflows, but I am weird in that sense.

Being a crash that is hard to replicate, happens not very often (one of  the reasons that make me think there's sth wrong in  your system, hardware or -more likely- software/OS) , it makes it particularly hard to fix with a workflow (that is, not fix the bug, but find a workflow to avoid the bug, which all what my workarounds are, of course: they keep me working without issues until they release a bug-fix), and more of a case to send the crash report file to the devs, be it here attached to a post, or a dropbox they could set up for you ...Although...Monthly?,   We are talking about version 2.0.3, right? Not v1.x... as 2.x has been around yet very little time. 

Happening so rarely ...+ using Affinity all day, and only twice a month happening makes it hard to address it as an app problem (and yet could be), as then it typically would happen constantly, and there at least would be "some" pattern, something that you do, that due to a bug, makes it crash. When there's none, it sounds a lot like a disk/file failure, some corrupted system file that's not called constantly, some system file conflict, some moment in which the memory is filled badly, some conflict with the graphic driver, etc, etc. The bad news is that there's no shortage of factors, in Windows. I don't either love the idea of the crash reports, but IMO your case would require the blood and tears I spent to find my tricks, or simply upload/attach such files, that's your decision. 

Still could be an Affinity bug, but I would personally want to discard any issue in my system, and definitely not just for Affinity apps to work well (indeed, for other more concerning aspects).

But yeah, in these first moments there are many bugs, it could be one more. But really if we remove the factors in our side, better for us (for curating our system and to actually solving our problem) and for the devs (and actually we and them spending energy/time in what are actual apps' bugs ). I hope this can get solved for you.

But yeah, the crash report is what would help to catch the  bug, or them warning you about some problem in your system (like just some hours ago, one user that had issues with an intel card driver, and the crash report helped them see to that).

 

[Rowanfreemaker]

I personally think that you've "nailed it" in your first sentence of your last post.

The integrated card can be an issue... maybe if the Affinity apps are not really designed for other thing than dedicated cards, or at least not so much. Also, for having much less capability, it all adds up. And many apps can crash if  the VRAM (or shared memory in this case) is not enough.

I kind of think that's the crux of the problem. I'm currently looking at purchasing a machine with minimum of 6gigs of VRAM. I'm not a professional graphics designer, however I love graphics design, page layout and the like. Again, it's just very annoying to have the software just "get ghost" on me right in the middle of executing a design idea. I'm very willing to put up with it, as again, it only happens approx. 2 to 3 times a month and very randomly.

I'm going to locate the crash reports you speak of and submit them as I am curious as to what is actually happening here. As I mentioned; I've upgraded to version 2 of all of the Affinity apps. And at first...I thought the problem was solved by the version 2 update, but that wasn't the case. And you are correct, it is an AMD machine (laptop) with very minimal everything. I can't wait to get the new machine and to see what happens when Affinity is loaded on it. It could very well be that any video intensive functions are taxing the shared video memory to it's limits. Because at times, while dragging a paragraph in a text frame (in publisher) the frame will noticeably lag behind the cursor when moving a text block. (this also happens at times with a graphic that has been imported or one that I've created with publishers tools.

My other reason for posting this is, I wanted to see if anyone else was having the same symptoms as I was. However that point is really moot due to the fact that there are way too many variables to consider. As every machine (be it laptop or desktop) has a different hardware configuration. The only real way to test this theory, is to duplicate the same hardware/software configuration and that's not feasible here.

I've built a few machines (PC's) in the past, so I'm not uninitiated when it comes to IT. However, it's been awhile and you are far more (for lack of a better term) further along than I am. Though, I'm no slouch either. I am enjoying conversing with you on this subject (or more accurately) symptom.

Again thanks for the response(s) and I look forward to your reply.

Have a good day and an even better new year (if you celebrate that sort of thing, of course)

PEACE☮

[SrPx]

[ placeholder to say that I 100% agree with that, I'm just busy right now, will reply better tomorrow. And yep, happy new year !  🍰🎈✨ ]

[Dan C]

Hi @Rowanfreemaker,

Thanks for your report and our sincerest apologies for the delayed response here. We are exceptionally busy following the release of V2 and we thank you for your continued patience and understanding here.

Are you able to provide crash reports from Publisher, as SrPx described above?

Can you also please open Publisher then navigate to Edit > Preferences > Performance and provide a screenshot of your settings here for me?

Many thanks in advance!