Affinity Publisher 2 2.2.0 crashes when I use data merge

[Joeri Beelprez]

I get a instand crash when I use data merge in the latest version, acceleration is already turned of but it doesn't help. Ik worked fine with the previous version.

Mac oc Ventura 13,2

Affinity Publisher 2 2.2.0

data is in a excell file 

 

 

prijslijst.afpub prijslijst basis.xlsx

Crash report1.rtf

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Do you still see the same crash when the images you're linking to are located on your internal Hard Drive rather than One Drive? I can open your file without issue but I suspect that's because I'm not attempting to link to the One Drive images.

You could test this in a new document by moving/copying the associated images for the first half-dozen entries on your spreadsheet to your internal Hard Drive and then restricting your Data Merge to just those records to see if you experience the same crash or if this fixes the issue.

My guess/assumption is the crash is likely caused by Publisher attempting to sync to One Drive though I'm sure someone from the moderation team will be better able to determine the cause from your crash report.

[Joeri Beelprez]

The one drive is also present on the hard drive. The pictures are actually on the harddrive, and not in the cloud. Till a few weeks ago it worked just fine. I prefer that they stay on the one drive, They must be accessible to the other computers as well...but is there is no other way.....

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Thanks for letting us know...

Would you be able to Save your Publisher file as a Package so it includes the linked images from the main part of the catalogue and also include the images from OneDrive for the first couple of spreads as shown on your spreadsheet (maybe the first 24 rows, i.e. pages 4 to 8)so we can see if we can track down what may be causing the crash?

[Joeri Beelprez]

The images of the bottels where not in the package...i've added them in the folder 'flessen'

affiinity.zip

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Many thanks for the files... I've just run a test and I didn't experience any crashes...

There did appear to be a couple of font issues, attempting to install Al Nile gave an error so I didn't install it...

And it doesn't seem to like the Adobe Song Std font glyphs, in particular, the diaresis for the letter ë used in 'Argentinië', 'Italië', 'Sicilië', 'Australië' and 'Californië' or the acute accent used for the é used in Rosé.

The accented glyphs in that font also seem to use some odd spacing...

I also noted that the country header text is outlined, I was unsure whether that was intentional but you effectively have grey text with a black outline...

 

But in terms of the Data Merge, that all seemed to go without issue...

I don't know if it's worth temporarily disabling the Adobe Song Std and Al Nile fonts one at a time to see whether or not either impacts the Data Merge... for you, is it literally crashing at the point you hit Generate in the Data Merge panel?

[stokerg]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Like @Hangman, I'm also not getting a crash when merging your document.

Our QA team informed me that, it appears to be crashing when determining the transform for cell handles in the data merge cell.  Which could be related to the font issue or clicking around the document while the merge is happening.

 

[Joeri Beelprez]

The fonds where the problem! It works again! Thanks for the support. I couldn't find this myself!

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Thanks for the update, were you able to determine whether it it one or both of those fonts causing the issue?

[Joeri Beelprez]

I replaced both to be sure.

[stokerg]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Glad we could help  

Since my last post and with the help of QA, I've been able to replicate the crash now and will get it logged with the Developers, as a crash is always unwanted behaviour  

[Joeri Beelprez]

This is the first time I need support...thank you both for the quick and helpfull solution. 👏🤘

[Joeri Beelprez]

I'm not out of the mist yet apparantly. When I change the rows on page 18 from 2 to 1 I get a new crash when I hit the update button. It worked fine on the previous pages. I tried to replace the rows but the problem stays 😪

 

Prijslijst.zip

crash report.rtf

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Again, I'm not seeing any issue or crash here though as @stokerg mentioned above, he's been able to replicate the crash but I'm not entirely sure the method used.

What I am seeing however is that after changing the row count on Page 18, Pages 18 and 19 fail to update correctly when the file is merged...

 

Just a quick heads up, to prevent such lengthy posts when posting a crash report you can either attach it as a .ips file by right-clicking it in the Console and selecting 'Reveal in Finder' and then attaching the file itself or if copy/pasting you can select the Code option (<>) in the forum formatting toolbar and paste the report in there which has the benefit of using a scroll box to keep the post a little shorter...

[Joeri Beelprez]

That is a blank record...a wine who is not in the listing anymore...I was goiing trough the list and i remove and add unlisted and new wines. But the problem is not the blanc record. As you can see in the movie it works fine till I remove 1 row on page 18. I get a crash when I do a update from the source file.

Thanks for the tip on the crash report 🙂

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Good point, I hadn't checked the spreadsheet but yes, as you say, both the missing entries are blank records so that makes sense...

Checking your linked files in Resource Manager, five of them are still cloud-based, denoted by the Linked (Remote) Placement...

and the Cloud Storage file location which is shown at the bottom of the Resource Manager Window.

Try moving those files to the OneDrive Hard Drive on your Mac and relinking them and see if you still get the crash when merging the file.

[Joeri Beelprez]

I'm not getting the missing status you have, according to the resource manager it is all fine. I have changed the few embedded files to linked but the result is the same.

[Hangman]

I've now mirrored your file structure exactly and I'm no longer seeing the Linked (Remote) status for those five files either but I'm still struggling to generate the crash on merge even after deleting one item on Page 18...

I know @stokerg has been able to replicate this though I don't know if this was on Ventura. I've been unable to replicate the crash on Monterey thus far regardless of what I do so I'm hoping @stokerg will be able to provide some more helpful feedback as to possible causes for the crash than I've been able to.

[Joeri Beelprez]

I could update to 14.0 Sonoma but I wait a bit for the reaction of @stokerg once updated there is no way back...

I have other documents linked to the same excell file who are working just fine. Thanks for al the efforts!!! If you where in Belgium I Could offer you a bottle

[Hangman]

To be honest, I would hold off updating to Sonoma, there have been numerous reported issues with Sonoma affecting the opening of Affinity files and various other issues so I think you may regret updating at this stage. I would be inclined to wait until some of those issues have been ironed out and fixed before updating as I think, at the moment, it could lead to more problems...

I've not been to Belgium for many years, but maybe it's time for another visit...

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

One additional thing you can try, which seems to be working but may or may not work for you is to delete the 16 rows with no data or #N/A values from the spreadsheet. This should leave you with 203 rows including the Header row (see attached).

Then re-save the Excel file and either Select or Update it in your Publisher document and see whether or not that makes a difference.

prijslijst basis.xlsx

[Joeri Beelprez]

When I delete 16 no data rows I must also adapt the rows in Afinnity...I have filled the 16 data rows with date but the problem stays the same ...crash after i remove a line on page 18 when i do the update. The strange thin is that I removed lines on page 16 without a problem before I moved on to P18

 

[Hangman]

Could you upload the updated spreadsheet where you've filled the 16 rows with data so I can give that a test as well... I'm trying to get to the bottom of what is causing this to crash for you but not for me...

[Joeri Beelprez]

When I leave the document like it is update and generate works

When I remove a row on page 18 and generate without update...it works

remove a row on page 18 en and i do a update...crash...I did not change anything in the excel file

prijslijst basis.xlsx

[Hangman]

Hi @Joeri Beelprez,

Thanks for the updated .xlsx file...

Having tested your file with the updated spreadsheet I still don't get the crash either before or after removing one row from Page 18.

The only other thing I can suggest trying if you are happy to do so, is to duplicate the project and move your files from the current OneDrive location to your main Internal Hard Drive. This would mean doing a quick Find and Replace for the file locations in the spreadsheet but it would potentially rule in or out whether having the files located where they currently are is the cause of the crash.

Other than that the only difference I can see is that I'm running on an Intel Mac using Monterey and you're running on a M1 Mac using Ventura... If you do try duplicating and moving the files please do let us know how you get on.

Using the Updated Spreadsheet