Sliding Printing Crashes Print Page Range

[Brian C]

This does not affect normal printing as long as you are printing the entire report.

If you are attempting to print a range of pages using the Print From: To: in the print dialog, FMP 9 crashes only if you have fields on the layout set to use Sliding/Printing options.

I have provided a sample file.

I do not yet know if this affects the windows version of FMP 9.

TestSliding.fp7.zip

[Vaughan]

A similar report has been made to TechNet, but it's related to the page range, not to sliding printing.

It's been confirmed and reported to FMI.

[Brian C]

This took me a while before I managed to identify that the crash was tied to the sliding printing option. I was encountering it in some of my databases that worked fine in 8.5. So I started out by building a new database from scratch and added elements one by one until I could reproduce the crash reliably. Turn on the Sliding/Printing and printing a page range crashes FM. Turn it off, and the page range printing works fine.

Im glad it got reported. Though it is not a huge bug, it is still a little inconvenient.

[Vaughan]

"Though it is not a huge bug, it is still a little inconvenient."

On the contrary, many top developers consider this a show-stopper.

[Fenton]

It is a show stopper for me for 2 reasons. First is that it is uncontrollable, if you allow your clients to Print with any kind of flexibility. You do not know when or for what reason they will suddenly decide to print a page range. It was quite a shock to me the 1st time it happened, and caused me to have to redo a little bit of work.

The second reason is because I take my files seriously. If a file crashes I will stop, go back to a clean copy and redo my work. You cannot really expect your clients to do so, nor can you expect them to shoulder the cost of what would be possibly many instances of you having to restore their solutions to a pristine condition.

In other words, without stability FileMaker 9 is no longer a viable database. FileMaker has avoided these kinds of problems by being amazingly stable. FileMaker 8.5 has never quit on me. I'm sure 9 will be the same, after they iron out these rather small but severe problems; hopefully that will be pretty soon.

I don't know that sliding/printing matters. I just created a new file. Drew a box; no sliding. Tried to print page 2 to 2. Quit.

[Vaughan]

"I don't know that sliding/printing matters. I just created a new file. Drew a box; no sliding. Tried to print page 2 to 2. Quit."

That's been the experience on the TechNet forum.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

It's a bug, Dave. I feel much better admitting that now, you know.

Be sure to file a bug report on the sliding aspect of this.

Steven

[Brian C]

"I don't know that sliding/printing matters. I just created a new file. Drew a box; no sliding. Tried to print page 2 to 2. Quit."

That's been the experience on the TechNet forum.

I have filed a bug report via FMP's website. I never hear back from them on things but it doesn't hurt to do it just the same.

I have not experienced any crashing at all due to the page range unless sliding/printing is used. I have tested this extensively. Perhaps the bug reports on the tech forums are with the windows version? I don't have the ability to test that right now.

[Genx]

Well at least on technet, maybe it actually will get through to FMI.

[Vaughan]

"It's a bug, Dave. I feel much better admitting that now, you know."

Ahhh Steven, I could see your lips move.

[Brian C]

I hate to admit it but I should have caught that being brought up on technet.

I don't know what your take is on this but I think it also helps to post this stuff here as well for those who are not technet members so they can be aware of any issues that v9 may have currently.

[Vaughan]

"... it also helps to post this stuff here as well for those who are not technet members..."

I can see your argument, but: 1) I've got better things to do that repost between forums all day; 2) that's partly what TechNet is all about, having discussions that are one-level closer to FMI than a public forum; 3) people can join TechNet themselves, it's now quite cheap; and 4) I can't see a benefit in having conversations about the same thing in two different forums.

[Ender]

You're kinda talky today, Vaughan. Are you just excited about hitting 6,000? :)

[Vaughan]

Oh, I didn't notice... can I stop now? Do I get a watch or something?

[Brian C]

I have posted my update on this bug to the technet forums.

[xochi]

I saw a crash doing a normal "Print to PDF" operation -- no special page range was selected. Grr, that's bad...