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RE: st: ? Bug: Stata 10 crashes when ctrl+9 pressed twice


From   "Saleheddin Mahmud, Dr." <[email protected]>
To   <[email protected]>
Subject   RE: st: ? Bug: Stata 10 crashes when ctrl+9 pressed twice
Date   Mon, 22 Oct 2007 22:45:14 -0400

I agree with Dave that the initial release of Stata 10 had more bugs
than earlier releases (just my feeling; no stats to back up this claim).
Most the bugs I encountered affected the interface in the MS Windows
edition. And they were generally more of annoyances than serious
limitations. 

However, most of these bugs are easy to spot. Perhaps they were the
unexpected results of last minute changes that went unnoticed. The
disappointing thing from my perspective is that some of these
well-documented bugs were only partially fixed in the latest update (of
15 Oct 2007). In addition to the bug I reported earlier, the find (&
replace) form in the editor is still unresponsive to both mouse and
keyboard strokes when used in any second or subsequent editor window. It
works OK in the first window--- which is an improvement on the initial
release. Also, the icons for printing and saving in the editor's toolbar
look very similar so I keep clicking the wrong one. Switching to larger
size icons (using the "customize" menu) does not solve the problem. In
fact, the large icons look distorted. Some useful commands such as
"select all" have no corresponding icons.   


Stata was never strong on the interface which is generally not a problem
except for the do-file editor. I do lots of coding so having a decent
editor that is also **well-integrated** with Stata (to allow quick
testing and running of code) is very important to me. 

Despite the recent improvements in the editor, it is still lacking in
many aspects and my hunch it will remain so for a while. I think Stata
should extend its open architecture approach (the main reason I remain
Stata user) to its interface or at least to its editor. Rather than
trying to keep up with the endless list of suggestions for additional
features, Stata should just allow external editor plug-ins to hook into
certain interface functions such as running code and returning error
codes. Users who do not like using the integrated editor could just plug
in their editor of preference. Many excellent editors are open-source so
it should be relatively easy to teach them to interact with Stata.

A more advanced implementation of the editor plugin framework would
allow the guest editor to retrieve info on the currently open dataset
(e.g., retrieve a list of variables to show in the editor) or monitor
(or event interrupt) the execution of code. Anything that will reduce
switching back and forth b/w the editor and Stata's main window is a
plus.

Another important (but easy to fix) problem of Stata interface is the
lack of a way to customize the toolbar of the main window, to add/remove
programmable buttons. Perhaps this feature is coming soon because there
is currently a disabled "customize.." menu attached to the toolbar (the
one attached to the editor's toolbar is functional). More important is
the ability to assign interface function to function keys. Eg press F3
to show/hide the variables window.

Just my two cents,

Salah



-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of James
Hassell, StataCorp LP
Sent: October 22, 2007 15:01
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: st: ? Bug: Stata 10 crashes when ctrl+9 pressed twice

David Jacobs <[email protected]> has raised several issues
related to Stata10 on Windows. I will address his remarks inline
below.

> I am having all sorts of difficulties with Stata 10 MP 4 on a Windows 
> XP 32 machine with 2 gigs of memory.  First, it locks up at random 
> times and sometimes at quite awkward moments before I've saved the 
> recent alterations to my data.  I'm not sure exactly what I've done 
> (if anything) to precipitate this untoward behavior.

We have not had other reports of this behavior. If possible David should
try to determine what he is doing when this occurs so we can try to 
duplicate the issue. David should send his findings to 
[email protected].


> Second, if I leave a help screen up and then create and edit a graph, 
> the help screen can't be moved nor can it be removed by clicking on 
> its "X" button.  The only way to get rid of that locked help screen 
> is to click on the Window tab at the top and ask Stata to "close all
viewers".

This could occur if the "Make windows float" checkbox is selected in the

window preferences.  This problem was fixed in the last executable 
update.  David should type -update all- in the comamnd window, followed
by -update swap- when prompted.


> Third, before I set the results buffer to a much higher capacity then 
> the default setting, I couldn't use "control+1" to get the cursor 
> into the results window after I'd performed a multiple runs.

We are unable to reproduce this problem.  David, please send a screen
capture of Stata and your Windows desktop to [email protected].
Also send output from typing -query interface- in the Command window.


> I also miss both the "open recent" option under the file command in 
> the version 10 do file and the "shift-control-S" command in the same 
> place that set up a "save as" for a do file.  I was promised that the 
> "open recent" option that was in prior versions would be added in an 
> upgrade but I haven't had the time to find out.  Has it been?

Recent files were added to the Dofile Editor in the last executable
update.  David should update as noted above.  We will add Shift+Ctrl+S
as a shortcut to "Save-As" in an upcomming executable update.


-- James Hassell (StataCorp)
[email protected]

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