Why are files closed on opening a project and file tabs reordered?

chrishelps · Mar 24, 2017#12017-03-24T22:15+00:00

Hi

There appears to be a bug, possibly related to Project functionality.

UltraEdit keeps randomly closing open files, and scrambling the order of open file tabs. At first, this only happened when I opened a project, now seems to happen at any moment.

It became much worse today: multiple files would close, and then each reopened file would close while I reopened the next one. This seems to happen either when I'm in another application, when I use the Project Settings window to open a file, or when I try to rearrange the File Tab order. It has become so bad that UltraEdit is all but unusable.

I've seen this behavior on 2 different computers running 2 different versions of Windows (7 and 10), though it seems to be worse on Windows 10.

I'm using 64-bit UltraEdit Version 24.00.0.56, Windows 10 Pro.

Mofi · Mar 25, 2017#22017-03-25T10:58+00:00

You have not written which GUI mode you use in UE v24.00.0.56. So I write my answer assuming usage of toolbar/menu mode with traditional menus.

UE v24.00.0.56 does not automatically close files, except on usage of a project and some configuration settings are set resulting on closing files on opening files.

Open Advanced - Configuration and look on following items. Click on button help in appropriate configuration dialog for details on the settings.

The setting Open from Explorer also loads file list at File Handling - Advanced whereby Explorer is exemplary
for any other application from which a file with a specific file extension is opened in UltraEdit via file association in Windows registry or starting uedit*.exe with the file(s) to open as parameter(s).
The settings Reload files previously open on startup and Reload FTP files when reloading a project or last open files at File Handling - Load.
The setting Close all files when opening or switching projects at File Handling - Miscellaneous.
The settings at File Handling - File change detection.
The settings at Application Layout - Miscellaneous.
The setting Sort tabs on file open at Application Layout - File Tabs - Miscellaneous.

3 more general suggestions:

Uninstall UltraEdit without deactivating license and without removing application settings, restart Windows (to complete uninstall process) and install UltraEdit again.
Then check if the weird file handling does not occur anymore.
While no instance of UltraEdit is running, rename directory %APPDATA%\IDMComp\UltraEdit for example to UltraEditBak.
Start UltraEdit which creates the application data directory for UltraEdit completely new with all settings set to default.
Then check if the weird file handling does not occur anymore. In this case keep the new configuration.
It might be necessary to restore some of your configurations. This could be done for example by copying one uedit* file after the other from UltraEditBak to UltraEdit while UltraEdit is not running and start UltraEdit after copying one configuration file.
Which file contains which settings is explained at How to transfer / copy / move / migrate configuration settings to a new PC?.
The usage of the UltraEdit script RegIniFileSort - Script for smart sorting REG and INI files or Macros for smart sorting INI and REG files and comparing the sorted INI files might be also helpful to find out which settings need to be copied from your previous configuration to newly created configuration.
Start msconfig.exe, click on tab Startup and open startup configuration, uncheck all items and restart Windows with now nearly all automatically started processes disabled.
Then check if the weird file handling does not occur anymore. In this case a background process was responsible for the weird file handling in UltraEdit. Enable the processes one after the other with restarting Windows after each activation to find out which process is responsible for the unwanted behavior.

chrishelps · May 06, 2017#32017-05-06T06:52+00:00

Looks like the problem was caused by the fact that newer versions of Ultraedit default to only 1 line for file tabs - opening more files than would fit on one tab line caused the older tabs to scroll down to a non-visible line. Setting this option to multiple lines seems to have fixed the problem.

Mofi · May 06, 2017#42017-05-06T12:14+00:00

Thanks for letting us know what was the real reason.

I prefer the file tabs bar setting Single Line - scrollable and would have never thought that UltraEdit or UEStudio users think a file is closed when its file tab is not visible anymore on the file tabs bar.

I use only rarely the mouse in UltraEdit, I use the keyboard and the hotkeys Ctrl+F6, Ctrl+Shift+F6, Ctrl+Tab and Ctrl+Shift+Tab to switch between opened files. That's why I would have never thought that a file is closed just because of its file tab is currently not visible anymore because I most often do not look on the file tabs bar.