Scenario Editor giving error on startup and when saving a scenario

[Blacklight]

I am getting the following error window whenever I start the Scenario Editor and also when I go to save a scenario file:

Windows - No Disk
Exception Processing Message c0000013 Parameters 75b6bf9c 75b6bf9c

Cancel Try Again Continue

Clicking the buttons makes the default Windows error beep and makes this window pop up again several times. The window will eventually go away, but this window will pop open when i want to save a file as well. Any ideas ?

[rsharp@advancedgamin]

Blacklight,

Do you have any usb or virtual drives? Anything unusual?

What OS are you using?

I'll look into this in further detail tomorrow.

[Blacklight]

Nothing unusual. No virtual drives.

I'm running Windows XP SP 2.

I am running a USB external hard drive but that shouldn't cause any problems. It's running fine.

I unplugged the drive, rebooted and still am getting the same error. Also... I noticed that the last window that pops up after the repeating window I posted above is different.

This one reads:

Harpoon3ScenarioEditor.exe - No Disk
There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive J

Drive J is my CD Rom drive. I experimented to see if it was looking for the Harpoon disk, but it gives me the same message whether I have any CD in there or not.

I think it's looking for scenarios in Drive J for some reason. It's popping up that window when I go to load a file as well as when I try to save a file. It doesn't seem to want to let me save a file in a folder that I want to save it in. It keeps popping up those windows.

Maybe I'll do an uninstall and reinstall on it tomorrow morning. Maybe it got corrupted with the update somehow.
*shrug*

[Shemar]

Check your Harpoon .ini files and registry entries for any references to the J: drive, you may be able to fix it without an uninstall/reinstall

[TimOusley]

Blacklight and Russell:  We had a thread on this awhile back. I've had this same problem and we're not the first.  At first, it appeared to be something that just required that any disk be in the CD drive. That fix worked for awhile but then the behavior returned, and a re-install didn't fix the problem.  I checked in some other Matrix game forums, and it appears in at least one other Matrix game as well.  The behavior also appears in the regular game if you select 'Load File'.  I'm providing this info so Russell might have more to work with, maybe.  My configuration is normal, CD/DVD drives are D: and E:, Win XP SP2.  A friend of mine says he's seen a similar problem in machines that are running Microsoft .NET Framework before, and I do have that installed. Just a thought, I haven't un-installed .NET because I need it. Also, I have versions 3.7, 3.80 and 3.90 installed and the problem appears on all 3 versions.  It only showed up a few months ago but I don't know what install or upgrade--either H3 or MS--to connect it to.
Tim O.

[rsharp@advancedgamin]

Guys,

Just to restate the problem in one place: Harpoon 3 is tripped up by drives it believes to be odd. This leads to odd errors and disk missing messages. I believe it is a basic problem in the way the game is interfacing with the system.

I'm looking for a way to replicate this error so I can either find a work-a-round or a fix. Thanks for your patience. You guys rock.

[Blacklight]

I also have the .net framework installed if that helps.

There doesn't appear to be any reference to Drive J in any of the Harpoon 3 INI files.
I'm going to attempt an uninstall and reinstall just for the heck of it.  I also couldn't tell you if this problem cropped up a while ago because I ran the scenario editor for the first time just yesterday after I put in the new Harpoon update.  I'll re-install and try to run it prior to putting the update in to rule out the update being the cause.

*update*
The problem also occurs with a fresh install and no updates.

[rsharp@advancedgamin]

Hold up. I don't believe re-installing will help anything. Please check your PMs.

[FreekS]

I have same error loading and saving files. I have a new Dell Inspiron 530 PC running Vista. Freek

[Shemar]

Russell:
 
I belive this error is due to the Open/Save dialogues initialisation function trying to use a initial path that points to a non-permanent drive. There has to be some kind of file or registry entry that points to either a last used folder or a default folder (I think Harpoon uses default, not 'last used' method) for scenario open/save that somehow gets set to the wrong place.
 
I may be totally off base of course but it is worth checking out I believe.

[rsharp@advancedgamin]

I believe I've resolved at least one part of the issue but there may be more causes for this. What was happening was that the game was switching to each drive to prove it existed. It used this process to build a list of available drives. So switching to an empty drive would throw an error. Further, I think the behavior was based on the hardware driver for that drive.

I've changed the behavior to use a more general process with Windows and released the build to a few users with the change. So far the feedback confirms a kill. I'm debating on releasing this as the default release or keeping it on a as-needed basis. I'll let you know here.

[TimOusley]

Russell--The fix does work in the scenario editor, however for me, the issue also exists in the regular game and the DB editor as well.  It only appears when loading a file manually--selecting a scenario from the regular menu has always worked fine.
Thanks,
Tim O.

[Blacklight]

I never had any problem loading files in game. It was just in the editor.