[DUG] Crystal Reports Crashing the App

Neven MacEwan neven at mwk.co.nz
Fri Mar 30 13:47:09 NZST 2007


Rohit Gupta wrote:

"Hey Robert Zimmerman got a song for you, bout a young man called Dylan 
with a voice like sand and glue"

Glad you found it (if you had)

N
> Are you talking about John B Murphy or Frank Zimmerman ?
>
> I think I have found the problem.  It uses two callbacks from the 
> crpe.ddl back to TCrpe component (to local nested procedures in each 
> case).
> What amazes me is that works at all.  It also explains why the app 
> dies even when it is idle and finished doing the report many seconds 
> ago.  It is fiddling with data on the heap thats long gone.. and what 
> about the stack frame ?  Yeach !!
>
> We have just tried V11.  Luckiliy the VCL changes are minor and the 
> reports are working.  Still have to look at its source and test the 
> crash cases.
>
> Neven MacEwan wrote:
>> Rohit
>>
>> I think the crpe.dll was only written to be used by one app crpe.exe 
>> and is very sequence fragile,
>> I know the guy that wrote the VCL for it had all sorts of problems, 
>> I'd make sure you don't try to get it to do to many
>> things at the same time on the same instance
>>
>> HTH
>>
>> Neven
>>
>>> Robert,
>>>
>>> all this can not be correct.  How can a DLL be written that will not 
>>> work with more than one app at a time ?  Especially when there are 
>>> no common resources or files to use.  The data space is mapped to 
>>> the app that is using the dll.
>>>
>>> I have also discovered that the memory gets trashed asynchronously 
>>> of report access.  You can leave the app there and 10-30 seconds 
>>> later it will suddenly complain with rubbish errors or just 
>>> disappear.  This is when no one has even touched the keyboard in 
>>> that time.
>>>
>>>
>>> Robert martin wrote:
>>>> Hi
>>>>
>>>> Yes.  But what bugs will they have introduced in the process?
>>>>
>>>> Don't know if two would work.  I would guess yes.
>>>>
>>>> Rob Martin
>>>> Software Engineer
>>>>
>>>> phone +64 03 377 0495
>>>> fax   +64 03 377 0496
>>>> web www.chreos.com
>>>>
>>>> Wild Software Ltd
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Rohit Gupta wrote:
>>>>> I see that BO are saying the the crpe is now threadsafe in v11.  
>>>>> Do I believe them ?
>>>>>
>>>>> Question - do you know if it two crpe components  are allowed in 
>>>>> the same app ?  We use one to interrogate the report for formulas 
>>>>> etc and the other is bound to a form for running the report.
>>>>>
>>>>> Robert martin wrote:
>>>>>> Hi Rohit
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It has been some time since I used the Crpe method of accessing 
>>>>>> Crystal but my understanding is it is not Thread safe and 
>>>>>> therefore if you use it in threads or try running multiple copies 
>>>>>> of reports it can go bang.  This may be what you are experiencing.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> In the end w gave up on Crpe and now use the Com object to run 
>>>>>> them.  This works better but comes with other issues.  I think it 
>>>>>> is the better access method though.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Not a log of help i'm afraid :)
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Rob Martin
>>>>>> Software Engineer
>>>>>>
>>>>>> phone +64 03 377 0495
>>>>>> fax   +64 03 377 0496
>>>>>> web www.chreos.com
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Wild Software Ltd
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Rohit Gupta wrote:
>>>>>>> In our real app, the program crashes randomly (regularly for 
>>>>>>> some users) at the instance that Crpe is used.  The app 
>>>>>>> basically disappears which implies that substantial code and/or 
>>>>>>> stack is corrupted.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> In a smaller app that only opens the report to get some stats 
>>>>>>> (it does not connect to the database), I can get it to crash in 
>>>>>>> the same fashion predictably.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> The sequence of events is open two copies of the app )or one 
>>>>>>> copy of the app and the CRW designer)
>>>>>>> Open any report in the first app (which always assignes 
>>>>>>> ReportName to blank and does not destroy the crpe component
>>>>>>> Open any report in the second app or CRW Designer
>>>>>>> Open any report in the first app and its gone with no trace.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> In real life the users can not run multiple copies, the app 
>>>>>>> takes care of that.  However the symptoms are identical leading 
>>>>>>> me to believe that if I can find the cause of the second crash, 
>>>>>>> I can fix the first one.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Any clues anyone ?
>>>>>>> I cant find anything pertinent on google, except for one item 
>>>>>>> where the author insists that the problem is a secret com object 
>>>>>>> that crpe launches and if you wait for it to finish and 
>>>>>>> terminate then there are no crashes.  However, delays dont have 
>>>>>>> any effect on my test case.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> In the debugger, if I keep doing F7, everything keeps working.  
>>>>>>> But as soon as I press F8 or F9, it gets an AV because it starts 
>>>>>>> executing in hyperspace.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>> Delphi mailing list
>>>>>>> Delphi at ns3.123.net.nz
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>>>>>>>
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>>>>>> Delphi mailing list
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>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> *Rohit Gupta*
>>> * B.E. Elec.   M.E.   Mem IEEE    Associate IEE*
>>> *Technical Manager*
>>> *Computer Fanatics Limited*
>>> ** *Tel*     +64 9 4892280
>>> *Fax*    +64 9 4892290
>>> *Email  *rohit at cfl.co.nz <mailto:rohit at cfl.co.nz>**
>>> *Web    *www.cfl.co.nz <http://www.cfl.co.nz/>
>>>  
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>>
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>>
>>
>
> -- 
> *Rohit Gupta*
> * B.E. Elec.   M.E.   Mem IEEE    Associate IEE*
> *Technical Manager*
> *Computer Fanatics Limited*
> ** 
> *Tel*     +64 9 4892280
> *Fax*    +64 9 4892290
> *Email  *rohit at cfl.co.nz <mailto:rohit at cfl.co.nz>**
> *Web    *www.cfl.co.nz <http://www.cfl.co.nz/>
>  
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> This email and any attachments contain information, which is 
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> you are not the intended recipient, you must not use, distribute or 
> copy this email or attachments. If you have received this in error, 
> please notify us immediately by return email and then delete this 
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