On 2/27/2010 5:24 PM, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
Hello Wayne,
I sympathise with your problem, but please understand you are not making
it easy for us when you give us incoherent information.
I hope the coherency has improved recently. :-) I think if you saw the
cramped quarters I'm in that you might understand my supposed
incoherency. For what it's worth, and that's about zero, I'm working
with my old XP and W7 machine's keyboards, mice and monitors
side-by-side. I have several times found my self using the wrong device.
I'm steadily moving from programs and data from one to another. This
weekend when I get a printer cable, the XP machine will be relegated to
a distant table.
You tell us to "try this" and give a folder structure:
Folder1
track1.py
data1.txt
data2.txt
data3.txt
Folder2
track1.py
dset1.txt
dset2.txt
...
dset8.txt
but then when you send a copy of the actual code you are running, it is
called "ReportingToolAwww.py" and it is 417 lines long. What happened
to track1.py? What is in that? Does track1.py reproduce the fault?
Yes, it's a lot easier to type track than the above. I invented
fictitious names for the above to simplify it all. The program does
indeed work on track data for meteor trails.
There are five possible faults:
1 A problem in your Python code.
2 A serious bug in Python itself.
3 A serious bug in Windows file system.
4 Disk corruption making Windows confused.
5 A PEBCAK problem.
I'd vote for a W7 problem. I think I mentioned that W7 will not even
allow me to find all files in a folder with track in them. It's
possible the new filter concept for files is at work.
I can confirm that ReportingToolAwww.py doesn't seem to contain
any "funny" path manipulations that would cause the problem: it simply
calls open on relative path names, which will open files in the current
directory. The problem does NOT appear to be in your Python code.
Good.
A serious bug in either Python or Windows is very unlikely. Not
impossible, but unless somebody else reports that they too have seen
the fault, we can dismiss them.
See above about W7.
Disk corruption is possible. If all else fails, you can run the Windows
disk utility to see if it finds anything.
Beats me.
But the most likely cause of the fault is that you aren't running what
you think you are running. When you say:
"If I've created a shortcut, it wasn't by design. Ctrl-c to ctrl-v most
likely."
"Most likely"? Meaning you're not sure?
Meaning I agree with you that it was not a use of ctrl-c/v. I offered
the other only possibilities I know of. That's for programs likeWord.
Given that you are talking about the Properties window talking
about "pointing to" things, I think it is very likely that in fact you
have created a shortcut, or a symlink, and when you think you are
running a copy in Folder2 you are actually running a shortcut to
Folder1. That would *exactly* explain the problem you are experiencing.
Please take a screenshot of the Properties window showing the "pointing
to" stuff. I think you will find that track1.py in Folder2 is a
shortcut back to track1.py in Folder1.
OK, I'll do that with SnagIt, and attach it. If it's too big, it will
not make it on the list, but will make it to you.Geeze, I can't even do
that. I had contacted HP tech support (1 year of free support), and went
through this with a tech guy week ago. I gave him control of the
machine, and he started messing with the py file.I stopped him before
he changed anything, but copied the file somewhere, and renamed it, so
he could do what he thought needed to be done. The "link" points to
itself. I'm afraid after a week of dealing with this the trail is dead.
Chalk it up to a mistake on my part if you will. I'm done.
If somehow this magically revives itself in the next few days, I'll
respond. It's time to move this program ahead to completion.
(For the record, Windows does in fact have symlinks, as well as hard
links and a third type of link called junction points. They are
undersupported by Explorer, and so people hardly every use them. Most
people don't even know they exist, even though some of them go back all
the way to Windows NT. But as far as I can tell, there is no way for
you to have created a symlink from Explorer.)
So noted. The last time I had anything to do with the more esoteric
links is a decade ago when I worked with Linux.
--
"There is nothing so annoying as to have two people
talking when you're busy interrupting." -- Mark Twain
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