Textpad keeps losing its settings

General questions about using TextPad

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fuzzy
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Joined: Thu Jan 17, 2008 6:51 am

Textpad keeps losing its settings

Post by fuzzy »

This started some time this year, didn't keep track of exactly when, but once or twice a month Textpad will lose all of its settings, returning back to the just-installed state. This is really annoying since it means going through the config manually re-setting everything that I'd changed. What seems to be happening is that ConfigState.xml gets deleted or zero'd. It's just happened again, with Textpad open all the settings have been lost and the config directory contains:

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10/12/2020  17:26               0  ConfigState.xml
11/12/2020  13:13           1,760  custom.bnd
10/12/2020  17:26          77,777  GUIState.xml
23/09/2019  21:37              24  U1033.TLX
When I reset all of the settings and exit Textpad I get:

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11/12/2020  13:16          13,612  ConfigState.xml
11/12/2020  13:13           1,760  custom.bnd
11/12/2020  13:16          77,763  GUIState.xml
23/09/2019  21:37              24  U1033.TLX
I'm assuming this is a Textpad bug since I can't see why another program would zero/delete a single config file deep inside the Textpad subdirectories.
ben_josephs
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Post by ben_josephs »

I've seen this too. I suspect it happens when Windows updates itself.

I've taken to saving ConfigState.xml and GUIState.xml so that I can restore them if they get destroyed.
fuzzy
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Joined: Thu Jan 17, 2008 6:51 am

Post by fuzzy »

ben_josephs wrote:I've seen this too. I suspect it happens when Windows updates itself.

I've taken to saving ConfigState.xml and GUIState.xml so that I can restore them if they get destroyed.
Ah, that could be the case. After getting sick of having to reset the settings on a regular basis, meaning after I realised this was a recurring Textpad bug and not just a one-off glitch, I did the same, I have a script that checks for a missing/empty ConfigState.xml and restores it from a copy when it gets deleted/reset.
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Fioravante Patrone
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Post by Fioravante Patrone »

Same strange behavior for me also. It happened two times, and could be due to Windows 10 upgrades. It is affected also the program that I use to manage an Epson scanner (this progarm and TextPad are completely unrelated).

So, I will follow your suggestion, saving the settings to a directory, just to be able to restore them
I love TextPad
fuzzy
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Post by fuzzy »

Fioravante Patrone wrote:So, I will follow your suggestion, saving the settings to a directory, just to be able to restore them
In case it's useful, here's the command I'm using, however it's written for 4NT/TCC rather than CMD so will need some modifying if you're not running that particular shell:

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iff %@filesize["%AppData%\Helios\TextPad\8\ConfigState.xml"] lt 1 then cp <saved file location> %AppData%\Helios\TextPad\8\ConfigState.xml endiff
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AmigoJack
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Post by AmigoJack »

Since all you guys seem to have no problem with an operating system that is rather bringing you trouble than being assistent (speak: Windows 10): how about modifying the folder's access rights? Check the security permissions and try disallowing rights like "write" and "delete" for users "SYSTEM" and everyone else that is not you. Logically seen only you as a user will run TextPad, neither SYSTEM nor NT AUTHORITY or any other non-person account - likewise it shouldn't matter that nobody but you is able to modify and/or delete files in that folder.

I'm sorry if anyone feels personally attacked, but using workarounds and just accepting that file contents can be gone with any update is ridiculous - at that point you are not in control of your system anymore. I'd be furious.
fuzzy
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Joined: Thu Jan 17, 2008 6:51 am

Post by fuzzy »

AmigoJack wrote:Since all you guys seem to have no problem with an operating system that is rather bringing you trouble than being assistent (speak: Windows 10): how about modifying the folder's access rights? Check the security permissions and try disallowing rights like "write" and "delete" for users "SYSTEM" and everyone else that is not you. Logically seen only you as a user will run TextPad, neither SYSTEM nor NT AUTHORITY or any other non-person account - likewise it shouldn't matter that nobody but you is able to modify and/or delete files in that folder.
That assumes it's some system-level process that's causing the problem. If not, it won't have any effect. In particular if it's a TextPad bug, which is the most likely situation, then changing permissions to only allow the (TextPad) user access will do nothing.
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mike_applebee
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Post by mike_applebee »

My keyboard settings disappear.
Those XML files are unchanged but the custom.bnd reverts back to factory settings.
I agree that a hack is not the solution but it will begin to shine a light on when/why its happening.
fuzzy
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Joined: Thu Jan 17, 2008 6:51 am

Post by fuzzy »

Aaaannnd... Textpad just lost all its settings again. It's unrelated to anything else, no Windows update, nothing, it just reverted to default settings and there's a new Textpad icon in the Start menu as if it's just been newly installed. Luckily I've got the restore-settings script (see an earlier post) which restored things without having to manually reset everything in the config, but it's still annoying...
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AmigoJack
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Post by AmigoJack »

Have you looked at the "new Textpad icon in the Start menu" (speak: link) creation time of that file? Was it created just at the second you've started TextPad? How are you certain it was not a Windows Update? Have you looked at Control Panel > Management > System logs to exclude it was nothing from your operating system?
fuzzy
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Post by fuzzy »

Unfortunately I've already deleted the link, and it wasn't Windows Update since I've got that set to manual, it never runs unless I tell it to. In terms of logs, unless you've got something specific I should be looking for ("Success audit, deleted Textpad settings file") it could be anything, there's huge numbers of events logged covering all sorts of stuff.
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