Keeps Crashing when Running Research

[why1942]

I'm having a lot of problems with this program. The latest is, after doing the last update, the program once again started crashing whenever I would launch it. I was able to stop this by deleting and reinstalling, but then I discovered running Research (ALL) crashes the program now, too. 

 

I tried launching with Ctrl+Alt to get the extra options in safe mode. I checked Remove Startup session (which did nothing) and then relaunched and also checked Remove General Settings. This allowed the program to start working again, but upon attempting another Research (ALL) it crashed once more.

 

I have to be honest, the overall experience I've had using Accordance has been very, very frustrating. Is there any way to resolve this crashing problem now so I can actually use this program and also not have it start crashing every time I try installing an update in the future? 

 

why1942

[JonathanHuber]

I've been having troubles with Research also, and it's really frustrating but I can't find a reproducible way to trigger the crash.

[Fabian]

I get crashes too.

 

But open the Preferences on Read/Resarch and do the "Rebuild Search Cache". (Translated from German, maybe actually it is called differs a little bit.

[why1942]

Hey everyone,

 

So, it appears I was able to resolve the Research problem. It was crashing whenever I would do a Research (All), (All Texts) or (All Tools).

 

I uninstalled, reinstalled, uninstalled all the modules and then had to reinstall all the modules (real pain Accordance Staff), and still had the same issue when running Research.

 

Of course, I'm having to wait for Tech Support to open (because I'm only in town on the weekends) and I have a narrow window. I'm not typically in town or with internet access during the week so this is a real problem. While waiting, I started poking around. Found the main Accordance folder where the program is installed. Found and ran the Cleanup. This apparently removes all the Registry keys, etc. It took me back to the beginning, once again deleted all of my modules I just installed (what a lovely time I'm having here Accordance, you really should use these kinds of experiences in your marketing), and now, as I'm slowly reinstalling modules and testing as I go, the Research (All), etc are working fine now.

 

At least at this point, it appears it was a problem in the registry. Here's a tip, program designers. Stop putting crap in the registry. TheWord does not do this at all! You can run it off of a thumb drive on any computer! 

 

I have to say, Accordance has been the most UNSTABLE program I've ever used! If I had not already shelled out $500 + on it and the modules I needed I would have abandoned it LONG ago! DO BETTER!

 

We'll see how long this lasts without more errors or another crash when I try to install the next update.

 

why1942

[why1942]

I've been having troubles with Research also, and it's really frustrating but I can't find a reproducible way to trigger the crash.

Hey Jonathan.  Try running the cleaner in the main Accordance folder (if you're running on windows. I don't know how the Mac version is set up). This worked for me and Research seems to be running fine now. But, I have not finished reinstalling all my modules.

 

One thing this experience did, though, was delete all my User Tool files I spent a few weeks importing. Never again! So the user tool the pdf import is a complete write off because the software is unstable and unreliable. 

 

Hopefully you'll have luck getting Research back up and running.

 

why1942

[Joel Brown]

why1942:

 

I'm very sorry to hear about all of your troubles.  Here's some advice to get you working, and to help you in the future:

 

1) If the research is crashing, you should Clear the Research Cache.  This is an option in the Safe mode you described (you only need to hold Alt).  You can also rebuild it in Preferences -> Reading/Research.

 

2) You very rarely need to uninstall and reinstall all modules.  Obviously, if you run the Cleanup routine that warns you it will delete *everything*, then it will be a huge effort to reinstall.  I recommend against this unless you are actually uninstalling Accordance from that machine.  I'm sure the fix was not the very minor use of Registry keys that we use, but the fact it also cleared your Research cache for you.

 

3) Its unlikely this was caused when you did an update, but obviously if the problem resurfaces when you update Accordance, let us know.

 

Also, if you e-mail support (at) accordancebible.com, they may be able to get back to you, even on a weekend.

[HelgeH]

why1942:

 

I'm very sorry to hear about all of your troubles.  Here's some advice to get you working, and to help you in the future:

 

1) If the research is crashing, you should Clear the Research Cache.  This is an option in the Safe mode you described (you only need to hold Alt).  You can also rebuild it in Preferences -> Reading/Research.

 

2) You very rarely need to uninstall and reinstall all modules.  Obviously, if you run the Cleanup routine that warns you it will delete *everything*, then it will be a huge effort to reinstall.  I recommend against this unless you are actually uninstalling Accordance from that machine.  I'm sure the fix was not the very minor use of Registry keys that we use, but the fact it also cleared your Research cache for you.

 

3) Its unlikely this was caused when you did an update, but obviously if the problem resurfaces when you update Accordance, let us know.

 

Also, if you e-mail support (at) accordancebible.com, they may be able to get back to you, even on a weekend.

I get the same crashes when searching in the research tab as the users above. There were not many frequent crashes before the time around 13.1.2/timeline introduction or some of the module updates around the same time as far as I am aware, but accordance was reinstalled just a few weeks before on a fresh Windows 10 install. I did experience the crash when pressing the information icon in the library, but this was fixed shortly after. I thought it was just me since I did not see any references in the forums and were waiting for a fix in 13.1.3 but seeing this reply it does not seem that there is a fix on the roadmap for 13.1.3.

 

The crashes do not produce a crash report, and it has been going on about two weeks time now. Rebuilding the research cache only works momentarily the first 1-3 times accordance is run after the rebuild. So far, the crashes have been happening 5 times these last two weeks. But it would have been more if I did not stop using research as often because of the crashes. The machine has been rebooted several times during this period, and all other software are functioning as expected.

 

I reproduced the crash twice just now by following the following steps: 1. Open clean accordance. 2. Rebuild Research Cache. 3. Close Accordance. 4. Open accordance. 5. Search for “Samuel” in [All] English (works between 1-3 times) 6. Accordance crashes without warning or crash report. 7. Any English search in the research tab from this point without rebuilding the Research Cache crashes Accordance in the same way

 

I do suspect that an update to a module are causing this. If it helps bug tracking, I did multiple searching in the research tab on English. Accordance crashes on [All], [All Texts], [All Tools] and [Translator Notes] when using the string “Samuel”. All other searches I performed works fine.

[JonathanHuber]

I get the same crashes when searching in the research tab as the users above. There were not many frequent crashes before the time around 13.1.2/timeline introduction or some of the module updates around the same time as far as I am aware....

 

The crashes do not produce a crash report, and it has been going on about two weeks time now. Rebuilding the research cache only works momentarily the first 1-3 times accordance is run after the rebuild. So far, the crashes have been happening 5 times these last two weeks. But it would have been more if I did not stop using research as often because of the crashes. The machine has been rebooted several times during this period, and all other software are functioning as expected.

 

This sounds similar to my experience. 

[HelgeH]

I do suspect that an update to a module are causing this. If it helps bug tracking, I did multiple searching in the research tab on English. Accordance crashes on [All], [All Texts], [All Tools] and [Translator Notes] when using the string “Samuel”. All other searches I performed works fine.

Nevermind this comment. I tried some more and get the same crash on the other [] categories. Somehow it worked for a while but now it crashes all of the ones I've tried.

[why1942]

So I come home this afternoon, turn on my laptop, launch Accordance and....guess what program won't work yet again? You guessed it! 

 

I tried using safe mode, which brought the program back up, but Research was dead in the water. Crashed whenever I tried running it. Again. So I uninstalled and tried reinstalling the previous version, thinking maybe the problem was in the new update, since the problems started after installing that. No deal. Research crashes yet again.

 

Then I remember Fabian's suggestion. I go in and try the rebuilding of the search Cache. Restart, try Research and it works! (Thanks Fabian). I restart my computer and relaunch, try again, and it works! I finish installing all my modules and restart and try Research again and it's still working. Fingers crossed it will continue working this week when I'm out in the woods without phone or internet. That would be nice since, well, you know, I paid for it. Programs people pay money for should, I don't know, actually function as advertised. Maybe that's just me.

 

why1942

So I come home this afternoon, turn on my laptop, launch Accordance and....guess what program won't work yet again? You guessed it! 

 

I tried using safe mode, which brought the program back up, but Research was dead in the water. Crashed whenever I tried running it. Again. So I uninstalled and tried reinstalling the previous version, thinking maybe the problem was in the new update, since the problems started after installing that. No deal. Research crashes yet again.

 

Then I remember Fabian's suggestion. I go in and try the rebuilding of the search Cache. Restart, try Research and it works! (Thanks Fabian). I restart my computer and relaunch, try again, and it works! I finish installing all my modules and restart and try Research again and it's still working. Fingers crossed it will continue working this week when I'm out in the woods without phone or internet. That would be nice since, well, you know, I paid for it. Programs people pay money for should, I don't know, actually function as advertised. Maybe that's just me.

 

why1942

[Silas Marrs]

I'm trying to track this down.  Can someone who is experiencing this research crash try the following?

 

1. When opening the Research Tab, hold cmd + opt.  This should create a "Debug Information" file in your "Accordance Files" folder.  (If it doesn't, try again after restarting Accordance)
2. After it crashes, open this file with a text editor.
3. The very last line will be the name of the module it was searching when the crash occurred.  Post the name of that module here.  Also, open the "About Info" for that module, and post the version number.
4. Try deleting that module in your library, and see if the crash still occurs.
5. Does it just happen again with a different module?

[Fabian]

Especially User Bible are a crasher.

 

I sent you two.

 

Fabian

Edited July 20, 2020 by Fabian

[Daniel L]

This problem was occurring on my laptop, but not my desktop -- both Windows 10. The suggestion to Rebuild Search Cache worked. Thanks, Fabian.

 

I want to add to the complaints of why1942. Accordance is by far the most buggy and crash-prone app I have. It is the only app that crashes on my computers with normal use. It's been true since 12.x (first version for me). This reminds me of the bad, old days of Windows 95, except it doesn't take the whole OS down like then. If you didn't have the great auto-recover feature, Accordance would not be worth the hassle on Windows. Auto-recover doesn't work quite as well at restoring the most recent state on Android, but the app has been more stable with recent updates. It used to be a nightmare -- almost unusable.

[Fabian]

 It's been true since 12.x (first version for me). 

Good for you. Version 11 was even 10x worse. No joke. I have wrote it too. Accordance is also by me on Mac the most crashy software I have. 

At the moment it crashes also by a restart of the Mac. I reported this too but it is not solved. HINT.

 

And honestly I fear it is coming back by the transition to Apple silicon. If Accordance would be a word processor I had left it. But I have invested too much...

 

Fabian

Edited July 23, 2020 by Fabian

[JonathanHuber]

I'm going to push back on this a little bit. Yes, Accordance crashes for me, but any software that's constantly trying to add new features is going to introduce bugs here and there. Safari is the app that crashes the most on iOS for me, and the most irritating bug on my Mac is in Apple's Mail. The reason I encounter these a lot is that I use those apps a lot, and that's true for Accordance also. It's almost constantly open and I use it a lot, so it's more noticeable and troublesome when there are bugs. 

 

There's also the issue of how much data Accordance is working with at a time. Yes, it's mostly text, but it's an awful lot of text being accessed continually through Research and the Info pane. When I was writing my dissertation, I had to keep the chapters as separate documents because MS Word couldn't handle it all as one big file. I regularly use an app at work for analyzing scientific data, the premier software program in this field that costs hundreds of dollars per year for a license subscription, and it crashes multiple times every single day. 

 

This isn't to say that crashing is ok. Yes, I always want my software to be more stable. I just don't think I agree that Accordance is disproportionately plagued with more bugs than other apps I regularly use. 

[HelgeH]

 

I'm trying to track this down.  Can someone who is experiencing this research crash try the following?

 

1. When opening the Research Tab, hold cmd + opt.  This should create a "Debug Information" file in your "Accordance Files" folder.  (If it doesn't, try again after restarting Accordance)
2. After it crashes, open this file with a text editor.
3. The very last line will be the name of the module it was searching when the crash occurred.  Post the name of that module here.  Also, open the "About Info" for that module, and post the version number.
4. Try deleting that module in your library, and see if the crash still occurs.
5. Does it just happen again with a different module?

 

I tried this on Windows 10 with ctrl+alt to generate the debug information. The module was CEI-2008. The text folder did contain both CEI-2008 and CEI-2008-2, so I deleted them both. Then I cleaned the library cache and research cache before installing the module again through easy install. The issue still persists in the same way as before. The search works the first time and crashes on the second. This time the debug information shows the ESVS module. The version number of ESVS is 6.0. The files were last modified on 15^th of June 2020 (ESVS) and the 31^st of October 2015 (CEI-2008). Which is long before the problems occurred around the introduction of accordance 13.1.2.

 

Edit: In the first run when accordance crashed while searching CEI-2008 it already searched through the ESVS module previously without crashing here. Now it crashes consistently on the ESVS module before reaching further each time I run the research search on “samuel”. The ESVS module does not contain two folders such as the CEI-2008. This accordance instance was a fresh install from 27^th of June 2020 and the research worked as expected in the first days. The modified dates above correspond to the date the module was modified by accordance.

Edited July 23, 2020 by HelgeH

[Silas Marrs]

We've got a fix coming soon.  Sorry for your trouble!

[edform]

I'm brand new in the Accordance world [First purchases on July 21] and I looked in the forums because I experienced crashes related to the Research workspace. I'm working in Windows 10 with Accordance 13.1.2, having bought the  Starter Collection 13 - Hebrew and added GNT-28T plus some resources from the Lite version. Clicking Workspaces and choosing Research produced an instant crash every time.

 

My solution was to locate Research.accord in the Accordance Files directory, delete it, and delete the entry from my Library. I then set up a suitable group of facilities for my kind of research work, saved it as  Research.accord and added that to the Workspaces listing. The problem has disappeared, so it looks to me as though the original Research.accord from Oaktree was corrupt.

 

Ed Form

[Scott H]

I'm also new in the last week and in the process of moving from Logos to Acc13. I have been experiencing the same issue which can be temporarily fixed by clearing the research cache. When collecting the debug information as suggested by Silas Marrs it fails on the first line, NKJV, my primary bible.

 

Any word on a fix?

[dandennison]

Joel:

 

Can you add a crash handler that clears or rebuilds the Research cache if the stacktrace calls for it, or alternatively do a rebuild on startup if the most recent crash had research in the stacktrace? I know architecturally, it's not necessarily the cleanest solution out there but it would fix this for most use-cases.

[Silas Marrs]

Dan, we'd considered adding something along those lines.  But we're releasing a fix for the bug that's causing this problem soon, so hopefully that will be enough for now.  To some extent, it's actually handy not to do it automatically, since we may not have even found out there was a problem with the cache if not for all the reports.

[samuel ramac]

I am having issue with Research crashing.   I just noticed this thread, and it wasn't clear if the fix has been released for this. 

[JonathanHuber]

Yes, this issue was fixed in version 13.1.3. If you already updated and are still having problems, you could try rebuilding the Research cache (Settings -> Reading/Research -> Rebuild Research Cache).

[samuel ramac]

Thank you, rebuilding the Research cache did it for me. thanks.

[Carol Kankelborg]

On 7/20/2020 at 10:19 AM, Silas Marrs said:

I'm trying to track this down.  Can someone who is experiencing this research crash try the following?

 

1. When opening the Research Tab, hold cmd + opt.  This should create a "Debug Information" file in your "Accordance Files" folder.  (If it doesn't, try again after restarting Accordance)
2. After it crashes, open this file with a text editor.
3. The very last line will be the name of the module it was searching when the crash occurred.  Post the name of that module here.  Also, open the "About Info" for that module, and post the version number.
4. Try deleting that module in your library, and see if the crash still occurs.
5. Does it just happen again with a different module?

I recently moved Accordance over to a new Macbook Pro with M1 Pro silicon. I am running Accordance 13.3.2 on MacOS 12.2.1. A Research search for [All Tools] crashes Accordance consistently, even after rebuliding the research cache. I went through your steps. It failed on a User Tool (probably downloaded from the Accordance repository of user tools eons ago): Greek roots.acc7. I removed that file and Research no longer crashes.

 

As for Accordance's stability, I have found it reasonably stable on the Mac over the years up until 13.2. With that release Accordance began complaining that it needed unlock codes for modules, listing modules that were installed as available to install in Easy Install, and crashing much more often. (All this before moving to my new laptop.)

 (iOS is a different story -- it would crashing far too often and I lost too many edits to user notes such that I gave up using it for sermon notes -- but after the early years it has become much more dependable.)