* Possible Bug when Editing Notes

[Gowermick]

When I find large Individual notes, with multiple items, I am tidying them up, by splitting the notes into separate notes, adding a date to each where necessary.

I found that if I highlight a section for cutting and pasting to a new note, when I use Ctrl-X to cut the highlighted text, the whole of the original text is deleted, not just the highlighted section (luckily Ctrl-Y restores it).

When I then use Ctrl-V to paste it to the new note, the actual text that gets pasted is part of original note, but not the highlighted section! I get round it by copying the whole text, pasting it to the new note, then editing new note to remove the unwanted text!

It doesn't seem to happen with small notes, so is there a limit for the amount of text the clipboard can hold when text is cut rather than copied, or is it bug?


NB I am unable to reproduce at present time, but it has happened a lot in the past week. Should it happen again, I'll get a screenshot to add to this topic.

[jimlad68]

I did notice this at http://www.family-historian.co.uk/downl ... ade-to-6.1

- Improvements to the Property Box and the Witnesses Window
.....
Ctrl-A did not work in a number of fields in the Property Box that it should have worked in. Now fixed.
.....

It is an area they are obviously looking at in v6.1.2. Looks like you are still on v6.0.4, might be worth dropping them a line if still a problem in 6.1.2.

[tatewise]

I have experimented with both FH V5.0.11 and FH V6.1.2 with long Note text and cannot make it go wrong.

When you say Ctrl-Y restores, I suspect you mean Ctrl-Z, because Ctrl-Y just produces the unrecognised keystroke 'ping'.

It cannot be a limitation of the clipboard, because FH uses the standard Windows Clipboard that is virtually unlimited, and allows text to be transferred into &/or out of FH.

Are you sure it is not some intermittent glitch with your mouse/touchpad operation?
Touchpads are known to be temperamentally sensitive when your hand/fingers stray near them, so maybe when moving from touchpad to keyboard the selected text changed accidentally, but now you are more conscious of the problem you are taking more care watching what is selected, and so nothing goes wrong.

[Gowermick]

Mike,

I stand corrected, I did mean Ctrl-Z.

As for touch pads, I never use one, horrible things, I barely tolerate them when I'm using my laptop on my lap, with no room for a mouse! Wherever possible, I stick with just mouse or just keyboard, and try not to switch between the two.

Thinking further about the problem, I wonder if I pressed 'Del' to get rid of the highlighted text. If Calico haven't allowed for the keypress when text is highlighted, this could explain whole note being erased rather than the highlighted text. I believe this key would normally delete the whole note if memory serves.

I'll experiment some more and see if I can re-produce the problem.

[tatewise]

I experimented with Del and Backspace keys in both V5.0.11 & V6.1.2 and they always just deleted the highlighted text.

They only delete the whole field on the All tab (or in Records Window) when you select the field name on the left rather than the text.

[Gowermick]

Mike,
It has happened again, and have attached a screen shot of the result.

Last piece of text of 1841 note, originally ended with 'William 1833, Ann 1838 & James 1841 Living at 25 Pitts Place'

The text 'Living at 25 Pitts Place' was from 1851 census, so wishing to move it to a new note, I highlighted it, cut it, then pasted it to the new note.

What was pasted was 'Census shows parents Ja', (I added 1851 in front so you can identify the new note)

I did all this in the note box itself, I did NOT open an edit box to do this. Is that where it's going wrong?

PS Ctrl-Z did NOT work.

[LornaCraig]

When you use the keyboard Ctrl-X do you glance briefly at the keyboard, taking your eye off the highlighted text on the screen? Is it possible that as you look at the keyboard the mouse moves slightly and selects a different chunk of text without you realising it?

Instead of the keyboard method have you tried highlighting the text and using right-click with the mouse, then Cut or Copy? By doing that you will always be looking at the text and can see exactly what is being selected.

[Gowermick]

Nice try Lorna, but no. I was taking special care and used Ctrl-X only, followed by Ctrl-V in the new note. The correct highlighted text was cut, but wrong text was pasted!

[tatewise]

Again I have tried repeating that scenario to no avail.
It should be nothing to do with whether in edit box or not.

The symptoms you describe are different from your first posting, where you said Ctrl+X deleted/cut the entire text, whereas this time the correct text appears to have been cut, but just the paste went wrong.

If/when it happens again, open another program such as Word or Notepad and paste into that to reveal what is in the clipboard.

[Gowermick]

I agree Mike, weird doesn't describe it. You begin to doubt your sanity at times.
I'll persevere, and double-double check my actions next time.
It has happened again this morning, but when I tried to clarify my actions, it wasn't reproducable, and all follow up attempts worked fine. Worst type of error to cure, those that cannot be reproduced!

[AdrianBruce]

Is it possible this is nothing to do with FH but a driver issue where Windows has transmitted a position on the screen to the FH User Interface that is not the visible position? (Video driver? Mouse driver? Nonsense on my part?)

[Gowermick]

It happened again yesterday, and I was taking extra extra care of my keystrokes this time.

I wrote a note for an individual, which also applied to his sibling, so I tried to copy it, rather than re-type it.

I carefully highlighted the text, using 'Shift' and 'left' arrow key (i.e. not mouse). Then VERY VERY CAREFULLY pressed 'Ctrl' 'c' when poof, text disappeared, ('Ctrl' 'v' put it back). I moved to his sibling and used 'Ctrl' 'v' to put it there too.

Having eliminated possibility of a mouse problem, (Adrian please note ) I now need to discover if this is a Windows problem, or FH6.1.4.

Next time it happens, I'll open notepad and try experimenting with cut and paste there, to eliminate FH as the source of the problem.

EDIT 09.34am
Happened yet again in FH, didn't happen in Notepad! But as FH is not doing this consistently, it may be same with Notepad. I'll keep you posted

[Gowermick]

Further to my last post on this, I notice that one can copy a fact AND a citation at the same time, but their usage is a bit hit and miss. Which leads me to believe FH has it's own clipboard mechanism, contrary to what MikeTate has said.

The following scenario highlights a problem there too.
I enter census details and citation for head of family. I copy the fact, using icon, then copy citation too.
I enter head's occupation then paste citation. So far so good.

I then move to his wife and children and paste the fact there too. I then enter their occupations and paste the citation, again so far so good.

I then spot his sister-in-law is staying there too, so navigate to her, but when I try to paste the fact, I get a warning of no fact to paste! I have to navigate back, re-copy the fact, and then I am able to paste the fact to sister-in-law successfully.
Can anyone throw any light on this? When does the copied fact get erased?

[mjashby]

Mike

If I've read your sequence of actions correctly, what you are doing is overwriting the Windows Clipboard's memory when you copy and paste the Citation between the two fact entries, which is why you can't paste the Fact again. You could try to use one of the freeware Windows Clipboard management tools that retains multiple clipboard entries if you find that you need to follow this procedure regularly, but it's not a Family Historian issue.

Mervyn

[tatewise]

Not sure when those Fact/Citation 'clipboards' get cleared.
Also not exactly sure how they interact with each other and with Windows clipboard.
The last Copy used does put text in the Windows clipboard.

But contrary to what Mervyn says, it is possible to copy both a Fact and a Citation independently sometimes.
So there appear to be two internal FH clipboards for them as well as the Windows clipboard.

[jimlad68]

For a clipboard manager I use ARSCLIP which is portable http://www.joejoesoft.com/vcms/97/, but there are many more see http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-fr ... tility.htm.

Ditto seems to be a favourite and is also available as a portable app via http://www.liberkey.com/en/catalog-flat-list-view.html

With Arsclip you can have different sets of presets for different programs with hot keys. A bit of setting up, but once done saves a lot of time.

[Gowermick]

Jimlad,

I can happily copy facts and citations at same time, so as Mike says, FH must have its own clipboard built in.
My problem is that the fact gets lost somewhere, and I don't know why. I can happily paste fact 10 times, and it works fine, then move to another family member and find the fact has disappeared, and I have to re-copy it.

If it was using Windows clipboard, I could as you suggest use a clipboard manager, but it isn't so I won't

[PeterR]

Rather than make a copy of an Individual's Note Field to attach to another Individual, why not create a Note Record and link it to both Individuals?

Is there absolute certainty that a keyboard problem is not providing Ctrl+X when using Ctrl+C?

[Gowermick]

Peter,
As far as I can tell, Ctrl-c works correctly everywhere else on my PC. The problem has only manifested itself within PH to date, but to be honest, I'm getting to the point where I can't rule anything out. I'm tempted to get a keystroke capture program, just to see where the problem lays.

PS a note record may be the way to go, as this note is getting used more and more as I progress through the 1939 Register (It simply says '1939 entry assumed, record redacted', and is used when I'm fairly sure who has been redacted.)