Sigil fails to start

[phossler]

All of a sudden, Sigil will just fail to start. Used to work fine, both the 'official' and the latest beta.

Vista, 32 bit. No recent updates

Everything else seems to work OK

I uninstalled and reinstalled Sigil, restarted the PC, all the standard stuff

Click on the shortcut, circle spins once or twice, and then nothing happens

Does any one have ideas, like de-registering and re-registering DLLs etc.

Calibre is acting up also - I uninstalled it and reinstalled it and Edit metadata and Convert will cause an immediate exit.

Is there something in common between the 2?

Paul

[Toxaris]

They both use the Qt framework, but that is part of the installer. Are all other programs running fine? Try to run Ccleaner to clean some stuff up, see if that solves anything.

[phossler]

Thanks, I did use RegClean and cleaned out %temp% but didn't make a difference

I was wondering about the Qt framework (since I read of it here) and that seemed to be the only common thing. There seems to some python involved also???

I would have thought that a complete uninstall of both Sigil and Calibre would also remove QT.

Is there a way to force a fresh re-install of Qt? The DLLs in the Sigil folder are gone, but does some Qt still remain?

Paul

[DiapDealer]

There shouldn't be any connection between the two, but you can try starting calibre in debug mode, to see if it spits out any messages that might at least offer a hint as to what might be wrong. From a command prompt, type "calibre-debug -g" (without the quotes, of course). Maybe seeing what's wrong with calibre will nudge you in the direction of what's wrong with Sigil.

[phossler]

@DiapDealer -- thanks to the tip to use debug

I'll try it when I get home. Hopefully it generates a nice log file with all the steps

Does Sigil do a debug log file I wonder? Something like with Try/Fail steps (simple/dumb example: )


Date/time -- Starting Sigil
Date/time -- Loading QTframework.dll
Date/time -- QTframework.dll not found in c:\ programfiles\..........
Date/time -- Sigil unsuccessful load

might be helpful to try down problems.

If the log file ends abruptly, at least you would know how far you got

Paul

[Toxaris]

It uses its own libraries, no shared dll's are used to my knowledge. Sigil is not build in Python, unlike Calibre.

I actually don't know if Sigil has a logfile.

[phossler]

@Toxaris -- Do you know what / if Sigil uses any MS run time libraries?

During the install, there's a dialog about 'Installing 2010 ....." to what appears to be a GUID-type folder

Paul

[theducks]

Originally Posted by phossler

@Toxaris -- Do you know what / if Sigil uses any MS run time libraries?

During the install, there's a dialog about 'Installing 2010 ....." to what appears to be a GUID-type folder

Paul

I remember seeing something like that this time ONLY

So is this just a leftover from a Debug session?

[user_none]

Sigil uses the 2010 runtime. It always has. As of 0.6.901 I changed the installer to install the redistributable (if not already installed). Previous versions just put the dlls into the Sigil installation directory. This was to makes it easier for me to ensure the correct version is being packaged.

This is required by any application compiled using Microsoft's 2010 VC compiler. Pretty much all versions of Microsoft's compiler require the appropriate runtime to be installed (or distributed with). Otherwise the application will not run.

As people have stated, both Sigil and calibre use Qt. Each installs it's own private version in their own installation directory. The way Windows loads DLLs means that they will not conflict.

[Timoleon]

Try doing a System Restore from a couple of weeks ago, and see if that helps.

[phossler]

@Timoleon

Actually just tried that, but no joy

Paul

[cybmole]

i see from your calibre thread that you found the culprit - constant guard. you shoud post an explanation here also

[phossler]

@cybmole -- absolutely !!

from kovidgoyal in the Calibre forum ---

http://manual.calibre-ebook.com/faq....s-occasionally

Constant Guard Protection by Xfinity causes crashes in calibre. You have to manually allow calibre in it or uninstall Constant Guard Protection.

That fixed both issues. I never new that CG had that 'feature' but both Calibre and Sigil showed in CG's Blocked Programs list. Click "Allow" and problems gone

There must have been something new in 9.18 and Sigil beta to trigger CG's 'Unsafe Program' block, since I never had the problem until a few days ago when I updated.

Life is good -- thanks again to both forums for help and assistance

Paul