Random crashes using snippets

[Phssthpok]

I've just started using snippets, and have two defined like this:

  <a = <a class="footnote" href="fn$1" id="pos$1">$1</a>
  <s = <span class="smallcaps">${1*}</span>

They both work fine most of the time, but sometimes when I press ctrl-J after typing the trigger, the editor just crashes: "calibre-parallel.exe has stopped working". I can't reproduce the problem, it just seems totally random; it happens with both snippets, whether I have text selected or not, sometimes in the middle of a line, sometimes at the end, sometimes near the beginning of a file, sometimes near the end...

I'm using Windows 10, Calibre 1.73 (32-bit). I would love to report it as a bug but since I can't come up with a reproducible case there isn't much to report.

Has anyone else seen anything like this happening?

[kovidgoyal]

I cant recall any reports of crashes related to snippets usage. As is usual with keyboard related problems, the first thing to check is if you have some kind of keyboard manipulating program like AutoHotKey or the like and if turning that off makes the crashes go away.

[Phssthpok]

Is there anything I can do to capture a crash dump or something to find out more about what's going on?

[kovidgoyal]

On windows not so much. If you have a linux machine you can build calibre from source, and that will give you good debug dumps for crashes.

[knorris]

Cheers Kovid.
Hope this is not too late?
I also am getting random freezes/crashes using the excellent built-in link snippet <a and as of today am consistently getting an immediate crash at one site in the epub book.
If I take the file out of the book as a separate 'book' the crash does not occur.
Running in debug mode simply yields 'Segmentation fault (core dumped)'.
I'm running Calibre on Ubuntu 16.04 64-bit with no other (noticeable) programs running.
How can I analyse the fault?

[kovidgoyal]

If it is repeatable for a particular book, open a bug report and attach the book and I will take a look -- although it will be a little while before I can, as I am busy working on calibre 3 right now.

You can also get a backtrace for the crash. The details depend on the distro, but for systemd based distros

echo 'bt\n' | coredumpctl gdb

should be all that needed (after installing gdb)

[Phssthpok]

Originally Posted by knorris

I also am getting random freezes/crashes... I'm running Calibre on Ubuntu 16.04 64-bit with no other (noticeable) programs running.
How can I analyse the fault?

I'd be really happy if you could help pin this one down, as there seems to be no way for me to gather crash dump info on Windows, and in the meantime I've just had to give up using snippets altogether.

[knorris]

Apologies again but exactly how does one use gdb to load calibre and access the backtrace? I'm reasonably confident the distro is systemd based.

[kovidgoyal]

Run the ebook editor, cause a crash

Then, run

echo 'bt\n' | coredumpctl gdb

[knorris]

That easy? Unfortunately I worked around the two sites that invariably caused crashes by retyping the characters nearby and then reapplying snippets (<a), which worked as usual. But when it crashes again, I'll get the report (hopefully).

[knorris]

Sorry (and happy) to say that Calibre editor has not missed a beat since I offered to help track the matter, despite all attempts to overload it and cause a crash. I didn't do anything intentionally to the operating system and other programs, but the random crashes with snippets no longer occur.
Editor also works faster now than it did—does not get bogged down with snippets, saving etc.
No idea.

[knorris]

So I had a crash running editor from the main Calibre page—several times in one location—ran:
"echo 'bt\n' | coredumpctl gdb"
but got a response of:
"No match found."

What next or what have I missed?

[kovidgoyal]

No idea -- you'd need to figure out why copredumps are not being generated on whatever distro you are using. Most likely it is a sysctl setting you have to toggle to turn it on. Google turning on coredumps for your distro.
Or if you have a book that consistently reproduce sthe crash, open a bug report and attach it.

[knorris]

The terminal outputs below occurred in association with (some) "snippets" crashes. Not sure they are relevant and apologies if not.

devicePixelRatio: 1.0
logicalDpi: 96.0 x 96.0
physicalDpi: 112.286084142 x 112.758381503
^CTraceback (most recent call last):
File "site.py", line 66, in main
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/worker.py", line 176, in main
File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 176, in run_main
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 191, in main
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/basic.py", line 131, in handle_control_request
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/basic.py", line 80, in complete_names
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/basic.py", line 62, in get_data
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
KeyboardInterrupt
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 92, in handle_data_requests
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 61, in send
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
IOError: [Errno 32] Broken pipe
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14087, resource id: 62914667, major code: 18 (ChangeProperty), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14088, resource id: 62914667, major code: 25 (SendEvent), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14091, resource id: 62914670, major code: 18 (ChangeProperty), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14092, resource id: 62914670, major code: 25 (SendEvent), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14097, resource id: 62914673, major code: 18 (ChangeProperty), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14098, resource id: 62914673, major code: 25 (SendEvent), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14101, resource id: 62914676, major code: 18 (ChangeProperty), minor code: 0
QXcbConnection: XCB error: 3 (BadWindow), sequence: 14102, resource id: 62914676, major code: 25 (SendEvent), minor code: 0
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/preview.py", line 107, in run
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/simple_worker.py", line 71, in __call__
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
EOFError
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/preview.py", line 107, in run
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/simple_worker.py", line 71, in __call__
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
EOFError

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site.py", line 66, in main
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/worker.py", line 176, in main
File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 176, in run_main
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 191, in main
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/basic.py", line 131, in handle_control_request
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/basic.py", line 80, in complete_names
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/basic.py", line 62, in get_data
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
KeyboardInterrupt
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 92, in handle_data_requests
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/completion/worker.py", line 61, in send
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
IOError: [Errno 32] Broken pipe
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/preview.py", line 107, in run
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/simple_worker.py", line 71, in __call__
File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/__init__.py", line 22, in eintr_retry_call
EOFError

belly@antonina2:~$ calibre-debug --edit-book
devicePixelRatio: 1.0
logicalDpi: 96.0 x 96.0
physicalDpi: 112.286084142 x 112.758381503
calibre 2.85.1 embedded-python: True is64bit: True
Linux-4.10.0-33-generic-x86_64-with-debian-stretch-sid Linux ('64bit', 'ELF')
('Linux', '4.10.0-33-generic', '#37~16.04.1-Ubuntu SMP Fri Aug 11 14:07:24 UTC 2017')
Python 2.7.9
Linux: ('debian', 'stretch/sid', '')
Successfully initialized third party plugins: EpubMerge (2, 1, 0) && Find Duplicates (1, 6, 3)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/boss.py", line 959, in search
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/search.py", line 1522, in run_search
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/search.py", line 1446, in do_replace
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/editor/widget.py", line 303, in replace
File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/editor/text.py", line 595, in replace
IndexError: no such group

[kovidgoyal]

I cant see how they could be possibly related, they are all in entirely different code paths (apart from the QXCBConnection errors, which could be related, but are useless since they come from the GUI toolkit, not calibre itself).