GUI malfunctions

[SNM_NL]

I am running Arch Linux with GNOME 3.4.2 and OxygenXML Editor 14. and the top menus do not work properly. They appear-disappear immediately when left-clicking them. I had this problem with the previous version already, but used the keyboard to navigate them as a temporary solution.

The look and feel is "Metal", and when I configure the LnF to be "Default" it reverts to "Metal".

I tried to change the default JVM by setting the JAVA_HOME environment variable to my Java 7 VM, which does not cause a change (and I verified that Oxygen XML Editor does indeed run under a different JVM).

Please solve this problem with me.

===
Details:

3.4.4-2-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Sun Jun 24 18:59:47 CEST 2012 x86_64 GNU/Linux

java version "1.7.0_05-icedtea"
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (IcedTea7 2.2.1) (ArchLinux build 7.u5_2.2.1-1-x86_64)
OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM (build 23.0-b21, mixed mode)

[adrian]

Hello,

We have had similar reports regarding Oxygen in Ubuntu 12 (Gnome3/Unity), but so far we have been unsuccessful in reproducing the issue. The problem seems to be caused by an incompatibility of the bundled Java Runtime Environment with Gnome3/Unity.

If you want to use the system installed JRE, you can bypass the one bundled with Oxygen by renaming the jre directory from the Oxygen installation directory. Oxygen will then use the JRE specified in the JAVA_HOME environment variable.
Please note that you may encounter some issues with OpenJDK 7 and Oxygen. If you encounter any problems, I recommend using OpenJDK 6 which Oxygen has been tested against for some time.

Regards,
Adrian

[SNM_NL]

I can confirm that the problem can be solved by replacing the "jre" directory in the Oxygen XML Editor application directory with a symlink to the "jre" subdirectory of a JDK version 1.60_33 installation.

I advise other users to download the "*.bin" JDK/JRE installer, and skip software package distribution systems of their Linux distro. (http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/ ... index.html)

Can you update the JRE included in version 14 of your application? The aim of including a JRE is to warrant stability. I would think that with some basic testing, this bug on the Linux platform could have been prevented (with the release of 14, at least).

[adrian]

Hi,

I find it strange that it works fine for you with Java SE 6 1.6.0_33, but not with 1.6.0_32 (bundled with Oxygen 14.0). 1.6.0_33 is supposed to only include security bug fixes. We were definitely not expecting it to bring any improvements with regard to this menus bug.

At the time we started QA testing for v14.0, 1.6.0_32 was the latest version available so that's what we used. Actually we initially started with 1.6.0_31 but considered we had enough time until the release to test this new version, so we went ahead.
If we can't reproduce a problem (especially when it comes to JRE related problems), it's very difficult to justify upgrading to an untested version and start testing from scratch. This means we usually stick with what we have already tested and know works for us, even if a newer version becomes available in mid testing, like it happened here with 1.6.0_33.

We will definitely include Java SE 1.6.0_33 or later (depending on what's available at that time) in Oxygen v14.1. But I can't promise the same for the next maintenance build of v14.0. We will start testing 1.6.0_33 and if everything goes well, we will include it in the Linux kit of one of the maintenance releases for v14.0.

With regard to the menus bug, let me know if you are willing to test a few small samples of Java code with both JREs. I would like to clarify this way if this menu issue was indeed explicitly fixed in 1.6.0_33 or we are seeing something else.

Regards,
Adrian

[SNM_NL]

I also find the problem strange. I had it with the previous version under Ubuntu as well, but Arch Linux uses plain GNOME 3. Due to other pressing issues I have no time to perform further tests at this moment. Please contact me by e-mail and in a week or so, I can do a few tests for you.

[adrian]

Hi,

Could you please check only one thing in Oxygen?
Go in the main menu to Help > About, System properties and look for:
java.runtime.name and java.runtime.version.
What are the values of these two properties?

Regards,
Adrian

[SNM_NL]

java.runtime.name Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment
java.runtime.version 1.6.0_33-b03

Adrian, I already wrote that the version has indeed changed since I performed the actions I described. I verified that in the same way as you ask me now. Let me know if you want me to do further tests. (The GUI still works correctly at this time.)

[adrian]

Hi,

No further tests are necessary from your side.

Unfortunately it was not possible to include this JRE in the first maintenance release for v14.0 (build 2012070512, released July 6th). There were a lot of bugfixes (some critical) that had to be pushed ASAP for v14.0 and we could not wait to finish testing the JRE for Linux.
We'll just have to finish testing this on our side and if everything goes well, we'll include it in the next maintenance release of Oxygen v14.0 (probably next week).

Regards,
Adrian

[adrian]

Hi,

I just wanted to let you know that the JRE for the Linux kit has been updated to 1.6.0_33 in the latest maintenance build of Oxygen 14.0, 2012080717 (released on August 8th).

You can download it from our web site:
http://www.oxygenxml.com/download.html

The list of bug-fixes can be found here:
http://www.oxygenxml.com/build_history.html#2012080717

You can follow the release/build RSS feed here:
http://www.oxygenxml.com/rssBuildID.xml

Let us know if you encounter further problems with this new build.

Regards,
Adrian

[SNM_NL]

Sorry, but the problem is back. It was back some time ago already, but I use OxygenXML on my home PC only occasionally so I did not bother to chime in again.

It seems to be related to the window manager. I run Gnome 3 with Compiz, as is the standard today. If memory serves me right, the problem went away when using either Gnome classic (2), by means of "forced fallback" mode in Gnome 3, or by replacing the JRE that is bundled with the system JRE with a symlink replacing the "jre" subdirectory of the OxygenXML installation directory.

Syncro Soft: please look into Gnome 3 compatibility enhancements to the JRE. In case an OS-supplied JRE indeed runs without problem during possible problems like this, then would it not be wiser to change the policy of bundling a JRE with the installer, on the Linux platform at least?

My solution for now to run OxygenXML under Gnome 3 without having to make configuration/file changes from the default situation after every update of OxygenXML, perhaps useful to others:

Code: Select all

#!/bin/sh



export DISPLAY=':0';

NESTED_DISPLAY=':1'; 

REDUCED_RESOLUTION='1920x1045';





Xephyr -ac -screen "$REDUCED_RESOLUTION" -br -reset -terminate "$NESTED_DISPLAY" &



DISPLAY="$NESTED_DISPLAY" sh "${INSTALLATIONS}/OxygenXML/Oxygen XML Editor 14/oxygen14.0" &



xfwm4 --display="$NESTED_DISPLAY" &

You should install Xephyr and XFCE window manager for the above script, and adjust the "-screen" parameter and the path after "sh" to your own situation, of course. You can use Devilspie or the Gnome Compiz fixed windows plugin to change the properties of the Xephyr window, like removing the window decoration (title bar).

[SNM_NL]

Can you not edit your posts? I would like to add that some "sleep" statements should be added between the executing commands in the above script. Sleep for 1s or 2s or so, to prevent the OxygenXML not having window decoration inside the Xephyr display.

[adrian]

Hi,

So far, for a few Ubuntu (11.x and 12.x) users that experienced the issue, the update to 1.6.0_33 has fixed the problem. Are you sure you're still running Oxygen with 1.6.0_33?

The problem is most probably related to the window manager, but I can't tell what's actually causing it. Did you tinker with any of the window manager settings or graphical effects from Gnome 3.x?

I can't comment on your solution since we can't reproduce the problem and test this solution against it.

Regarding the bundled JRE, since most of our Linux users are not encountering such issues (or at least we did not have any other reports of such incidents after 1.6.0_33), we will continue to distribute the Linux distributions of Oxygen with a bundled JRE.

As you know, you can bypass the bundled JRE by renaming the 'jre' folder from the Oxygen installation folder and then Oxygen picks up the system JRE if one is available in JAVA_HOME or PATH environment variables. For Linux (or any other platform) you can also use the "All Platforms" distribution of Oxygen that does not have a bundled JRE.

There's an explanation for the bundled JRE that I've posted around the forum:

At one time Oxygen did provide installers with and without JRE for most platforms. Gradually we have realized that it would benefit both us and our users if we would use a bundled JRE of a fixed version. The reason for this is that the Sun JRE(now Oracle JRE), like any other piece of software, has various bugs at various versions. Some old ones get fixed and some new ones get introduced accidentally.

Using the latest version of the Java SE JRE is not necessarily the best thing, not to mention that not all people will update their Java installations to the latest version. Also, in practice, allowing the user to run Oxygen with his/her own installed JRE means exposing the user to various and unknown bugs from the various JRE versions. This is without mentioning the heap of problems that arise from the incompatibility with various versions of open source JREs(GNU, OpenJDK) that could be installed on the user's machine.

In conclusion, the reason we are offering most of our installers with a built-in JRE is that this way we control the distribution and version of the JRE that Oxygen is running on. Having a fixed version JRE means we can thoroughly test the application with it which allows us to make sure no critical bugs are present in it and if there are any, we have the possibility to guard them accordingly in our code.

On top of all this, not all users know that Oxygen is a Java application, some don't even know what Java is and how it relates to Oxygen and we would rather keep things simple for them.

Regards,
Adrian

[SNM_NL]

I certainly run Sun JRE version 1.6.0.33_b03. I just tested it, and for one time the problem with the window menus only manifested when the window was resized once.

I haven't been using extraordinary settings for GNOME over the time that I have been experiencing this issue. I use two monitors, so the screen is a virtual desktop that extends onto the next monitor (default setup). I recently changed one monitor/resolution, and this hasn't had influence on the issue.

By the way, I do not use Ubuntu, but Arch Linux. Interesting: the (recent) XFCE window manager seems not to have this problem, given the same vendor-supplied JRE. You are totally right about the multiplatform installer without JRE, I could use that instead. I do not like to spend much time on side issues, so that's why I prefer not to test that installer right now. I will keep you posted if I learn more. details about this problem

Hi,

So far, for a few Ubuntu (11.x and 12.x) users that experienced the issue, the update to 1.6.0_33 has fixed the problem. Are you sure you're still running Oxygen with 1.6.0_33?

The problem is most probably related to the window manager, but I can't tell what's actually causing it. Did you tinker with any of the window manager settings or graphical effects from Gnome 3.x?

I can't comment on your solution since we can't reproduce the problem and test this solution against it.

Regarding the bundled JRE, since most of our Linux users are not encountering such issues (or at least we did not have any other reports of such incidents after 1.6.0_33), we will continue to distribute the Linux distributions of Oxygen with a bundled JRE.

As you know, you can bypass the bundled JRE by renaming the 'jre' folder from the Oxygen installation folder and then Oxygen picks up the system JRE if one is available in JAVA_HOME or PATH environment variables. For Linux (or any other platform) you can also use the "All Platforms" distribution of Oxygen that does not have a bundled JRE.

There's an explanation for the bundled JRE that I've posted around the forum:

At one time Oxygen did provide installers with and without JRE for most platforms. Gradually we have realized that it would benefit both us and our users if we would use a bundled JRE of a fixed version. The reason for this is that the Sun JRE(now Oracle JRE), like any other piece of software, has various bugs at various versions. Some old ones get fixed and some new ones get introduced accidentally.

Using the latest version of the Java SE JRE is not necessarily the best thing, not to mention that not all people will update their Java installations to the latest version. Also, in practice, allowing the user to run Oxygen with his/her own installed JRE means exposing the user to various and unknown bugs from the various JRE versions. This is without mentioning the heap of problems that arise from the incompatibility with various versions of open source JREs(GNU, OpenJDK) that could be installed on the user's machine.

In conclusion, the reason we are offering most of our installers with a built-in JRE is that this way we control the distribution and version of the JRE that Oxygen is running on. Having a fixed version JRE means we can thoroughly test the application with it which allows us to make sure no critical bugs are present in it and if there are any, we have the possibility to guard them accordingly in our code.

On top of all this, not all users know that Oxygen is a Java application, some don't even know what Java is and how it relates to Oxygen and we would rather keep things simple for them.

Regards,
Adrian

[rtbtobi]

Hello,

same problem here with your newest release. But it seems to occur only with the window maximized. First I thought Cairo-Dock is the culprit, but after turning this off still strange behaviour in maximized window, although seems a bit different (jumping to another main entry).

This ist Linux Mint 13 with Cinnamon and Oxygen XML Editor 14.1, build 2012101809, jre folder renamed.

Best regards,
René

[adrian]

Hello René,

Unfortunately this problem is caused by the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) that Oxygen runs on top of. The Linux kit of v14.1 comes bundled with version 1.6.0_33 which seems to have solved the problem for Ubuntu systems. As far as we have been told, the problem persists on some other Linux configurations, however we cannot reproduce it on our test machines (mostly Ubuntu and SUSE).

If you have renamed the 'jre' folder, Oxygen is now using whatever system JRE you have installed. You can check the name and version of the JRE used by Oxygen in Help > About, System properties.
java.runtime.name
java.runtime.version

Could you please also install and use with Oxygen the latest version of Java SE 6 or 7 from Oracle:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/ ... index.html
If you don't want to use this as the system wide JRE, you can simply copy it to the Oxygen folder and rename it to 'jre' (in place of the bundled 'jre' folder). Make sure that the path to the Java executable is [Oxygen-folder]/jre/bin/java.

Regards,
Adrian