For this section of our newsletter, we will be reporting on the most common, and the most exotic bugs that we have encountered over the past two months. Keep in mind that these bugs will not be around forever, so enjoy them while you can, especially this issue’s Most Strange.
If you have experienced a strange occurrence when using one of our products, reports can be sent to “AmbrosiaSW@aol.com,” and if you are wondering why Maelstrom plays a chime and freezes as you start a game, you have the Caps Lock key down. This is Maelstrom’s pause feature.
Most Common:
Recently I have been receiving questions concerning a “sticky key” syndrome with Maelstrom™. It seems that while playing Maelstrom, some folks have experienced their controls becoming locked. The thrust stays on, or the ship continues turning left even after the keys have been released. Is Maelstrom possessed?
Work Around:
This is a perfect example of an INIT conflict. Maelstrom is running fine, but during play, a Control Panel is being activated, causing keys to remain depressed even when they aren’t. This Control Panel is Easy Access from Apple and is provided with all new machines and systems. Easy Access is an extension to help those who may have a physical handicap, and are unable to press a key combination (such as command + S). You can press the command key two or three times, and it is effectively held down by the Control Panel, while the user hits another key, completing the key combination. The easiest way to avoid this conflict is to remove Easy Access from the Control Panels folder, and restart.
Most Unusual:
For this issue’s Most Unusual, I am including two bugs, both regarding the same product, FlashWrite ][™. When accessing FlashWrite’s menus, some users experience artifacts in the form of vertical lines, usually purple, after the menu has been released. These artifacts continue to remain, and every time a menu is used, a new line appears.
Another strange problem that some of you are experiencing is an unusual crash after FlashWrite is launched using the Hot Key INIT, FlashWrite ][ Opener. FlashWrite opens properly, and appears normal. But, as soon as something is attempted, a menu pulled down or a key pressed, the machine freezes and has to be restarted.
Work Around:
The artifact problem is due to a bug in FlashWrite which does not take into account certain newer features of Color QuickDraw. Basically, the artifacts only appear when the color depth of the current monitor is set to 24-bit color. This problem will be fixed in the next upgrade.
The mysterious crash is just that indeed, mysterious. We began receiving complaints that FlashWrite was hanging systems, but my copy on the IIsi that I was working on was not giving me any problems. Then, I got a Q605, and tried the Opener again. Sure enough, FlashWrite hung my system. It seems that this bug only shows itself on the 040 based machines. If you have problems with the FlashWrite ][ Opener, remove it from your Extensions folder, restart, and access FlashWrite ][ from the Apple menu. This will also be fixed in the next upgrade.
If you have any problems with any of Ambrosia’s products, please let us know. We can be reached in a variety of ways, but the best thing to do is to send E-mail to AmbrosiaSW@aol.com. Replies are usually returned in about 24 hrs.
