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Decision Explorer® FAQs - Technical

This page contains questions that are often asked, or conversations from the user email list that we think are particularly useful for users. If you have a question, or further comment to this information, please email us on info@banxia.com.

The installer stops at 67% installed

This problem occurs when the installer program is trying to read the second file (with the extension ".W02") and it is either not there at all, or it is corrupt (faulty). If you are installing from a downloaded file, make sure that the .W02 file is in the same directory as the .EXE, and has the same base name (DE30DEMO.EXE and DE30DEMO.W02 for example). If the file is there, then the .W02 file is probably faulty, having been corrupted while downloading. This is particularly common with Netscape. Download again using an alternate link if our pages have one, or use another browser or FTP application.

If you still keep having trouble, please email info@banxia.com and we will arrange for a disk set for you.

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Installer reports "corrupt installation detected"?

There are two known reasons for "Corrupt Installation Detected" when installing our products.

1. You have not downloaded the file completely or it has been damaged in some way. To fix that, get a fresh copy by downloading again.

2. Your system has a write-protected Windows directory. This is quite common on systems connected to a corporate or university network and some systems running Windows NT.

* If you frequently get this error message when trying to install programs on the system, then this is probably the reason. Many software companies use the same installation system as us so you
would see the problem on their products too.

* If you install a lot of software and have never seen this error before, please consider that point #1 above may apply.

How to check if #2 is the problem

• Open a word processor and write a short document
• Do File and then Save As
• When prompted for a save location, find the c:\windows folder
• Try to save the file as c:\windows\only a test
• If your system gives an error, that confirms the problem

(Note, the exact location of your Windows folder may vary)

What to d: Modify the permissions for the Windows directory on an NT computer for the Everyone group so it is not "Read Only (IE, not RX status). You may need help from your systems administrator to do that.

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Why don't maps paste properly?

Decision Explorer® outputs pictures on the clipboard using a standard "drawing mode", but not all applications support it properly. We obviously can't control how third-party applications handle the clipboard formats. We are working on how to make our output more compatible (3.0.5 had some alterations to improve it), so if you find an application that has problems, please let us know. In the meantime you may find that an alternative application allows you to paste the picture properly. For instance, different versions of Microsoft Word handle the pictures differently. Some have no problem at all, some create a box over the front (which can be removed by just double-clicking to edit, and then clicking close), and some don't handle all the picture.

The answer for Microsoft® Office users with a version that fails is to paste it into PowerPoint® first. Then select it in PowerPoint®, and copy it again, and then paste into Word. PowerPoint® seems to handle clipboard pictures much better than Word, and can be used as an intermediary.

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When I run Decision Explorer®, it just stays "preparing"?

A very few customers have reported that Decision Explorer®'s main window appears, but the "preparing" dialog doesn't go away, and it doesn't respond to commands.

This is caused by a faulty display driver. You can prove this by switching to the "standard" Microsoft SVGA (or VGA) driver. You will find that Decision Explorer® works fine. You will want to obtain the latest drivers for your video graphics card from the manufacturers web site. If you have problems obtaining one, we may be able to help.

Update: Decision Explorer® 3.1, a free update for registered users, includes a work-around for this problem, and may be an easier solution for people.

Technical information: Windows has a number of standard graphics modes.Applications can use whichever suits them best for displaying graphics. Decision Explorer® uses a mode called MM_LOMETRIC, which is less common, but other major applications also use it. What happens is that Decision Explorer® tries to obtain the drawing mode it requires. The faulty device driver doesn't return it, so Decision Explorer® cannot continue. Because it should never happen, no code was put in to tell the user of this error, so it just sits there. Code will be added in a future version for these rare occurrances.

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Printing doesn't work properly

Printing problems typically come down to the printer not being able to cope with a full page of graphics. Decision Explorer® uses more capabilities of the printer than basic text printing requires, so text printing okay does not prove that a graphic map will too. If half of a map appears, or the text is printed with no arrows, then the printer memory has probably run out.

Solution: The solution for this is to get more printer memory, or to reduce the resolution that is used for printing.

Margin trouble usually appears on ink-jet printers which have a large margin at one end of the paper, and a small one at the other. When printing text documents, this is not normally noticable, but when printing maps, particularly with borders shown, it becomes apparent.

Solution: If this is a problem for you, use the border control options in the Decision Explorer® map print dialog to adjust the document borders.

Edges not printing properly is similar to the ink-jet problem, but usually caused by a driver incompatibility. Decision Explorer® asks the printer driver how big the printable area is, and prints to that space. If the printer can't actually print that area, either through design or alignment trouble, then Decision Explorer® can't know about it.

Solution: Use the border control options to tell Decision Explorer® to print in less space.

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A file doesn't load any more - Decision Explorer® reports an error

Decision Explorer® verifies the model files as they are loaded, and if it detects a problem it will not load the model. Decision Explorer® has never been known in over nine years to save a faulty model, so model file corruption is usually physical disk corruption.

Solution: First, ensure that the disk is not in trouble using SCANDISK or CHKDSK (or similar). Next, look for the .MDK file that matches the .MDL file. This file is the backup made at the last model save. Rename it to have a new name and the .MDL extension, and it will probably load. Also check to see if there is a .MSV file - this is an auto-saved file which you can again rename and give a .MDL extension.

If the file has been transferred using the internet, either FTP or HTTP, you should check that a "binary" mode has been used. If text mode is used, then the load error with a number 11 is likely to occur because the file has been modified. For FTP, either select binary mode, or add a .bin extension (see your FTP client help for selecting binary mode). For HTTP (web) downloads, the mode is controlled by the server (consult your server documentation), but you will find that zipping the file will generally solve this.

If it's really important (the model file is really critical to you), Banxia could have a look at it, but at a cost. If no backup is available, and the user wants an instant answer, then loading the file into NotePad will allow the extraction of the concept texts. To many people the concept text is the most important aspect - putting links back in can be done relatively easily.

We are sometimes asked what the number in the error message means. It is simply an indicator as to where in the process of loading the error occurred, and doesn't really help anyone much, but for interest the following table is provided:

0 no specific reason found
1 unable to create a window
2 printer change cancelled
3 unable to create & open temporary files
4 failed to read a concept into cache
5 failed to read a concept (no cache)
6 failed to read concept's memory info
7 unable to allocate memory for file extraction
8 write failure extracting file
9 unable to open temporary file for output
10 unable to open the model file for read
11 invalid model header (see notes above)
12 old version not supported
13 Error reading concept structure
14 unable to allocate memory for concepts
15 Link header invalid
16 Link memory allocate fails
17 Link read failure
18 model header invalid
19 model header read error
20 unable to allocate memory for set control
21 set header is invalid
22 set detail header is invalid
23 unable to allocate memory for set itself
24 unable to allocate memory for model etc
25 no allocated memory for model etc
26 Error reading concept general
27 dynamic array header failure
28 error allocating dynamic memory
29 error reading dynamic info
30 gcs header failure
31 error allocating gcs memory
32 error reading gcs info
33 error reading smart segment start
34 error reading smart segment end
35 error reading smart segment itself
36 unable to allocate model attribute memory
37 error reading model attribs into memory
38 error interpreting model attribs
39 unable to allocate view attribute memory
40 error reading view attribs into memory
41 error interpreting view attribs
42 user cancelled after unknown smart seg
43 unable to allocate memory for file move
44 unable to open a file for moving
45 file write failed during move

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Closing Decision Explorer® produces a grey window

For added flexibility, Decision Explorer® doesn't use the Multi-Document Interface (MDI) method of handling multiple windows. The grey window that appears when you close a model allows you to open another model, or close Decision Explorer®. If you want to avoid it, simply use the File menu Exit item (Alt-Q) instead of Closing.

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The map "goes mad", with lines shooting top to bottom, left to right.

This is very rare, but it does unfortunately happen sometimes. The problem is that Windows runs out of resources, usually because of a resource leak in printer drivers (Hewlett-Packard in particular). Decision Explorer® asks Windows how big a concept text is on screen, and Windows returns "zero", so Decision Explorer® bases its calculations on that value. Unfortunately, that sends things "mad" with arrow lines going vertically up or horizontally across to nowhere.

Solution: Close Windows down - you have to restart to get the resources back to normal size. Then, load the model. It may still be shown wrongly, but now press Shift-Alt-F5 (or hold Shift while selecting the View menu Redraw item). This tells Decision Explorer® to recalculate the concept sizes again. Most of the time it will instantly be corrected and displayed normally. If it doesn't correct the map, the command "MAP ONMAP" will restore order, but unfortunately the previous map layout is lost.

A final note - Decision Explorer® has a finite map size, which is much bigger than any normal map is ever going to reach. However, if you create a really really wide map, hundreds of concepts wide, then it is possible that the map area will overflow and give similar problems (lines apparently going horizontally or vertically). Spotting this situation is easy though - the map is massive! In this case, you should reconsider your methodology, the tool isn't designed for building a single massive map display (though we'd be interested in knowing your reasoning in case we should add such facilities).

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Toolbar changes don't get saved

Decision Explorer® remembers the toolbar settings when you close a model. If you wish to save a particular configuration, make sure that you close other models before closing that one. The easiest way to ensure this is to have only one model open, reconfigure the toolbars, and then close it. Those settings with then be remembered.

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