Number: 831

Date: 24-Apr-84 17':18':47

Submitter: 

Source: vanMelle

Subject: FILE NOT FOUND error in FONTCREATE not continuable

Lisp Version: 

Description: '
When FONTCREATE fails to find the font file requested, it generates a FILE NOT FOUND error "with the name of the most specific file tried".  This is not a particularly useful error to generate, because it is not continuable--since the filename in question is not supplied as an argument to FONTCREATE, the error machinery has no way to figure out how to fix it.'
'
Specifically, this leads to the following moderately serious bug': if you call FONTCREATE on a font that lives on some directory found in DIRECTORIES but NOT in FONTDIRECTORIES, then FONTCREATE will fail to find the file, and generate, say, FILE NOT FOUND FOOBAR12.STRIKE.  SPELLFILE, the generic remedy for FILE NOT FOUND errors, now goes into action, and finds this file somewhere not on FONTDIRECTORIES, prints, say'
={SISIFS}<LISPCORE>PRIVATE>FOOBAR12.STRIKE'
and returns this file to the error handler, which tries to recover by retrying the FONTCREATE.  This leads to an infinite loop, which looks to the user like'
={SISIFS}<LISPCORE>PRIVATE>FOOBAR12.STRIKE'
={SISIFS}<LISPCORE>PRIVATE>FOOBAR12.STRIKE'
={SISIFS}<LISPCORE>PRIVATE>FOOBAR12.STRIKE'
={SISIFS}<LISPCORE>PRIVATE>FOOBAR12.STRIKE'
 . . .'
'
A possible simple fix is to have FONTCREATE generate a different error, say "Font not found" (family size face rotation).  A more complicated fix is to have FONTCREATE call a subfunction (named without a backslash!) with the desired file name as argument, and have it generate the FILE NOT FOUND error; the error machinery would then succeed by restarting the subfunction.'
'
A completely different approach is to fix the error machinery to not attempt a restart when it couldn''t find "the offender" in the argument list of the place it''s restarting.  However, I don''t know that this solution would not break other things.

Workaround: 

Test Case: '
(swap DIRECTORIES FONTDIRECTORIES)'
(FONTCREATE someStandardFontNotInCore)

Edit-By: 

Edit-Date: 24-Apr-84 17':18':47

Attn: Nuyens

Assigned To: 

In/By: 

Disposition: 

System: Windows and Graphics

Subsystem: Fonts

Machine: 

Disk: 

Microcode Version: 

Memory Size: 

File Server: 

Server Software Version: 

Difficulty: Easy

Frequency: Everytime

Impact: Moderate

Priority: Hopefully

Status: Open

Problem Type: Bug

Source Files: