bugGNU Octave - Bugs: bug #55584, "There is no disk in the...

 
 

bug #55584: "There is no disk in the drive. " error message displayed after returning from sleep in Windows 8.1 x64

Submitter:  None
Submitted:  Sat 26 Jan 2019 11:42:37 AM UTC
   
 
Category:  GUI Severity:  3 - Normal
Priority:  5 - Normal Item Group:  None
Status:  Need Info Assigned to:  None
Originator Name:  DIV Originator Email:  -email is unavailable-
Open/Closed:  * Closed Release:  * 4.4.1
Operating System:  * Microsoft Windows Fixed Release:  None
Planned Release:  None
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Sun 10 Mar 2019 07:08:15 PM UTC, comment #20: 

No response, asumming this has been fixed in the latest release.  Closing report.

Rik <rik5>
Group administrator
Sat 02 Mar 2019 07:18:32 PM UTC, comment #19: 

Version 4.4.1 is deprecated and no longer supported.  Please try with the latest stable release which is 5.1.0.  The problem is likely to have been fixed.

Rik <rik5>
Group administrator
Sun 03 Feb 2019 11:39:49 PM UTC, comment #18: 

Follow-up:

I had already reported that the message came up after restarting Octave but without rebooting Windows. 

I can now confirm that the message has also come up after rebooting* Windows too. 

I am not entirely sure if I got what you mean by a "roaming profile".  My login account for the laptop is stored on the laptop.  It is not a school/work/govt laptop, it is my own personal laptop. 
I have sometimes been using VPN (which automatically disconnects while the laptop is sleeping), but I don't think this is what you were asking about. 

It's still a bit weird, but if indeed it does work for everyone else, then I guess it's not really a big deal. 

—DIV

  • Technically I shut Windows down, and then started it anew.  Also, I didn't unplug the USB modem "dongle".  Just like I don't unplug the keyboard or mouse when I restart Windows.
Anonymous
Fri 01 Feb 2019 01:33:47 PM UTC, comment #17: 

@DIV:
Torsten's answer in comment #15 indicates that at the Octave side there's nothing we can do.
What you can do is reboot w/o dongle attached and let's hope the problem at hand is fixed then.

So I suggest to close this bug report, status to be determined but possibly "Works for me" (as it does for me).

Philip Nienhuis <philipnienhuis>
Group Member
Thu 31 Jan 2019 06:39:19 PM UTC, comment #16: 

On Windows, .bash_history, .octave_hist, and even a .octave_packages are kept in %USERPROFILE%, i.e., C:\Users\<user_name>

But octave-packages (w/o leading period) is in Octave's installation tree, in <Octave_install_dir>\mingw64\share\octave\

Applications are usually unaware of profile location settings, I assume that's something to be managed through system policies. But network administration on Windows is not my cup of tea.

Philip Nienhuis <philipnienhuis>
Group Member
Thu 31 Jan 2019 06:04:23 AM UTC, comment #15: 

Can an application explicitly decide whether to use a local or roaming profile? I am not aware of something like this in the octave gui.

Regarding the preferences file, octave uses home_dir/.config/octave/qt-settings. I do not know where history and package installation information are stored.

Torsten Lilge <ttl>
Group Member
Wed 30 Jan 2019 10:13:00 PM UTC, comment #14: 

Hey Torsten, spot on, that could be the culprit.
Although it depends on how DIV's domain is set up. Parts of the profile may be roaming, parts may be local, all depending on network/domain policies imposed during login and depending on local or network login.
Does Octave prefer a roaming or a local profile?

Philip Nienhuis <philipnienhuis>
Group Member
Wed 30 Jan 2019 09:19:26 PM UTC, comment #13: 

DIV, but you are not using a roaming profile, right?

Torsten Lilge <ttl>
Group Member
Wed 30 Jan 2019 01:39:59 PM UTC, comment #12: 

"Have you tried restarting ..."
Not since the bug report.  [I can update this later.]
But, of course, many times before the bug report :-)

—DIV

Anonymous
Mon 28 Jan 2019 07:42:03 PM UTC, comment #11: 

One of our core devs (Jordi) likes to refer to these kinds of events as "nasal demons" :-) But then more in the sense that nasal demons don't exist.

It's at least intriguing that your laptop thinks Octave has something to do with F:

My only worry here is that maybe maybe Octave would silently try to go on-line during installation (although I really doubt it).
If we are certain that it isn't the case we can close this bug report as fixing it simply looks to be beyond our reach.

@DIV:
Have you tried restarting your laptop w/o the dongle attached to it, and see if that F: error message still pops up?



Philip Nienhuis <philipnienhuis>
Group Member
Mon 28 Jan 2019 10:38:22 AM UTC, comment #10: 

Two mistakes in one post -.-: comment #0 and comment #7 and "off and on" of course.

Kai Torben Ohlhus <siko1056>
Group Member
Mon 28 Jan 2019 10:36:27 AM UTC, comment #9: 

In comment #0 and comment #8 you keep saying:

> I have not restarted/shut-down the computer yet.


But when I think back of my time with windows, wasn't this always the solution to inexplicable, weird windows behavior? ;-)

> Have you tried turn it on and off again!

Kai Torben Ohlhus <siko1056>
Group Member
Mon 28 Jan 2019 05:55:54 AM UTC, comment #8: 

Is there any link to the missing drive in the current directory that is shown in Octave's file browser widget?

Torsten Lilge <ttl>
Group Member
Mon 28 Jan 2019 01:49:19 AM UTC, comment #7: 

The error message is back again today upon waking laptop from sleep.
As mentioned, this is a new instance of Octave that was opened (not the instance opened from the installation-complete dialogue box).  I have not restarted/shut-down the computer yet. 
I did, however, run various "help ..." commands in this instance of Octave, as enumerated in Comment #5

BTW, clicking "Try Again" also got rid of the message with no repercussions. 

—DIV

Anonymous
Sun 27 Jan 2019 02:01:17 PM UTC, comment #6: 

P.S. I have Kaspersky Internet Security (19.x) installed, and running continuously.  A couple of other security tools are installed/saved but not running (in any form).

Anonymous
Sun 27 Jan 2019 01:56:40 PM UTC, comment #5: 

Cheers, Philip. 

As you are aware, my first thought was that Octave was hardwired to look for something on F:.  This idea was inconsistent with the fact that other users are apparently not seeing this. 

The lag from opening the laptop cover until the modem reconnects is a good idea.  Although it's a little unexpected too, given I haven't see anything similar from other applications (whether webs browsers or various updaters). 
[I am assuming at this point that the error message was generated upon waking, rather than upon sleeping or while sleeping.]

Perhaps it's related to running Octave immediately after the installation.  After closing that instance and running a new instance, I have now resumed from laptop sleep 2 or 3 more times, and not seen the error message again. 

The only other thing I thought of was whether any of the commands I ran might have triggered it.  Specifically: 

  • trying to run tinv before installing the package; 
  • running a command "help X" where X is not the name of an Octave command (maybe checks online???); 
  • running "help tinv" (refers to more info. online);
  • running "help makedist" (maybe checks online for current availability/status of this not-yet-implemented command???). 

But these were all momentary sort of events, that I wouldn't have thought should have an enduring effect. 

—DIV

Anonymous
Sun 27 Jan 2019 12:12:16 PM UTC, comment #4: 

Hi DIV:
Thanks for reporting back and no worries about "bugging" us.

Even if this is not a genuine Octave bug it's good for us to know about this sort of scenarios that are completely outside the control of Octave. When returning from sleep (or hibernation) several pieces of SW in RAM have to be restarted; the order in which that happens is often vital yet equally often unpredictable, at least for us mere mortals here but also -as seems evident- for external driver SW. Network (re-)connection delays undoubtedly interfere as well.

FWIW it could even have been a virus or malware checker that tries to check Octave's "fingerprints" in an on-line database.

Octave has no built-in (auto-)update mechanism.

Nevertheless, you write that you didn't check the "Allow Octave to the Octave web site ...." button, so IMO there should be no reason that Octave is even mentioned by Windows when your box is returning from sleep.
I'll just cc other devs who know more about the GUI, installer and Windows, just to verify that Octave (-'s installer) does not connect to the Internet.
JohnD, Torsten, would you know if Octave or dependencies (Qt, nsis, ...) might try to connect during installation?

Philip Nienhuis <philipnienhuis>
Group Member
Sun 27 Jan 2019 12:19:14 AM UTC, comment #3: 

Forgot to add:  yes, Octave seems to work fine apart from that message appearing.  Although I've only run very, very basic code in it so far.
—DIV

Anonymous
Sun 27 Jan 2019 12:18:11 AM UTC, comment #2: 

Hello, Philip.

Yes, the message showed up post-installation. 

Your analysis about the message being displayed by the Windows OS (about Octave), rather than generated by Octave itself sounds reasonable.

"The only thing I can imagine [...] is that during installation you allowed Octave to access on-line info about updates etc." — I don't recall clicking/unclicking any option about this.  Is there actually any option about this? 
FWIW, I ran the installer from octave_4-4-1-w64_installer.exe (slightly renamed file).  In other words from the EXE, not ZIP or building from source or whatever. 

"In Edit | Preferences, Network tab, be sure to uncheck [...]" — I had checked my Preferences for any reference to F: already. 
I have just checked again for the Network preferences, and can confirm that nothing was ticked.  "Use Octave to connect [...] to display current news and information" was not ticked, and "Use proxy server" was not ticked.  (Everything else is greyed out.)  I have not made any changes to those settings. 
BTW, during installation I was asked whether I wanted to receive news and so forth (which I would have recalled to have been via email, but maybe it was through the application itself), and I definitely selected 'no' to that. 
I'm not sure about your reference to updates.  A lot of software polls the/server regularly for possible updates, and often that's user-configurable:  e.g. allow/disallow, frequency of checking, action upon discovering update.  I cannot see anything in the Octave settings about "updates". 

Under the "File Browser" tab in Preferences I do have "Synchronise Octave working directory with file browser" ticked (by default). 

Besides the Windows 8.1 x64 built-in internet capabilities, I also have a separate widget (from Vodafone) that I am pretty sure is x32 and possibly written for Windows Vista or something like that originally.  It seems to run OK, but had displayed a warning at one stage about not being written for Windows 8.1. 

My File Explorer instances sometime occupies a whole CPU core:  generally when I'm reconnecting to the internet. 

So, yes, it's plausible that this could be due to some buggy driver on my system.  If so, then sorry to 'bug' you :-)
I may have been too quick to point the finger at Octave, although that was based upon the error message I saw. 

—DIV

Anonymous
Sat 26 Jan 2019 05:18:44 PM UTC, comment #1: 

Do I understand correctly this bug report is all about post-install issues of Octave? Any problem with running Octave "normally' (= after closing it and restarting)?

First off, the error message you see is a system error message, not an Octave error message. Octave doesn't have a "No disk" error message coded anywhere.

Second, you indicate that drive F: is related to the modem.

The only thing I can imagine then for your use case is that during installation you allowed Octave to access on-line info about updates etc. Obviously that requires an Internet connection.

My guess is that the reason the complaints refer to a missing F: drive rather than a missing Internet connection is simply due to poor SW quality of the modem driver and modem support SW. It looks like the modem driver/SW returns confusing error info to Windows.
Again note that it isn't Octave complaining, it's Windows and while Windows is smart enough to know that a request by Octave is involved it can't correct BS info from the modem SW.

So, just close Octave and restart it. In Edit | Preferences, Network tab, be sure to uncheck "Allow Octave to the Octave web site ....".
Please report back.

As to the advice about not installing in "C:\Program Files\", IIRC that issue has been solved but we're just a bit conservative :-)

Philip Nienhuis <philipnienhuis>
Group Member
Sat 26 Jan 2019 11:42:37 AM UTC, original submission:  

I just installed Octave 4.4.1 x64. 
GNU Octave Version: 4.4.1 (hg id: 1f46d371968c)
GNU Octave License: GNU General Public License
Operating System: MINGW32_NT-6.2 Windows 6.2  x86_64

Before installation I closed down extraneous applications. 
I installed to the recommended location on my C drive, which is "C:\Octave\Octave-4.4.1". 
(I did firstly request installation under "C:\Program Files\...", but the installer warned me not to, because Octave cannot cope with spaces in directories [What?!?], so I decided to revert to the recommended installation directory.) 

During installation I received a warning that no JRE was found, and that some functionality would therefore not be available.  (I guess it should be only restricting the calling of Java functions from within Octave?  It wasn't really made clear.)

After installation was completed I was given the option to run Octave immediately, which I did. 

I ran some very, very basic code in Octave, and each time I put Windows to sleep (by closing my laptop), when I then wake Windows up there is a warning message waiting for me IMMEDIATELY upon opening the laptop.  This warning message appears BEFORE I log back in, and even BEFORE the login field is displayed, before I press any key. 



octave-gui.exe - No Disk

ⓧ There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive F:.

Cancel                Try Again                Continue


I have tried pressing Cancel and Continue, and the message goes away.  There is no indication in Octave of anything wrong.  There is no obvious setting related to F:. 

Nominally I don't really have an F drive, except that my mobile-broadband modem is assigned to F:, but I am not convinced that this has anything at all to do with my modem.  I am guessing that Octave has been pre-programmed to seek something on F:, which it can't find. 

I got this message three to five times. 
There was only ONE occasion I woke the computer from sleep and this warning was NOT displayed.
I have not yet shut down or restarted Windows since the installation, NOR have I closed Octave since first running it — so this is all referring to the first (and only) instance of Octave running.

—DIV

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