Filer problem with RISC OS 5.14

I think on the wakefield show I got a CD from RISC OS open containig a ROM image for RISC OS 5.14 which is considered to be stable. I was trying to load this onto my Iyonix a few days ago and there was no error during reflashing the ROM. After starting it booted normally but opening the root directory of the harddrive caused an unspecific error that the filer is wrong and I can choose to continue or not. However the filer window is opened and further error messages appear if any directories are opened.

I also noticed that the filer menu has a very strange entry below the “open parent” entry. It is empty but has an subdirectory arrow on the right side with a yellow background followed by a menu separator. I made a screenshot and can send it to anybody interested.

Is this a known problem? The error message may be directly connected to the strange menu.

Also it seems that I cannot not go back to 5.13 since there is a programming error.

Not having gone through a flash of ROM, this is purely a guess until someone more knowledgable comes along.

Have you tried a hard reset? It could be that some ROM Modules needs to be re-initialised. Might be worth doing a *ROMModules command to see if this is the case.

Did you see this error when trying out a 5.14 softload before flash programming? It’d be interesting to know if there was a difference in behaviour there.

The problem also remains when the computer is switched off completely and then restarted.

Unfortunately I did not try a softload before, so can not say whether the problem is also there. Does it make sense to download 5.14 again from the website or do you think it might be possible that one or more bits of the flash rom were not flashed correctly?

Otherwise the system is very stable and usable.

RISC OS 5.14 has been running here, as a softload, for quite a while now and I haven’t noticed any strange behaviour. Given that I’ve made various modifications to the Filer it’s a part of RISC OS that I do keep an eye on, so I’m sure I would have noticed anything strange happening.

Michael: Could it be that you some utility in Boot that tries to patch the Filer? If so, then it’s most likely compatible with 5.13 but not 5.14.

An old version of QuickFiler could cause very odd (and nasty!) effects if the Filer version was changed. The latest QF version (v2.21 15 May 2007) should be failsafe and disable itself when dangerous changes are detected. It certainly works without problem with 5.14 softloaded, but I have not flashed my ROM so have no experience of that.

I ran 5.14 softloaded for a while and now have it flashed on my own Iyonix; I also noticed no strange Filer issues. I don’t (knowingly!) run any Filer patching software.