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.user file won't open in editor

P

Paragon

Well-known member
Well, this is new. Wanted to open my modified Broken Earth file in the editor to check something and got this:

"Encountered PCDATA for element 'document' proscribed against PCDATA".

Anyone got any idea what that's about? I can get in and edit directly, of course, but sometimes when you just need to change something small the editor is easier.
 
umm does the file work? is that ONE part of a single source or is that the entire file for the source.

Generally, that is an XML formatting error which indicates you have stuff in the wrong place....

For example,

Code: 
<tag>boo
<subtag>blah</subtag>
</tag>


In this very simple example, tag is supposed to ONLY contain child tags and not "real" data. Now... I am not 100% sure that's what this is exactly complaining about, but that is the type of thing I could see validation code checking against.

Best thing would be to link to google drive or dropbox if the file is very large or post here if it's smallish.
 
File seems to be loading and operating fine; I just can't open it in the editor. And its a full sized .user file for the Broken Earth setting.

The odd thing about it is that its just an edited version of the .user file I was using just yesterday (with the changes necessary to deal with the change in eval scripts in Edges); and its being pretty unspecific. I can certainly upload and link to it, but its 3154 lines, I can't assume people are going to want to pile all the way through that.
 
Okay, just put the old version back in to see if it would open that--and it will. What's odder, is HL is not throwing errors for doing so; in fact I created a character with an Edge with an eval script and it seems to be working. In addition, the editor is still show the "Edge with Bootstrapped Weapon/Armor" tab, which I thought was no longer supposed to be supported.

So now I'm really confused.
 
Paragon said:
Okay, just put the old version back in to see if it would open that--and it will. What's odder, is HL is not throwing errors for doing so; in fact I created a character with an Edge with an eval script and it seems to be working. In addition, the editor is still show the "Edge with Bootstrapped Weapon/Armor" tab, which I thought was no longer supposed to be supported.

So now I'm really confused.
Click to expand...

Are you using some type of source control? ie, do you have access to both the original and "broken" one? If so, can you do a diff(alternately, if you have both files and can link, I could do a diff.) The XML may be well formed, but may not be VALID and there is a difference!!! Valid refers to being having a structure which corresponds to a "contact" so speak, what tags can be where, in what order, how many, etc, etc etc. The runtime for building characters may not enforce the validity constraint, while the editor seems to do so.

If you don't have both files, well.. don't sweat it, just make sure you test your work. Does anyone with DEEP knowledge or from LWD know if there is an XML schema for .user files(for everyone else, schema is the contract by which an XML document agrees to abide.)
 
That's a syntax error. It sounds like somewhere there's some scrambled code, and since it's reporting it at the document level, it's bouncing all the way up. If you send it to me, I'll take a look. I've got a good color-coding editor (UltraEdit).
 
Since you've both offered, here's the current version (the one that's bouncing off the editor):

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BxEGOF0GjtxoRzVTZ01HbjFGUlE

and here's the prior one without the corrected eval scripts and the Weapon edges in their separate category:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BxEGOF0GjtxoM2FqenB0ZG9LejA

(I don't do full multi-version saves, but I do make it a habit to keep last-working versions of things. What really puzzles me is that it loads into the program itself fine without an error; its just the editor that seems to spit up about it).
 
Good catch CC.

Paragon, how do you edit? What are you using? I would HIGHLY suggest using something like Notepad++ and download the XML tools, making sure to use the Validate or Check XML syntax features to make sure your edited files are valid XML.

To be totally honest, I am very surprised this loaded in the main runtime at all since they are not valid XML.
 
That was what surprised me. Given I'd been working on the modified file for a while, and doing some cut-and-paste between the previous one and this one, these are entirely comprehensible errors--but I'd have thought it just wouldn't load. And alternatively, would have given me more specific errors.

As to your question, I normally either use the built-in editor, or if I'm doing direct editing in the XML, GetDiz. I don't do an enormous amount of the latter, normally; as I noted the only reason this probably happened was because I was cutting and pasting between the pre-update version of the .user file and the updated one, because I'd discovered some problems in the former after I'd done the latter. And of course the error message was, to say the least, vague.

Thanks as always, CC.
 
Paragon said:
That was what surprised me. Given I'd been working on the modified file for a while, and doing some cut-and-paste between the previous one and this one, these are entirely comprehensible errors--but I'd have thought it just wouldn't load. And alternatively, would have given me more specific errors.

As to your question, I normally either use the built-in editor, or if I'm doing direct editing in the XML, GetDiz. I don't do an enormous amount of the latter, normally; as I noted the only reason this probably happened was because I was cutting and pasting between the pre-update version of the .user file and the updated one, because I'd discovered some problems in the former after I'd done the latter. And of course the error message was, to say the least, vague.

Thanks as always, CC.
Click to expand...

I don't know anything about GetDiz, if it has some XML plugins validation tools, take advantage of that on those rare occasions where you edit the files directly.

If not, I can't recommend Notepad++ enough for editing XML(you would have to download the XML plugin and for any files which do NOT end with the .xml extension, make sure to set the "Language" to XML so the editor knows to treat it as being XML content. There are plenty of other free and low cost notepad replacements which have some type of XML validation tools available or built it, but I know if this one. I can't stress enough anyone editing files directly should be using an editor which is aware of "valid" xml formatting.
 
I'd give a second vote for Notepad++ (or, if you are on Linux like I tend to be most of the time these days, notepadqq). It's my editor of preference as well. Well, when using a text editor for XML anyway.
 
Last edited:
Well, like I said, I actually only rarely do it directly on the XML; I do it if I'm doing some sort of mass edit (like the Edge updates) or when the Editor just flat out can't address it (like the business with the Advances), but otherwise I prefer to use the Editor if for no other reason because I'm unlikely to accidentally change something I didn't mean to.
 
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