14. Troubleshooting

  1. When I run the compressed output program, the error "Unknown or missing variable" is generated.

    It is most likely that your program contains an EVAL keyword. Ensure that any variables that are passed to the EVAL function as strings, are not renamed by telling StrongBS not to rename these variables (LOCKed variables). See 9 above.

  2. When I changed some lines in the compressed BASIC program that was created by StrongBS using my favourite editor, the program failed to run and produces errors. It was OK before loading into the editor. What is happening?

    All editors that handle BASIC programs use either their own code or the built-in BASIC code for tokenising the BASIC line. Secondly some editors work on your BASIC program in text (Ascii) mode not in a tokenised mode, this will even give more errors.

    The problem is due to the fact that the compressed program has all spaces removed. When tokenising a BASIC line, BASIC and other applications need a space between a BASIC keyword and a variable, else they get confused and they will not tokenise the BASIC keyword, thinking that it is a variable.
    If the BASIC keyword is not tokenised, this will result in the length of the BASIC line being changed becoming larger than the original. If the line length is already close to the maximum allowed limit of 251 bytes per line, it is possible that this limit is exceeded and your editor will give an error that "Line too long". If the line length wasn't exceeded then your editor will happily tokenise the line but using the character equivalent of the BASIC keyword not it's token. When you come to run the program, BASIC will complain that it does not know the particular keyword. If you use the BASIC "LIST" keyword to list the line, you will not be able tell what the problem is, nor if you use an editor that does not show BASIC keywords in a different color.

    I personally recommend that, if you edit BASIC programs, use an editor that allows you to distinguish BASIC keyword from the rest of the program and most importantly, avoid editing a compressed program.

  3. My compressed output file failed to run!!!
    1. Ensure that your BASIC program does not contain the BASIC keyword "EVAL". If it does, then ensure that if "EVAL" is used to evaluate variables or procedure names, these should not be renamed. You will need to lock these variables from being renamed by StrongBS. See FAQ blow on how to do that and 9 above.
    2. If all EVAL variables are locked, as indicated above, and your compressed program still fails to run then disable all variable renaming and try again. If it did work, then you have discovered a bug in StrongBS, for which I appreciate that you inform me so that I can correct it.

      You can try compressing with some options disabled to see which option causes the problem.

      Please see the Section "Feedback to the Author".

  4. When double clicking on the StrongBS icon, to start it, nothing happens!

    You copy of StrongBS has become corrupt, try installing StrongBS again.