stalled script

duff · October 11, 2009

Hi everyone

I have installed the latest 2 beta in Firefox 3.0.14 in ubuntu jaunty. I am consistently getting the following message on firefox start up (along with a considerable delay in start up):

A script on this page may be busy, or it may have stopped responding. You can stop the script now, or you can continue to see if the script will complete.

Script: chrome://zotero/content/xpcom/translate.js:241

Usually I stop the script and start using firefox. It's annoying though! Is there a solution? I've tried uninstalling zotero and deleting the zotero folder under my firefox profile before re-installation. It didn't help.

Thanks for advice etc.

Duff

adamsmith · October 11, 2009

create an error report (gears menu) and post the error ID here.

duff · October 11, 2009

Error report ID: 1447074834

Cheers

Duff

dstillman · October 11, 2009

There's something wrong with your translators. You're also getting lots of lines like this:

[JavaScript Error: "Invalid or missing translator metadata JSON object" {file: "file:///[...]/Zotero/translators/AlterNet.js" line: 0}]

Try moving the 'translators' directory in your Zotero data directory out of the way and restarting Firefox.

Agusandy · October 28, 2009

Hi!
I have the same problem like Duff, getting the following message on firefox start up:
......."A script on this page may be busy, or it may have stopped responding. You can stop the script now, or you can continue to see if the script will complete.

Script: chrome://zotero/content/xpcom/translate.js:241............."

Error report 761734053
Thaks
Agusandy

duff · October 28, 2009

Hi Agusandy

I think my problem here was that I had copied a Zotero library from one PC to another. They were running different versions of Zotero 2 though.

What I did was made sure that the PC I wanted to copy from was running the latest version of Zotero and that the library had been updated. Then made sure that the PC I was copying to was also running the same version of Zotero.

Things were fine after that. Hope it helps.

Cheers

duff

dstillman · October 28, 2009

Agusandy: My advice would be the same as I gave duff above.

Toby Martin · December 11, 2009

I get the same problem, but intermittently, with Zotero 2.0b7.6, FF 3.5.5, WinXP Prof SP2. I'll try Dan's suggestion, but due to intermittency won't be able to tell right away whether it works.

Posting mainly to clarify adamsmith's suggestion: does creating an error report mean going gear -> Preferences -> Advanced tab, then enabling Debug Output Logging, then clicking Submit to Zotero Server? Thanks.

Bionatsci · December 11, 2009

does creating an error report mean going gear -> Preferences -> Advanced tab, then enabling Debug Output Logging, then clicking Submit to Zotero Server? Thanks.

No, logging debug output is a different thing from generating an error report (looking at debug output is generally the next step if the error report is uninformative). To create an error report go: gear -> report errors (if it is greyed out then there have been no errors to report).

Toby Martin · December 16, 2009

Thanks Bionatsci. I conclude that the stalled script doesn't always mean an error, because even after moving the Translators folder out of the way as Dan suggested I got the stalled script message this morning, yet the Report Errors... item is greyed out. I'm afraid that I didn't jot down what script was causing the problem, though the final # of the statement was 1482, not 241 as for Duff. I'll write it down next time and report it here.

Toby Martin · December 18, 2009

Looong, computer-kneecapping stall this morning. Troublemaker was:
chrome://zotero/content/xpcom/zotero.js:1482
This time the Report Errors item wasn't greyed out.
Error: 1985083065
As a side issue, I note that the "Don't ask me again" checkbox in the "Warning: unresponsive script" dialogue window seems to do nothing.
Thanks.

dstillman · December 22, 2009

Toby: That's a pretty odd place for a stall. That's the file and line, every time this happens?

Does this happen with other extensions disabled? Does it happen on Firefox startup, or when loading a page later?

Toby Martin · December 22, 2009

Hi Dan. Yes, that's the only file and line I can recall seeing over repeated cases of the behavior.

Other add-ons are Adblock Plus, FireFTP, Java Quick Starter, and TwitterBar. All have enabled during start-ups.

It only ever happens on Firefox startup.

In fact, some additional data: I only ever have the problem on my computer at work, which is somewhat underpowered. Start-ups have been brutal lately because of some anti-virus program tying up a ton of CPU and memory. I began to theorize that the zotero script stalls were less a cause of lousy computer/browser performance than a symptom of it. i.e. maybe zotero's stalling because of inadequate resources.

Yesterday the IT guy added some memory and disabled the AV program with a meat tenderizer, and start-up this morning was much improved. No script stall today, though as mentioned it wasn't stalling every day anyway.

Maybe given these circumstances it's best to consider the issue comatose, but I'll report again here if I get another stall.

Thanks for your patience.

marthasguy · March 11, 2010

I've been getting this "script is running" error (Id 1447074834, or perhaps 761734053). After rebooting, FireFox won't start at all (presumably the script is still running but the error message doesn't come up). I've closed down, and started Firefox in "safe mode" which works but Zotero is not there.

Dan Stillman says "Try moving the 'translators' directory in your Zotero data directory out of the way and restarting Firefox." Well, I can't find the translators directory, and I don't know what is meant by "out of the way" -- As to the "data directory" I can't seem to find anything except a "storage" directory which doesn't have any reference to "translators" and a "My Library Zotero" file and "Zotero Backup" Can you help?

dstillman · March 11, 2010

marthasguy: Start a new thread, and include the exact message you're getting, including file and line number. But first upgrade to 2.0, because you're using a beta version of Zotero from last October.

marthasguy · March 12, 2010

Thanks, Dan, the new version seems to have solved the problem. The issue may have been my having upgraded Firefox (not sure of causality) - it was after the Firefox upgrade that the stalling began.