I have seen this when the finalization process has died for
some reason. You will not be able to act on that file till the
earlier handle has been finalized. The way to get a new finalization
process to run is to execute, WeakArray initialize.

The HostFileTestCase should test for the presence of this condition.
If HostFileTestCase green lights, then there is something else wrong.

As for the public posting of this stuff... working out the last details
of what came from where under which license. Just crossing some t's and
dotting some i's.

John

> From: Paul McDonough <wnchips at home.com>
> Reply-To: wnchips at home.com
> Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2001 21:10:34 -0700
> To: squeak at cs.uiuc.edu
> Subject: [Squeak tour image] weird bug
> Resent-From: squeak at cs.uiuc.edu
> Resent-Date: 25 Apr 2001 04:24:30 -0000
> 
> Folks -
> 
> I know this is a long shot, but I'm trying to port some code over to the
> Squeak Tour image, and I'm encountering a really weird problem.  In the
> code I'm porting, there's a bit of recursion which basically drills down
> a directory tree until it hits bottom, deletes the files, and then
> climbs back up deleting the directories as it goes.  Simple enough.
> 
> Here's the odd part.  It consistently fails to delete the (one) file
> that's down there, and the primitive (apparently) fails silently,
> because the first visible symptom is the not-at-all silent primitive
> failure that occurs when it tries to remove the directory it should have
> deleted the file from.
> 
> I've been through the code, reading and running/stepping, and honest,
> there's no obvious problem at the Smalltalk level.  I haven't delved
> into the primitives yet, nor looked at random hackarounds that might
> avoid (vs solving) the problem.  I have very little time available to
> Squeak any more, and it's been a bit frustrating to keep having to start
> out my coding sessions by beating my head against the same wall for an
> hour or two to no avail.
> 
> So ... this is on the "pre-release" image that went around before
> Smalltalk Solutions.  There's a rumor that this was fixed in the image
> that got handed around *at* the conference (vs before), but I don't have
> that image available 'cause I wasn't there.  Does anyone out there
> (Thorsten?) have either that newer Squeak Tour image (someplace it can
> be downloaded), or happen to know a fix to the problem I'm describing?
> OS is MacOS 8.5.1.
> 
> Tia,
> Paul
>