Notepad++ has a Reload false alarm / bug? "This file has been modified by another program. Do you want to reload it"? even when it hadn't been recently modified at all?!

artie-finkelstein

@bo-chen
I’m going to go out on a limb here, as I note that this is your second post concerning MEGA and Notepad++.

AFAIK Notepad++ is designed around static storage, as in hard drives and SSDs. When a user decides to use network storage, whether it’s a corporate server, a NAS box or a cloud service, e.g., MEGA, they have started down the slippery slope of active version management. Notepad++ will detect a file modified ‘behind the users back’ and offer to reload it or ignore the changes. Trying to do more is outside the scope of Notepad++. My guess is that the developers do not offer more choices (e.g., save a copy somewhere else and then reload the contents) to avoid potential data integrity issues best left to the operating system (which at this point appears to have broken the implicit promise of static storage).

My guess is that you have somehow configured MEGA to do more than automatically preserve file contents. If that is the case, I’d then say Notepad++ is trying to cope with a system where file contents have changed and is now trying to alert you to that. The alert will be on a per file (active tab) basis when you (re)activate a tab. So far everything sounds normal to me. The how and why the MEGA presented file contents changed (or didn’t change) is outside the purview of this community. It’s also possible that MEGA is having issues, but that is not something Notepad++ can ever solve.

Alan Kilborn

Yep, I agree with @artie-finkelstein . Some time ago I posted about this sort of thing with files on a Microsoft “OneDrive”. I never really came up with a satisfactory solution so I just don’t edit files on this drive with Notepad++ (if I can avoid doing it).

Leo Eibler

Hi,
I want to upvote this thread because I installed new version of npp today and since this new update (version 8.1.9, 64-bit) I got “file has changed” notification.

The files are stored on a windows network drive and there was no problem with this mechanism this in the previous versions.
It is reproduceable by changing a file, save the file, switch to another program (e.g. explorer) switch back to npp and the message appears.

So it seems there was a change in detecting the modification of a file (maybe time resolution to recognize a modified file or something else was changed)?

thank you!
Leo

donho

@bo-chen
What’s your Notepad++ version?

donho

@leo-eibler

It is reproduceable by changing a file, save the file, switch to another program (e.g. explorer) switch back to npp and the message appears.

Is it reproducible 100% for you?
What’s the version before you updated your Notepad++ to v8.1.9?
I have tried with files on oneDrive, but cannot reproduce it. Any idea to build a windows network drive for reproducing this issue?

Dennis Lazo

@leo-eibler i am upvoting this. my files are saved on a NAS and am experiencing this as well.

donho

@dennis-lazo

@leo-eibler i am upvoting this. my files are saved on a NAS and am experiencing this as well.

It’s good for upvoting.
It’s better to let us know your Notepad++ version, so we can identify better the problem and fix this bug.

donho

@Bo-Chen @Dennis-Lazo @Leo-Eibler

I have no network drive/NAS/MEGA so I can’t reproduce this issue.
However, I find some incoherent code of timestamp detection and did a blend fix:
http://download.notepad-plus-plus.org/repository/MISC/

Could you guys test the fixed binary (download above) and confirm me if it work (and the message you see) please?

Leo Eibler

@donho Thank you very much for this fast fix. I installed your fixed version now and will see if it solves the problem.

I tried to find out the version I used before but I was not able to find it - if you have any idea how to find out the previous used version I will tell you ;-)

Leo Eibler

@donho happened again with new Version.
Dialog message: “File on disk timestamp is earlier than current buffer timestamp: #2”
And if I click on OK, a second dialog box with same message appears.
If I switch to another program and switch back to npp a 3rd dialog box appears with same message.
Dialog boxes can not be closed - after clicking on OK it appears again and again.

So I have to kill the process.

donho

@leo-eibler
Could you try the new fix please?
It should be fine now:
http://download.notepad-plus-plus.org/repository/MISC/NewFix/

Leo Eibler

@donho Is it possible that you don’t fixed the x64 version? because it has older date (2021-11-12 04:02 2.3M) and other filename (missing the word “new”)

donho

@leo-eibler

@donho Is it possible that you don’t fixed the x64 version? because it has older date (2021-11-12 04:02 2.3M) and other filename (missing the word “new”)

You are right. Fixed now.

Leo Eibler

@donho thank you very much. I will test it.

Leo Eibler

@donho it looks very good … I tested it now (for the last 2 hours) and no “file has been modified” dialog any more ;-)

I also tested to modify the file really outside the editor and this works also - the modified dialog appears as expected.

I keep on testing next week but I think you solved the bug ;-)
Thank you very very much for your really fast help!

BR

David Johnstone

@donho Out of curiosity, I looked at the code in FileInterface.cpp
In line 25, we have:

attrib = FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL | FILE_FLAG_POSIX_SEMANTICS;

The MSDN documentation for CreateFile says about FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL:

“This attribute is valid only if used alone.”

In reality, ORing with other attributes may make no real difference. But after coding for some 50 years, I believe being pedantic = good plan :-)

David Johnstone

@david-johnstone should say Line 125

donho

@david-johnstone

The MSDN documentation for CreateFile says about FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL:
“This attribute is valid only if used alone.”
In reality, ORing with other attributes may make no real difference. But after coding for some 50 years, I believe being pedantic = good plan :-)

You’ve got a point here.

OTOH, the another parameter FILE_FLAG_POSIX_SEMANTICS, MS Doc says:

FILE_FLAG_POSIX_SEMANTICS
0x01000000


	Access will occur according to POSIX rules. This includes allowing multiple files with names, differing only in case, for file systems that support that naming.

We do not need this ability, so I think it can be removed. What do you think @pnedev ?

donho

@David-Johnstone

The MSDN documentation for CreateFile says about FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL:
“This attribute is valid only if used alone.”

The thing is, even FILE_FLAG_POSIX_SEMANTICS is removed:

void Win32_IO_File::fillCreateParams(DWORD &access, DWORD &share, DWORD &disp, DWORD &attrib)
{
	access	= GENERIC_READ;
	share = FILE_SHARE_READ;
	attrib	= FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL; // Distinguish between upper/lower case in name

	if (_hMode == Mode::READ)
	{
		disp	=	OPEN_EXISTING; // Open only if file exists and is not locked by other process

		attrib	|=	FILE_FLAG_SEQUENTIAL_SCAN; // Optimize caching for sequential read
	}
	else
	{
		disp	=	OPEN_ALWAYS; // Open existing file for writing without destroying it or create new

		access	|=	GENERIC_WRITE;
		attrib	|=	FILE_FLAG_WRITE_THROUGH; // Write cached data directly to disk (no lazy writer)
	}
}

We add always FILE_FLAG_WRITE_THROUGH (Mode::READ is not used in Notepad++ code).

@pnedev
What’s your thought?

pnedev

@donho ,

The CreateFile’s parameter about file attributes is combined with other flags.
The MSDN is saying that FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL cannot be combined with other ATTRIBUTE values (because those will overwrite FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL) but flags are separate thing and can surely be combined with attributes. Those are basically two separate types of values combined in one variable.

Quote from MSDN from https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/fileapi/nf-fileapi-createfilew :

[in] dwFlagsAndAttributes

The file or device attributes and flags, FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL being the most common default value for files.

This parameter can include any combination of the available file attributes (FILE_ATTRIBUTE_*). All other file attributes override FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL.

This parameter can also contain combinations of flags (FILE_FLAG_) for control of file or device caching behavior, access modes, and other special-purpose flags. These combine with any FILE_ATTRIBUTE_ values."

So we can safely use FILE_FLAG_SEQUENTIAL_SCAN, FILE_FLAG_WRITE_THROUGH and FILE_FLAG_POSIX_SEMANTICS and any other FILE_FLAG_* value together with FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL.