Jabref: Entry Editor only opens after opening Preferences dialog

[matheger]

JabRef version 5.0-dev on Windows 10

• [x] I have tested the latest development version from http://builds.jabref.org/master/ and the problem persists

When loading an existing bibliography, the Entry Preview end Entry Editor panes only work after opening the Preferences and clicking "Save". (I don't even need to change any settings - just opening the dialog is enough.) This happens every time a new bibliography is opened, ie. even without restarting the program in the meantime.

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Create a new bibliography and add an entry
2. Save and close bibliography
3. Reopen
4. Entry Editor fails to show on double-click on the entry
5. Open Options -> Preferences
6. Hit "Save"
7. Entry Editor now opens on double click

The Event Log only shows "Can only load style files: Preview"

[AEgit]

Can confirm this issue for:

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-15--master--7ed15bc4a
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

[JoKalliauer]

Have the same issue on Ubuntu for:

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-15--master--7ed15bc4a
Linux 4.15.0-46-generic amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

[8greg8]

I found out that if you go to Preferences>Entry editor and uncheck Open editor when a new entry is created everything works then.

[AEgit]

That might be a workaround, but the bug remains

[matheger]

I found out that if you go to Preferences>Entry editor and uncheck Open editor when a new entry is created everything works then.

Nope, not for me.

[bernhard-kleine]

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-15--master--46d2c7dc2
Windows 7 6.1 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

Not only the entry editor is gone, but also the entry preview. Latest version of today. Is Jabref becoming Bananaware, matures at the client?

[Siedlerchr]

Does resetting the preferences help?

[matheger]

Does resetting the preferences help?

No, this also happens after a fresh install.

[bernhard-kleine]

@Siedlerchr: It does

[AEgit]

@Siedlerchr: Resetting the preferences does not help (at least for me).

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-15--master--7ed15bc4a
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

[Siedlerchr]

I can confirm this error also on Windows.
If you open the prefences dialog and click on save again, entry editor and preview will work again.
I am currently trying to figure out why

[AEgit]

Note, that even before this bug the preview would not work/turn up before having started the entry editor at least once (I think there was on issue on this before, which is still open). The difference now is just, that you cannot even open the entry editor with, e. g., doubleclick, before having used the "Preferences" workaround.

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-15--master--7ed15bc4a
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

[Siedlerchr]

@AEgit okay, thanks for your feedback. This might narrow it down to the preview initializing

[Siedlerchr]

@tobiasdiez I first thought it has something to do with the preview citation style. I debugged and temporarily added the discovery of the citation styles with a future.get() in the preview panel, but does not change anything.
And the workaround only works if you hit save in the preferences dialog.
So there must be a thing which prevents the entry editor from opening which is set in the preferences when you click save. I absolutely have no idea.
A resetting of preferences does not change anything

[matthiasgeiger]

Maybe 'git bisect' helps to track it down?

[tobiasdiez]

That's strange. The DatabaseChangePane apparently hides the entry preview/editor. I don't have time the next few days to investigate this further, but will return to it on Monday the latest.

[wujastyk]

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-16--master--d7dd41b00
Linux 4.15.0-46-generic amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

Same problem as reported above. Options / Prefernces / Save re-enables editing and preview.

[Siedlerchr]

I further found out that it only works if you click OK/Save in the Preferences dialog. Simply opening the dialog and pressing Cancel or Escape does not work.

[CaptainDaVinci]

Is this issue result of the changes made recently to the src/main/java/org/jabref/gui/BasePanel.java file? Undoing few of those changes in the constructor seem to fix the issue.

Edit: This line might be the cause of the issue.

[Siedlerchr]

Hmm that's interesting, thanks for your investigation. The reason why it fails would be interesting.
And furthermore what has saving the preferences to do with it? That's the point I currently don't understand

[CaptainDaVinci]

The reason why I think it works on clicking _Save_ under preferences dialog would be because that results in setting up the main panel once again which in turn clears the getChildren() for BasePanel. However, on creating an instance of BasePanel, the constructor makes a call to setting up the main panel before adding changePanel to it.

[Siedlerchr]

I think I understand the problem. It's a Stack pane. So there can be only at most one child visible. https://o7planning.org/en/10633/javafx-stackpane-layout-tutorial

[bernhard-kleine]

(@Siedlerchr) In addition to the errors reported earlier, the Ctrl-E does not work even after Open preferences->Save. You have to start the editor by View->Open entry editor.

[CaptainDaVinci]

In addition to the errors reported earlier, the Ctrl-E does not work even after Open preferences->Save. You have to start the editor by View->Open entry editor.

This issue remains even after removing the line which adds the changePane to the StackPane. In addition to that, keybinding for _toggle preview_ isn't working.

However, once you display the editor from view -> Open Entry Editor, the keybindings work.

[zoltanpm]

@tobiasdiez I first thought it has something to do with the preview citation style. I debugged and temporarily added the discovery of the citation styles with a future.get() in the preview panel, but does not change anything.

I agree -- I get the following in the log:

Can only load style files: Preview
Can only load style files: Preview

After open/save preferences, it works fine; 5.0-dev on Fedora 29.

[tobiasdiez]

The main bug should be fixed in the latest development version. Could you please check the build from http://builds.jabref.org/master/. Thanks! Please remember to make a backup of your library before trying-out this version.

There are still some related bugs left that should be fixed as well: https://github.com/JabRef/jabref/pull/4784#pullrequestreview-216419250

[wujastyk]

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-19--master--90376f40f
Linux 4.18.0-16-generic amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

Fixed for me. Double click n a row now opens the editor.

[bernhard-kleine]

the Alt-2 key to show the entry preview still is not working on a freshly loaded library. the Ctrl-E, however, works, and after opening the entry editor, Alt-2 works, too. Very strange.

[CaptainDaVinci]

ctrl+e doesn't seem to work for me. Even after opening the editor ctrl+e only closes the editor and does not toggle.

[bernhard-kleine]

@CaptainDaVinci : here JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-19--master--90376f40f on Windows 7 6.1 amd64 with Java 1.8.0_201
toggle works

[AEgit]

I can confirm that the main bug has been fixed in:

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-19--master--90376f40f
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

i. e., it is now possible again to open the entry editor by double-clicking on a row in the main table.
CTRL + E does not seem to (reliably) work for me (I only managed to open the entry editor with CTRL + E once and so far I haven't managed to reproduce this behaviour): Generally it does not seem possible to open the entry editor using CTRL + E. However, I am a bit unsure about this, since I haven't used this keyboard shortcut at all (but I checked in "Customize key bindings" that it was active) - it might be, that something else is off and/or there is a more general problem with the keybindings (?). So this needs more people to confirm.

What does remain, however, - as reported already by @bernhard-kleine - is that the entry preview will not show on a freshly opened database. Only after having opened the entry editor at least once, the entry preview will appear. Should a separate issue be created for this? I thought this problem had already been reported, but I cannot find the issue anymore.

[Siedlerchr]

Thanks to @matthiasgeiger this issue is now finally resolved.
The fixed version should be ready in a couple of minutes from https://builds.jabref.org/master

[AEgit]

Cannot confirm for:

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-25--master--e14b56742
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

As mentioned in https://github.com/JabRef/jabref/issues/4762#issuecomment-474752885, the main bug reported herein has been fixed. But the other issue reported in https://github.com/JabRef/jabref/issues/4762#issuecomment-474752885 remain - are these considered to be separate issues that should get their own thread? Or are they considered to be fixed? If the latter is the case, I cannot confirm the bugfix for JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-03-25--master--e14b56742

[Siedlerchr]

@AEgit The PR https://github.com/JabRef/jabref/pull/4806 fixed the following remaining issues:

table is now working again in case a new file is opened (also fixes #4793)
in case preferences are saved entry editor is working properly again
external changes are now also detected in case file name has changed due to "Save As"

View -> Entry Preview is checked: Uncheck and check again: Preview is shown,
Keybinding: CTRL+ e worked fine for me until I reset the keybindings. This is odd now. I will create a new issue

[matthiasgeiger]

You are right, that there is still something wrong with the opening of the preview and entry editor - but this was already wrong before the topic of this issue has been introduced (e.g. in JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2018-12-14--master--49c3ef396 which I have just tested).

The behavior seems to be: The preview is only opened after "toggle preview" twice. The Keybinding seems only to work when the preview or the entry editor has been shown before.

I'll create another issue for this...

[AEgit]

Cheers!