Loading Assemblies...........

[John]

JustDecompile has been working fine but now it gets stuck forever 'Loading Assemblies'........... at startup.

Now whatever the problem is, I reckon I could bypass it by returning JustDecompile to a Virgin condition, because in that state it does not load any Assemblies, but says 'Drag assemblies here'.

I've tried deleting Registry Keys, uninstalling the Application, running from a Virgin zipfile, etc., but it still wants to 'load Assemblies' forever!
What do I have to delete to get a Virgin Installation?

I attached the JIT Debugger and got the following output:

First-chance exception at 0x000007fefd65caed in JustDecompile.exe: Microsoft C++ exception: EEFileLoadException * __ptr64 at memory location 0x1d04d2d0..
System.Windows.Data Error: 40 : BindingExpression path error: 'Orientation' property not found on 'object' ''Menu' (Name='')'. BindingExpression:Path=Orientation; DataItem='Menu' (Name=''); target element is 'WrapPanel' (Name=''); target property is 'Orientation' (type 'Orientation')
System.Windows.Data Error: 40 : BindingExpression path error: 'Orientation' property not found on 'object' ''Menu' (Name='')'. BindingExpression:Path=Orientation; DataItem='Menu' (Name=''); target element is 'WrapPanel' (Name=''); target property is 'Orientation' (type 'Orientation')
System.Windows.Data Error: 40 : BindingExpression path error: 'Orientation' property not found on 'object' ''Menu' (Name='')'. BindingExpression:Path=Orientation; DataItem='Menu' (Name=''); target element is 'WrapPanel' (Name=''); target property is 'Orientation' (type 'Orientation')
First-chance exception at 0x000007fefd65caed in ImageAtBase0x3f390000: Microsoft C++ exception: EEFileLoadException * __ptr64 at memory location 0x00289ce0..
First-chance exception at 0x000007fefd65caed in ImageAtBase0x3f390000: Microsoft C++ exception: EEFileLoadException * __ptr64 at memory location 0x0028c8a8..
System.ComponentModel.Composition Warning: 3 : The catalog 'DirectoryCatalog (Path="C:\Program Files (x86)\Telerik\JustDecompile\Libraries\Plugins\De4dot")' could not load assembly 'C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\TELERIK\JUSTDECOMPILE\LIBRARIES\PLUGINS\DE4DOT\DE4DOT.JUSTDECOMPILE.MODULE.PDB'. Could not load file or assembly 'DE4DOT.JUSTDECOMPILE.MODULE.PDB' or one of its dependencies. An attempt was made to load a program with an incorrect format.
First-chance exception at 0x000007fefd65caed in ImageAtBase0x3f390000: Microsoft C++ exception: EEFileLoadException * __ptr64 at memory location 0x0028c8a8..
System.ComponentModel.Composition Warning: 3 : The catalog 'DirectoryCatalog (Path="C:\Program Files (x86)\Telerik\JustDecompile\Libraries\Plugins\Reflexil")' could not load assembly 'C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\TELERIK\JUSTDECOMPILE\LIBRARIES\PLUGINS\REFLEXIL\REFLEXIL.JUSTDECOMPILE.MODULE.PDB'. Could not load file or assembly 'REFLEXIL.JUSTDECOMPILE.MODULE.PDB' or one of its dependencies. An attempt was made to load a program with an incorrect format.

[Tsviatko Yovtchev]

Hello, First of all, if you don't have the latest version of JustDecompile, please, update to latest and give it another try. If that does not help try the stuff below.

When JustDecompile starts it tries loading the same assembly list that was opened in the previous session. The chances are there is an assembly in that list that makes JustDecompile crash.

We really want to find out what that assembly is and have a look at it. So, it'd be really nice if you could help us with that. In the process of collecting the necessary information the issue on your side will get fixed.

Please, do the following:

• If possible find out which assembly list JustDecompiel tries to load on start up (bottom left corner)
• Find the XML file corresponding to that assembly list in C:\Users\[USER]\AppData\Roaming\JustDecompile\AssemblyLists. If you were not able to determine the list in the previous step just try moving the XML files out of that folder one by one and try running JustDecompile after each move. Once it runs normally the file moved last would be the offending assembly list.
• Open the offending list in a text editor. Start removing <File> nodes one by one and try running JustDecompile after each remove. Once it runs normally the file moved last would be the offending assembly.
• Mail the offending assembly over to justdecompilepublicfeedback at telerik.com

So here's All the best,
Tsviatko Yovtchev
the Telerik team

[John]

Cheers, Tsviatko,
I should have thought to look in '%UserProfile%\AppData\Roaming\JustDecompile' for the Startup Data!
It turns out that there were no offending Assemblies after all!
The offending file was 'Settings.xml' which was totally empty (0 bytes)!
I don't know how it came to be empty as, when I deleted the 'JustDecompile' folder, the Software sprang into life almost instantly, compared to the faulty 0-byte dilemma which took about 15 seconds to appear, and began using up well over 100 MB of RAM, in its quest to 'load Assemblies'!

Once the program started working again, it wanted to update to yesterday's version, so I let it update and a normal, 4 KB, 'Settings.xml' was created.
I restored the original 'DefaultAssemblyList.xml' and it loaded without a hitch!

But I can see that you need to make a quick update, because the current version is equally useless in the face of a 0-byte 'Settings.xml'!
On normal start-up and close-down the program creates a 4 KB 'Settings.xml' file, if it does not exist, thus all that is necessary is to make a check for a 0-byte file as being effectively non-existent!

[John]

On further investigation I notice that just deleting even one character encased in brackets ,< >, or even a bracket itself, from 'Settings.xml' requires the use of a Task Manager to put 'JustDecompile' out of its' start-up misery!

[Yordan Dikov]

Hi John,
Thank you for your efforts in identifying where the problem was. At the moment we work on the way we handle our settings file, and the new logic should be ready for the next update. We'll definitely make it more robust to unexpected scenarios like invalid xml, empty file and so on. I'll ask you for some patience until we release the update, as we want to make it good, and not just a quick and dirty fix over those cases. 

All the best,
Yordan Dikov
the Telerik team