> does the .bak file already exist, and if so, is it either read-only or
otherwise
> locked ?

Yes, there was already a .bak file when I got the problems mentioned before.
I have tried removing the .bak file and reproducing the problem once again,
but I'm still not allowed to save the file, nor can POV create a new .bak
file (unless I haven't aborted parsing). The .bak file is not write
protected.

However, while POV cannot rename the file to .bak, I can edit the existing
.bak file from POV and save it.

Exiting POV seems to be the only way to get around the problem; closing the
.pov file after an aborted parse and re-opening it, I still can't save
changes to the file.

>what happens if you manually delete it ?

I can delete, move etc. the .bak file from Windows Explorer without
problems. However, I am not allowed to move or delete the .pov file until I
exit POV, as Windows claims it's in use, even though I've pressed 'Close'
with the file in POV. I suspect the problem may be an issue of closing the
.pov file when aborting the parse.

- Peter

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I am having a similar problem.  Aborting a parse on certain .pov files
(every one I have had problems with has called a macro...) can somehow lock
the file.  I get the unusal error "Failed to save file: operation completed
successfully".  It seems that many of the times I have had this problem the
status bar had read "Parsed 5002 tokens" for quite a while, but the clock
in the lower right corner continues to count.  This time when I tried to
replicate it, the last message was "Parse Error: Out of memory.  Cannot
allocate 156 bytes for pigment", but it still refuses to stop parsing.  I
have hit "the stop sign" several times.  It finally quit after almost
fifteen minutes.

My system is POV 3.6 under Windows XP Pro fully patched, AMD 2100+, 512MB
PC2700 Kingston Value Ram, ASUS A7N8X (Nforce 2) Motherboard, Radeon 7500LE
video.

I called a macro which I wrote which creates interesting fractal objects and
the higher the order, the more complex the object.  I bumped up the order
until it generates a couple million objects, and have this problem.  I was
having the same problem with much more reasonable renders, though.

Alex Wollangk

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Sounds like you're running out of memory and starting to swap.

Yup.  Actually, running out of memory, swapping, running out of swap space
and crashing.  That is fine and expected.  It was just that it then
wouldn't let me save the file giving me the error "Can't save file:
operation completed successfully" which is an extremely odd error.

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I've been having the same problem, but just so you know this problem also
occurs if there is a syntax error in a macro in the include file.

This means that the error occurs more frequently than it would otherwise- it
can't be prevented by simply avoiding stopping the render at parse time.
I'm having to restart POVray rather often as a result of this. It's just a
blessing that it opens and closes so quickly ;)

Cheers.

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