FG eats data when you try to input it

[Andrepartthree]

Has anyone run into a situation where FG "eats" any data you put into it (story entries, monsters and characters, et cetera) in a manner such that after you input it and save the data, when you return the data is all missing from FG ? Computer in question was completely wiped and reformatted with windows, FG was reinstalled , PC is completely bug-free using latest virus scanning programs, and yes it's a legitimate " DM license" ;) type version of FG ..

UPDATE - no error messages unfortunately it just... eats it. checked the XML files after the program is closed program and have entered the data and it's all there. However when you start it up and all the data disappears when you check the XML again it is blank like you never entered the data..

[Phystus]

Yes, I have seen this. Every time it has happened to me it turned out that something I input ended up creating invalid XML data. Typically it's been a character that's invalid in XML (like ` or &). When FG tries to open the campaign when you next start up it finds it, and deletes all the data in the db.

My "fix" whenever I have doubts about what I'm pasting in has been to open the campaign db.xml file with Internet Explorer prior to restarting FG. If there's a problem with the data the listing will stop with the last valid line, so it's easy to locate the error, fix it in Notepad, re-save, and try again. Once it will list out completely with IE it should 'stay' in FG.

~P

[Andrepartthree]

Hey thanks Phystus ! :) Will give that a try and see what happens and post back here :)

[SLB]

Yes, I had something similar. I always make a backup (or two) of the existing database (db.xml) before making any manual adjustments so the worst case is that I can revert back to before the changes. If I have made a lot of changes I back up the new file as well before I start FG.