Because .docx, .xlsx, etc. are not native macOS formats, I suppose. As far as I’m aware, Windows doesn’t have a directory-disguised-as-single-file concept equivalent to the macOS package or RISC OS application directory (also used for some documents). So instead Microsoft takes a directoryful of files just like the contents of a .pandb package, compresses it to a single-file ZIP archive but gives it the extension .docx, .xlsx or whatever. More cross-platform- (and cross-filing-system) compatible but also potentially needing more time and memory when loading and saving.
Rename an .xlsx file as .zip, open it and you can examine the file structure.
I’m puzzled now. I saved a small subset of the damaged file into a database, and now I am attempting to append it to the last known good file, and I am presented with this dialog:
How do you choose the database to import? I don’t see anything like the usual system file chooser. Keystrokes aren’t accepted, in fact I can’t see any way to indicate what file I want to import.
Any ideas?
OH WAIT never mind, the file had to be open already. Should be a note on that box, saying that the imported file should be already open.
I think that’s made pretty clear in the help page for ‘Import Database’. The second paragraph begins:
‘To import another database into the current one, choose File>Import>Import Database . This opens a panel that allows you to select an open database . . .’
I read too much Bucky Fuller as a child. Also, used OverVUE and previous Panorama for too many years. It really does take a long time to retrain to a completely rewritten program. There’s nothing you can do about that, I’m sure that the Panorama X team did its best.
This is completely different from your other problem. This definitely is a Panorama message, and it is entirely Panorama code.
In the scenario you describe, this is almost certainly a hardware issue. Macs do not have ECC (error correcting) memory. If a cosmic ray comes along - boop - memory is corrupted. The message above is entirely consistent with a one bit error. To prevent this sort of corruption from permanently damaging your file, Panorama checks the database structure before it saves. If it finds a problem, it doesn’t perform the save. That means the copy of the disk does NOT get corrupted.
As described in the previous paragraph, that shouldn’t be necessary. The file on disk should not be corrupted.
