Copy command sometimes stop working

[Mofi]

DCHooHa, as Microsoft explains in the article about clipboard formats, not the operating system Windows copies data to clipboard, but a member function of window class of an application does it. And this window function determines in which formats the data are copied to clipboard. It can even copy the selected data within the window in multiple formats. For example the document window class of Microsoft Word copies selected text in HTML, RTF and text (Unicode or ANSI depending on encoding of selected text).

Therefore it would be very interesting with which application you copy a selected text to clipboard which can't be pasted into a text file in UltraEdit because it was copied only in CF_OEMTEXT.

This would be further interesting because Microsoft writes in same article

The system implicitly converts data between certain clipboard formats: if a window requests data in a format that is not on the clipboard, the system converts an available format to the requested format. The system can convert data as indicated in the following table.

And the table below this information contains CF_OEMTEXT quite often. Therefore it should be no problem for any application pasting text available in clipboard only in format CF_OEMTEXT.

Also interesting is what MickRC3 posted (on first page of this topic). There could be a driver or a bad hardware which results in making a very small damage on copied data in RAM. I have had once a RAM with a stuck 0 in only 1 bit of the entire RAM. Everything else of RAM was okay. I needed a quite long time and damaged many files on this computer until I found this hardware problem, replaced the RAM and restored the damaged files from my second computer. When something is working just sometimes abnormal, then a hardware or software problem should be taken into account. Most bugs in software results always in same wrong behavior and then can be often easily found and fixed.

[DCHooHa]

Hi Mofi,

I just noticed your comments.

This happens on 2 separate Windows 7 PCs. So while it might both be due to a bad driver, it's unlikely to be a hardware problem.

Yes, I've been trying to determine which application seems to be invoking an automatic conversion to oem, while at the same time clearing out the plain text format. Haven't found that out yet. I use total commander, and usually Google Chrome as a browser, Mozilla Thunderbird as an email client, and of course UltraEdit. Although I use several other utilities, these are probably the tools that are up & running all the time.

The symptoms are not restricted to UltraEdit. When the Paste command doesn't work in UltraEdit, it also doesn't work with some dialog boxes in other applications, for example when trying to paste a user id or a password.

Trying to get more specifics.

[DCHooHa]

In case anyone's monitoring this topic and has similar problems, I just noticed something very interesting. I thought it might be partly due to Google Chrome, so I tried working without it this morning, not bringing it up at all.

Same thing - when the PC first booted up, copying and pasting into UltraEdit/UE Studio worked fine. Later, nothing gets pasted.

HOWEVER - as soon as I took down Internet Explorer, the pasting worked, without even re-copying. It never occurred to me that it might be a general browser problem.

But it's still not completely settled. When I run Internet Explorer again, the pasting CONTINUES to work. I've no doubt it will stop pasting soon, it always does.

So this is almost certainly browser-related, but not as simple as

If bIsBrowserActive
bIsPasteWorking := False
Else
bIsPasteWorking := True
Endif


I'll play with only Firefox after rebooting, and see what happens.

[rhapdog]

I use Firefox exclusively and never use Dundernet Destroyer, uh, I mean Internet Explorer, so perhaps that explains why I have never had this copy/paste issue that you have.

Perhaps it is something specific you do in IE, or a particular web site that you visit using IE, that is the culprit? There could be code on a site that is damaging in IE that other browsers interpret correctly? Or perhaps a website is taking advantage of an IE security flaw (happens all the time) in order to drive you nuts? (Okay, maybe not specifically you?)

If you're able to get it down to a particular website that causes the issue, and can duplicate the issue every time, then it will be time to tell IDM how to reproduce this issue. Perhaps a workaround IDM can implement is to uninstall IE from your computer... hehehe... (yes, I hate IE that much.)

[Mofi]

Hint: Enter into a WWW search engine of your choice the words Internet Explorer exploit clipboard It's quite interesting how many webpages are found about clipboard hijacking via webpage code with Internet Explorer. You should be very careful with ActiveX settings for security zone Internet.

[rhapdog]

Wow, Mofi. That really is scary.

Looks like it's not a bug in UE after all, but a vulnerability in IE.

Looks like DCHooHa is visiting pages that are just plain mean.

[vedellpt]

I was having this problem, and perhaps additionally could not even copy and paste within UltraEdit. The browser shut downs did not work. However, I switched to the User Clipboard 1 and then I could copy and paste within UltraEdit. Then, I switched back to the Windows Clipboard and was then able to copy and paste from other sources. The problem happened for me right after UltraEdit did an automatic update, but closing and restarting UltraEdit did not help. Only the procedure described above helped.

[vedellpt]

I would just like to update my previous comment to say that I am finding that the method I described that worked for me to re-enable Windows paste above doesn't always work, at least, not immediately. I sometimes have to wait several minutes before I can paste with the Windows clipboard again. I am not sure how to control the timing of it.

[Mofi]

vedellpt, most likely the problem is not caused by UltraEdit. I suppose there is a process running in background blocking access to Windows clipboard for a certain time. Perhaps an antivirus tool or more bad a trojan running with higher task priority than all other applications.

In our company the ID department has configured that the antivirus guard is making the database updates with a higher task priority than normal resulting in a more or less not responding applications while update process is running without any notification, especially on those computers not having a multi-core CPU. That's a stupid configuration of our IT department as by default antivirus applications make the updates with a lower task priority as normal application task priority.

On next time this problem occurs, I suggest to quickly open Windows task manager and look if any running process has a high CPU usage value.

[vedellpt]

Hi Mofi,

Thanks for the reply. I will try to identify something running with high prioritiy as you suggest next time it happens. The anti-virus I am using is WebRoot. I hope, at least, there is not anything viral causing this. Thanks.

Pete

[mrhodes]

vedellpt, similar problem on my system. Copy works to get text out of UltraEdit & pasted into other packages like Notepad, but I can't paste text back into UltraEdit whether I copied it in Notepad or UltraEdit. Been using an old copy of Windows Clipboard Viewer to check what did or didn't get copied to the Windows clipboard.

Turns out when I unloaded my Webroot SecureAnywhere Essentials from memory, paste started working again. Apparently Webroot is protecting the clipboard & that causes the paste to stop working. Not sure what copy you have, but in my copy (v. 8.0.2.27), I went to to the Identity & Privacy tab & clicked on View/Edit Protected Applications. I found uedit32.exe on the list of programs & it was marked Deny. When I switched to Allowed, paste started working. Same for Protected & unfortunately when I tried Deny again. I left it at Deny, rebooted & then paste was broken again. Apparently Webroot doesn't always immediately update with the new setting. I removed uedit32.exe from the list as a test solution. Not sure, but if it breaks again, I may leave it in the list with a status of Protected or Allowed to try for a more permanent solution.

[Mofi]

mrhodes, many thanks for your post. Now everybody having problems with data exchange with other applications via Windows clipboard has one very good information for a possible source of this problem.