Mysterious application crash

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hey guys, very important question!
First of all, I apologize in advance for the long question.
i'm working in a company which develop a Business management software to Thousands of people.
I deliberately say "thousands of people" because the error only occurs with one of our client and that's it.
the software is developed in vb6 (all of it) and the error (which make the software crash) occur when in one of the frm, the client tries to make a search request for one of the items using the MsDataGrid.

first of all, here is the Err Details:

CSS

Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name:   Bina.exe
Application Version:    1.0.0.0
Application Timestamp:  53be972f
Fault Module Name:  Msdatgrd.ocx
Fault Module Version:   6.0.89.88
Fault Module Timestamp: 39c11a4a
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset:   0001665c
OS Version: 6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.48
Locale ID:  1037
Additional Information 1:   eb98
Additional Information 2:   eb9805181ba13e7fd2338dc7f1390238
Additional Information 3:   024a
Additional Information 4:   024a72766fd3fbd1bc3a673912a4d696

The Client pc runs on windows 7 pro with 32 bit.
very important: the software is an Israeli one so there is an option in the menu to support Hebrew in tables or not. when the support turn off, instead of dataGrid table, the code load a DBgrid and then the fatal Err don't happened. when the support turn on, the code load a DataGrid and that's where it happened.
very important 2: The error does not occur on a regular basis and it has no specific pattern. Sometimes the client can use the software for hours and nothing happens.
We are yet to know if this is a problem in our source code or the customer's local pc.
thanks,
oron.

Posted 9-Sep-14 2:44am

oronsultan

Updated 13-Sep-14 9:24am

George Jonsson

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Comments

George Jonsson 9-Sep-14 8:59am

The obvious question is of course, how many other customers are using the Hebrew option?
That the problem only happens sometimes can be due to a run condition, where most of the times a pointer to an object is correctly initialized but in some conditions the pointer is null or undefined.
The other thing that can be is that you have some memory overwrite problem in the Hebrew mode, due to different string lengths or similar.

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 9-Sep-14 12:47pm

Quite a few could... Personally, I would only use English, not even my native language, but others would.
The problem is different: not enough information. I would use the debugger and pin-point the problem.
However, localization... with VB6... I would rather say: forget it, use something which really works. :-)
—SA

George Jonsson 9-Sep-14 22:39pm

Sure, but it would be interesting to know if other people are using Hebrew with the same system setup without any problems.
I have never used VB at all, so I have no opinion about its drawbacks, but I have solved enough strange problems in my life and know that there is always a difference that triggers the error.
The trick is to find it.

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 10-Sep-14 0:07am

I doubt it... VB6... — never was anything serious, and now, when everything is Unicode... Why not forgetting this trash?
—SA

George Jonsson 10-Sep-14 0:15am

You are probably right.
I remember trying localization in MFC once, with Chinese characters. That gave me a few surprises and a LOT of extra work. :P

oronsultan 10-Sep-14 2:34am

Dear George and Sergey,
first of all, Thank you for your quick reply.
George, about your question, 99.9 % of our clients using the hebrew option Since the
software is sold exclusively in Israel. handeling only in english is not an option to our company.
Sergey, i remeber you very well from one of my last QA here and you manage to prove me
your great thinking and knowledge :-)
regarding to your thoughts, converting the software to .Net is somthing we deeply considering but
that will take 1-2 years and it's not a quick solution to my problem.
as to your advice about debug the code, i'm afraid its not that simple.
Normally, when an error occurs on the client side, we pass the relevant database
through our FTP and use our vb6 environment and the debug tool to locate the Err.
Since we concluded that this case is not a problem that comes from the database there is no point in
doing it.
Possibility we thought and it is still considering, is installing the vb6 environment at the client side.
Certain action will help us in understanding the problem is the transfer of all of our source code
to the client side and run it on the
vb6 environment but it is clear to you that this is something that goes against the company's protocols.
Another thing we are considering is that we made may not install correctly the Msdatgrd.ocx.
we allready tryed this and so far no good.
no matter what, this is one of my wierd Err and finding a solution to this will be liberator.
if any idea comes in mined, please, let me know!
thank you so much,
oron.

George Jonsson 10-Sep-14 3:01am

How did you conclude that it is not the database?
Is the database located at the customers servers or do the customer connect to your DB?
Is it one computer at the client that causes trouble or all computers (if there is more than one)
If it is one computer it might be some software that the client has installed that interferes. Less likely that is is HW. (Although, I had a case once where a specific model of hard drive caused hickups in the serial communication.)

oronsultan 10-Sep-14 4:12am

1. in our source code, we have a global ErrLog function that handle all of the exceptions and bugs. when exception occure, a MsgBox with the relevent Err number and which function throw the exception is shown. in this case, the exception is somewhere outside our code.
2. the DB located at the client side.
3. the client have about 7-8 stations. the Exception is at least in 4 stations that we know of.

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 10-Sep-14 10:38am

:-)

George Jonsson 10-Sep-14 4:40am

I think you need to consider all differences, both hardware and software wise, between a working system compared to a non working system.
If it is possible you can install your own computer with the deployed solution, not dev, and test it both at home and at the client. If you still have have problem at your clients site, but not in your home environment, the problem should be in the database.
If no problem occur, then you need to look into the specific computer setup, especially if not all client computers have a problem.

oronsultan 11-Sep-14 4:26am

i understand that the Err is not so clear but can u analyze the error above? because i really dont understand what it means.
e.g, what does it means "Exception Code: c0000005" or "Exception Offset: 0001665c" and what is the "Additional Information" written at the end of the error. please help!

George Jonsson 13-Sep-14 16:05pm

As you didn't reply to my msg, I didn't see this until now.

oronsultan 15-Sep-14 5:08am

o.k i did it finally but i'm not sure how does it help me... please please please give me more details.

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George Jonsson · Answer 1 · 2014-09-13T10:21:00

This is the meaning of the error code.

C++

#define STATUS_ACCESS_VIOLATION           ((NTSTATUS)0xC0000005 L)

Not sure it will make you any wiser, though.

[Update]
There is a difference between a working system and one that fails.
The trick is to find this difference.

It might be worth looking into what kind of access rights they have set on the client computer.
If you can, set local admin rights an try to run for a while and see if the problem goes away.
If it is possible you can install your own computer with the deployed solution, not development, and test it both at home and at the client. If you still have have problem at your clients site, but not in your home environment, the problem should be in the database.
If no problem occur, then you need to look into the specific computer setup, especially if not all client computers have a problem.
Check which virus protection software the client is using.
Is this different from any other client?

[Update]
The steps below can be used of you get a blue screen of death, but it doesn't register anything if you get a regular dialog box with an error message.

You can try to enable the crash dump in order to get more error information.

Go to Start, in the Search Box type: sysdm.cpl, press Enter.
Under the Advanced tab, click on the Startup and Recovery Settings... button.
Ensure that Automatically restart is unchecked.
Under the Write Debugging Information header select Small memory dump (256 kB) in the dropdown box (the 256kb varies).
Ensure that the Small Dump Directory is listed as %systemroot%\Minidump.
OK your way out.
Reboot if changes have been made.

[Updated]
A more graphical instruction: How to configure Windows to create MiniDump files[^]

Here is some information how to analyze the crash dump in VS2010.
Application Crash Dump Analysis (Windows 7)[^]