Fences 6.54 Release Feedback

Known issues

While we appreciate all feedback, please remember that we offer no official support for beta \ preview \ developer channel versions of Windows. If you report issues while in any of those early release channels, you should not expect them to be addressed unless it still exists in a retail version of Windows.

***Reserved***

This version 6.54 will no longer let me move items from one fence to another, or even to another page—sends it right back.
Why?
Win 10 64

That's not happening for me in a quick test on Windows 10.  Can you confirm Fences both updated and is activated properly?  

To check, open the Fences Windows Application (from desktop or start menu), then click to the About tab of the app.

From there, check for updates for updating and manage product key can be used to deactivate/reactivate.   Be sure to note any errors if you see any when updating or activating.  

Also, it is important to be sure you've restarted your PC after any update. 

Best regards,

Adam McGuinness
Stardock Support Specialist

"This version 6.54 will no longer let me move items from one fence to another, or even to another page—sends it right back."

This is typically an installation or licensing issue (or licensing issue by way of install issue). Troubleshooting → Create Error Report might help us diagnose, but also likely uninstall, reboot, manually clear %programfiles%\Stardock\Fences and %programdata%\Stardock\Fence6, reinstall very likely to resolve. Possible permissions issues in play hence the clearing out.

Confirm it is the latest version, but here is the strange part, it now has become sporadic in this behavior. It may go an hour or two, and stop, yet it does always returns.  I'm moving items non-stop all day long between fences and pages for production proposes for our publication. I'll create a dump file on next instance, but concur it may be a corrupt file and the resolve would be a reinstall. Question: Since I never had to do this with Fences—will it give the option to save configuration?

To show you what is happening: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UJRb5Y-bnJZSgV4uD4uQNzC_SJc_mo_e/view?usp=sharing

Thank you for your report and video, it does look like something is preventing moving icons from a rolled-up Fence group.  We will have it looked into.

Internal reference: ODNT-12552

Best regards,

Adam McGuinness
Stardock Support Specialist

Hi Scientific Frontline, we're working on a build at that has considerably more debug info about this re "corrupt install", but the *intermittent* part is what's really concerning here. Not ready yet but will flag down once we have an installer.

In meantime, pls ensure "Advanced debug logging" is enabled from About → Troubleshooting, and we look forward to digging into the report once it happens again

Apologize for the delay in responding, been working straight through the last 48 hours without sleep on a research paper. I got some sleep this afternoon. I've enabled and will send log in the morning.

File was uploaded.

Hi Scientific Frontline, thanks for the report, and our apologies again for the disruption to your workflow!

We believe the issue you reported is related to a recent issue we saw where icons being drag-dropped from a rolled up Fence could fail to drop, after the Fence rolls back up. We believe we've resolved it with this new beta build. Feel free to give it a shot. v6.5.5.1

https://stardockcorporation.sharepoint.com/:u:/s/software/IQB0yGp8eI9yT7leYcA0zVHzAbJE4MOswjWlu50voNBgXW4?e=asrH0e

We hope your research paper has come along well!

You nailed it! No issues that I have seen at this time. 
Much appreciated.
Yes, the paper went well. Thanks for asking. It was titled: What Is: Paleovirology and Permafrost Pathogens

Very cool!

Since installing the latest update, if I leave my PC long enough, and my monitors go to sleep, when I move the mouse to wake them up, my desktop layout shifts and I have to reset from backup. 
Doesn't happen every time, but I'd say it happens at least once every 3-4 times I wake it up. 

I’m seeing an intermittent problem with ordinary unfenced desktop icons on the bottom row.

I have several horizontal Fences on the left side of the desktop, with ordinary unfenced shortcuts along the bottom row to the right of them. When I drag an unfenced icon to a valid position on that bottom row, it will sometimes jump several desktop-grid positions away when I release the mouse button.

The problem is not limited to the grid position immediately next to a Fence. For example, I can have a three-icon-wide empty gap between the right edge of the bottom Fence and the left-most existing loose icon, and the problem can still occur when I drop an icon into the third empty position, leaving two completely empty icon positions between the dropped icon and the Fence.

The behaviour is intermittent. The same shortcut and essentially the same drag/drop operation can work correctly on one attempt and fail on another. It does not appear to be tied to any particular shortcut.

I have only been able to reproduce this on the lowest desktop-icon row. Icons one row above can be positioned in the same general horizontal area without the problem.

This is also not new to Fences 6.54. I was already seeing the same behaviour in the previous version of Fences I had installed before updating.

Environment:

• Fences build: 6.5.4.1
• Single display: 1920×1080
• Windows scaling: 100% / 96 DPI
• Desktop icon size: 48
• Auto Arrange: Off
• Windows taskbar: bottom of screen
• Taskbar auto-hide: Off

I have tested the following without resolving the issue:

• Disabled Windows Align icons to grid
• Ran Fences Fix desktop icon spacing
• Toggled Use same spacing inside and outside of Fence groups both on and off
• Disabled StartAllBack and tested again

I enabled Fences advanced logging and reproduced the problem. One failed drag shows:

Icons moved post drag
Loose icons moved post drag 
[ResetFrom] Fixing PT Absolete ... rel:698,938 abs:698,938 useabs:1, newAbs647,757 
[SetTo] IconPosChanged Relative/Absolete (...) abs[698x938->622x730] rel[647x757->622x730] 


The same log reports desktop spacing of 76,104, so that resulting position is exactly two desktop-grid rows above the original bottom-row position.

I also captured another failure where an icon moved from approximately (622,938) to (774,730), which corresponds to exactly two columns to the right and two rows upward using the logged desktop spacing.

A similar drag shortly afterward placed an icon back on the expected bottom-row position, which matches what I see visually: essentially the same drag can either succeed or fail.

The diagnostics also show:
LVM_GETITEMSPACING = 76x101
SPI_GETICONMETRICS = 75x75

while during the reproduced failure ReadDesktopSpacing reports:

spacingDesktop(76,104)
spacingGroups(76,101)

This makes it appear that the loose icon’s position may be getting recalculated or changed after the drop, rather than the problem being specific to the shortcut itself.

I have not attached the full diagnostic package because it contains a lot of unrelated system and file information. If needed, I can provide a redacted log excerpt covering one of the reproduced failures.