Well, I still don't understand much about System Object Models even after
reading at it ... err ... by force, not choice, gloom.

And I didn't think that it had anything to do with RUNNING applications
sort of, until I wound up with a Lotus Smart Suite not even being able to
open up a Lotus 123 file without, "Unexplained OLE Error..." 
But, lo, it can relate to this.   After hours of research I stumble onto
both the Lotus Assistance web site and Usegroup remarks which say my exact
syndrome looks like empty extra space marks in the SET SOMIR= path string
.. or ..

     "An .IR file described in that path with 32 bytes in it!"

Duhh ... what's that?

As well this helpful soul notes that the SOM.IR files are really subject to
corruption, we don't know how, but if you are smart, you'll keep a backup
of them to use for restore purposes.

Duhh ... so sure enough, just ahead of the LOTUS .IR directories, is my
WATCOM V11 C/C++ compiler citation for WATCOM\SOM\ETC and you know, there
are four .IR files in it.  One of them, SOM.IR has only 32 bytes in size
and it is totally empty.  Gee, that's interesting!  I wondered, what might
this be like from months ago on my tape backups?

     Uhhh...   SOM.IR there has 349,280 bytes and is dated in 1997,
     The one here had an August date ... and 32 bytes?

Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to tape we go!  Not so fast dog!  Turns out that
file is locked and I can't replace it from tape!  Hmmm .. OK, REM out the
line for SET SOMIR in CONFIG.SYS and try that.  Sure enough, restore works,
but not without a complaint from BA/2 about resetting permissions or
something as well.  But this time, in this case, after replacing JUST THAT
ONE WATCOM .IR file that appeared bad,

     VOILA!  Lotus 123 is working again!

     Now .. how can that be that Smart Suite can't function without
     a prior SOM.IR being right for an application that has NOTHING
     to do with Lotus Smart Suite???

Oh well, back to work.

   ******************   Time passes through New Year! ******************

Not so fast puppy.  I noticed that Watcom has released their 'final' public
release of Watcom V11C late in December.  I've already updated those files
back about August, but we might as well get these latest ones on January
10,2003, and zip 'em into the box.  Well, two of them won't erase in UNZIP
unless you disable the RUN BATSERV.EXE and RUN NMPBIND.EXE in CONFIG.SYS.
After that the fix release versions will go into the update.

But ... suddenly, now, again, Lotus 123 is failing to load!   And this time
I discover that there are MORE botched .IR files in this mix that were NOT
botched prior to the attempted update of Watcom!!

I discover in C:\OS2\ETC that REXX.IR and WPSC.IR are now 32 bytes, with
the January 10, 2003, date and time I did the UNZIP for the Watcome
update...


Errr.... this ain't good.  In all I wound up restoring from tape a total of
I thing four .IR files bad, plus Smart Suite would still not work this
time. What to do?  Re-install Smart Suite!  Sounds like Windows, no?

Answer ... Well, first try to use the provided Smart Suite Uninstall Icon.
Well, that leaves the directories still on the disk!  Plus, it seems, that
there are still all kinds of things in the .INI file left behing as well
from this neat provided Icon of Faith!   So, instead, use Unimaint to
remove all traces of SmartSuite from the system and surprise!

     Unimaint balks as well on removing the Smart Suite .IR files too!

Back to the disable SET SOMIR= in CONFIG.SYS to complete the job and then
re-instate it as well.  Hmmmm, puppy is looking at how to crawl under the
fence in the back yard by this time.

OK, from a re-install clean, plus update to this and that, Smart Suite is
back working again.  But strangely, the .IR files are, in some
cases,different than they were in the tape backups which SHOULD have been
OK as Smart Suite was working fine, I think, then  ???

     Scratching head  ???

Hmpf .. Off reading "Client Server Programming With OS/2 2.0",
Part VI trying to learn about SOM.  But you know, there were all kinds of
corruption issues in the .IR files from dates that were really should never
have been involved in this.  Then, suddenly, I realized that when I first
'updated' Watcom V11 with that initial test release of the public code, it
was ... err ... August 5th ... ???

     Aha, insight ?

What is the rule of thumb on all this SOM madness?  If this kind of thing
can wreak an application collection like this, what do we really need to do
to check this?  Does one really have to make a special trip around the
SOM.IR directories to see what REALLY has been pranged, every so whatever
times?

Just how does this SOM thing work anyway and what ARE the caveates?

Inquiring mind wants to know.

Thanks.



--> Sleep well; OS/2's still awake! ;)

Mike {at} 1:117/3001

--- Maximus/2 3.01