When Things Go Wrong

Although TIP is designed for reliability, there will be times when it can’t do what you’re asking.  Often, the cause of the problem will be obvious; you may be trying to write on a disk that is no longer in the drive, or something like that.  At other times, you may have to contact TIP support for assistance.  Here’s how to prepare yourself to do so.

Dealing with Error Messages

When TIP runs into difficulty, it will tell you about it, usually with an error message box like this one:

You may or may not understand the messages.  TIP errs on the side of giving you more information than you may need, rather than less.

To make the error message go away, press OK.

But first, notice the button labeled Copy Message to Clipboard. Click there, and the entire message is copied onto the Windows clipboard so you can paste it into your word processor (to keep a record of it), your e-mail program (to e-mail it to TIP support), or even the online TIP problem report form.

Word to the wise: Even if you don’t understand the error message, the programmers do.  TIP support will want to see the entire message, and, quite probably, the TIP file that you were working with when the problem arose.

Getting Help through the Internet

You can contact the TIP support team through the World Wide Web at www.tipsoftware.com.

There is an online problem report form into which you can paste the error message that you copied to the clipboard. Of course, the error message is next to useless if we don't know what led to it, so the form also contains a lot of questions for you to answer so we can understand what was happening.

The TIP support team will respond to your question by e-mail if at all possible. If you cannot be contacted by e-mail, be extra sure to give us information about how to contact you.

Taking a Picture of the Screen

Sometimes the support team may need a picture of your computer screen. It's easy to make your computer send us one.

(1)              Press the Print Screen or PrtSc key on your keyboard.   On many keyboards you have to hold down Shift while doing this.

(2)              Open Word, or your favorite graphics program, or any other program that will let you paste pictures, and choose Edit, Paste (or, in most software, Ctrl-V):

Now save the file.  What you’ve obtained is a picture of the whole screen, and you can e-mail it to TIP support to illustrate a problem you’re having.

 

Common Questions, Problems, and Solutions

Why is TIP slow starting up?

TIP is probably the only program on your computer that uses the .NET Framework, a major new section of Windows. This means that when you turn your computer on, the .NET Framework doesn't start up until you need it - and TIP is the first program that needs it.

Accordingly, the first time you run TIP, you'll need to wait a few seconds for the .NET Framework to start up. This does not indicate a problem, and it will not recur when you use TIP again later the same day.

Why can't I paste bulleted lists (or other elaborate structures) into TIP?

This is by design. For more details click here.

TIP does not have a full word processing program built into it and cannot do everything that a word processing program can do. We encourage you to use tree structure in TIP, rather than elaborate text in the text boxes, when you have complex ideas to express.

Why does TIP ask for the installation CD at an unexpected time?

This generally means that one of the files that came with TIP, such as a library file, has been deleted. The Windows Installer detects missing files and reinstalls them as needed.