<b>Surf Express 1.1.1 update problem reports continue (and one possible explanation)

Problem reports continue Surf Express 1.1.1 has generated an unusually high number of bug reports. Rather than many confirming reports on just one or two problems, there tend to be many problems each with only one or two reports to support them. It makes it kind of hard to nail down what is going on.

Several readers described freezes and system crashes associated with the update; for example, Robert Brinlee writes that, with 1.1.1 installed, he could not get the Finder to load at startup. Marvin Greenberg writes that, after he installed the 1.1.1 Updater, he could not print in either Netscape Navigator, WordPerfect or Photoshop.

A possible explanation I suspect another Surf Express update will be coming soon. Meanwhile, Robert Mathews (of Tiger Technologies) offered an explanation for the problems his software was having with Surf Express 1.1.1. It may have bearing on many of the other assorted problem reports as well.

"I've heard from six different users who tell me that Surf Express 1.1.1 causes my programs (Window Monkey, Helium and Holiday Lights) to fail to work . Specifically, when opening the Window Monkey or Helium control panels, or the Holiday Lights application, users see a message saying that an "unexpected error occurred." With the help of one of these users, I have narrowed down the exact line of code that fails in my programs. It's in the resource-manager related toolbox call 'Get1IndResource.' In my case, it looks like this: Get1IndResource ('MCmd', 1). What this does is try to load the first 'MCmd' resource in the current resource file (which should be the control panel or application file). With Surf Express installed, this toolbox call fails and the resource is not loaded, which should never happen; hence the "unexpected error" message. Either Surf Express is changing the current resource file (very bad), or it installs a trap patch that causes Get1IndResource to fail in certain (perhaps all) situations. Get1IndResource is not a very commonly used resource manager call, but it's used often enough that I can see how this bug could cause other problems. For example, Navigator could fail to load the animated icon resources."