Error-Object reference not set

[Liv_W]

When I open the Flare project, I get the box asking me if I want to see Flare updates , then another asking if I would like the lastest version of the file. I click yes then after it is done compliling, I get this message "Object reference not set to an instance of an object." This happened after reopening the project the day after a long day of revisions.
I tried both solutions they listed in the help, deleting the appdata/roaming Flare folder contents and switching the window layout, but neither have worked. However, in both cases the instructions end with "change topic name," which I cannot do since I have no idea which topic is causing this error.
I haven't worked with Flare in a while and cannot figure out what I've done.
Does anyone have any ideas as to what this may be or how to figure out which topic is the one causing the error?
Thanks,
Liv

[Nita Beck]

This is a wild guess, but was a filename changed but the extension left off by mistake? I did that exact thing a few days ago and was hit with that error. By checking around in the Content Explorer, I fairly quickly found the topic that was missing its extension. Once I added ".htm", all was fine.

[Msquared]

Another wild guess.

Do you happen to have a # in any of your filenames? If you use Perforce source control and ask to get an earlier version of a file, say version 2 of a file tat is currently at version 3, you get a filename that includes a # (in this case #2). Even if you don't reference it from anywhere in your project, Flare does not like the # character in filenames.

[Liv_W]

Thank you both for the suggestions, I'll look through my files.
Liv

[CATERAF]

Ah, this error seems to be rearing it's head in many places. I got this error last week (or 2 weeks ago?) and searched the forums. There seems to be many different reasons for getting the error and it can be any number of things. In fact, the error may not even be related to the file that the 'message' window shows when you're building your target. My error came about because I had something wrong with cross-reference inside a snippet. I *think* (not 100%) that the topic the message window stopped did contain my problem snippet but there was no way I could've told you the cross-reference caused the error. I didn't even edit that cross-reference that day.

My advice is to flick your project to Tech Support. They're very good with their responses and identify problems very quickly (provided you live in a similar time zone.. they're normally sleeping when I'm working).