I tried to replicate this as well, but all the resolutions reported by Oolite can be switched to without problems and - as Kaks has already verified - quitting the game returns everything to the original screen resolution. Oolite uses SDL methods to query the operating system for a list of available resolutions and, if for some reason this goes wrong, my guess is that it is either an operating system or an SDL problem.
artao, what screen resolution you had before the crash? Is it possible to find out what resolution was attempted when the blackout occured? You can find that by running Oolite and going through the list of resolutions in the Options menu until you get to the one following the resolution you had before the crash (no need to try to switch to each of them). Or - even better - you can post a Latest.log after editing logcontrol.plist inside Resources/Config and changing the line display.mode.list = no; to display.mode.list = yes; and running the game.
Edit: Too late, I see that you have it already fixed. Good.
Aha! Shutting the computer off the 'hard way' would also prevent oolite from cleaning up after itself, same as a crash.
Good to know you got your system sorted out!
If you're ever in the same situation again you can always press f12 to switch to windowed mode, where you'd be able to see the full screen resolution that caused all the trouble (game options screen, accessible from the f2 screen).
One other option would have been to press the esc key (in windows it's the same as quitting Oolite via the menu: you should then be back to your normal desktop, but restarting Oolite will bring back the wrong settings (so you'd have to do the f12 thing anyway)
And I almost forgot: pressing f11 will cycle through all display resolutions windows says are available: pressing f11 a few times should eventually take you to a usable display resolution.
However, shift-f11 should cycle through resolutions in the opposite direction. Instead of tapping f11 a gazillion times, tapping shift-f11 once might well have saved the day...
Something to highlight in the documentation for 1.75, methinks!
Documenting workarounds and providing ways to disable F11 are non-solutions, since almost no-one will find out about them until it’s too late. So far, I haven’t seen an actual argument in favour of keeping a key to cycle through resolutions.
This 'f11 bug' is actually a combination of two separate issues
1. whenever a full screen mode program asks for a resolution change windows will change (& save) the new resolution globally. This 'interesting' design decision on the part of microsoft means that if a full screen program isn't exited cleanly the desktop forgets its original resolution - in a significant percentage of occasions.
This has been happening with pc games since at least win95. Had artao selected the 'evil' resolution via menu, and then chosen full screen mode - again via menu - he would have found himself in exactly the same situation.
2. Upon seeing an obviously malfunctioning screen artao must have felt time was of the essence - and who could blame him: quite a few CRT monitors in the good old days (aka 10-15 years ago) got damaged while playing around with resolution settings.
Unfortunately forcing a shutdown was one of the two almost certain ways of getting the computer stuck that way (the other is pulling the plug).
The 'workarounds' I mentioned are just a way of quickly getting out of a sticky situation using keyboard shortcuts.
One other 'workaround': alt-tab could also have helped, it switches between active programs & the desktop, restoring resolutions as it does so.
In both windows and linux Oolite does ask the os for available resolutions. The moment the display was configured properly, oolite wasn't offered the wrong ones by the os anymore - beforehand, windows sent oolite the full list of resolutions the graphic card was actually capable of.
Oolite always checks its full screen resolution against the list given by the os. Provided the os recognises the hardware properly, you can play Oolite fullscreen in 1920x1200, exit the game, plug a less capable monitor, and - again, provided the os notices - start oolite again, and it will fall back to the first of the now available resolutions, ignoring the previous -& now erroneous- full screen setting.
This 'f11 bug' is actually a combination of two separate issues.
Yes, but neither would have been an issue if it weren’t for the fact that he accidentally hit a key that does something essentially useless, right next to a key that does something useful. This can easily be avoided in future by removing the key that does something useless.
Yes, but neither would have been an issue if it weren’t for the fact that he accidentally hit a key that does something essentially useless, right next to a key that does something useful. This can easily be avoided in future by removing the key that does something useless.
That reminds me of the very first Apple computer I worked with. It had a reset button just above the return key.
An unbelievable design decision. A lot of users must have lost valuable work. The fix from apple was to update the manual with the tip to take a screwdriver and remove the reset-key from the keyboard. On the keyboard I worked with, that key was indeed missing.
Here the same rule applied: Keys that are used rarely and could do unwanted things, should not be placed adjacent to frequently used keys.
