I use Scrivener (3.2.2) on a MacBook Air. Recently, though, I’ve had reasons to turn to the iOS version (1.2.1) on an old iPad mini. The iPad is running iOS 9.3.5, with 27GB of memory.
Yes, it is very old. But I have had no problems creating projects and writing. No problem synching via Dropbox with the Macbook Air. Until I wanted to work on a larger project: 31 MB in size. Even that project seems to synch without difficulty. But when I try to open it on the iPad, Scrivener crashes immediately I tap on the project.
Here is the crash log. It looks to me like a kernel crash.
Am I being hopelessly optimistic in thinking I could do this on such an old iOS device? Or is there a fix? I’ve freed up some memory, rebooted, and made sure other apps aren’t running . But it keeps on crashing.
Try transferring the project via Apple File Sharing, rather than Dropbox. We’ve had a number of reports like this: the Dropbox API that Scrivener uses seems to misbehave on older iPads.
I assume you mean File Transfer through iTunes? But that won’t provide me with syncing, will it? Just manual transfer between iPad and Macbook?
I have been experimenting with an even larger project (partly to avoid corrupting the first one). This project, 100 MB, also seems to sync without any problems, but once again when I tap to open it oon the iPad Scrivener crashes. But here’s what seems weird to me: If I drag this project into the “On my iPad” section of the Projects list (which happens very quickly, with no further involvement of Dropbox) I can then open it locally with no difficulty!
But if I drag it back into the Dropbox section of the Projects list, tapping to open it causes a crash again.
Is this behavior still indicative of problems with Dropbox?
That is correct, File Transfer via iTunes is not synchronization.
If transferring the project to the “On my IPad” section fixes the problem, then yes, that definitely is a vote in favor of it being a Dropbox-related issue.
I think my work-around is going to be to edit the project in the “On my iPad” section, and then drag it into the “dropbox” section to sync it. That way syncing will still be possible, though I’ll have to remember to initiate it.
Many thanks for your help. There’s life yet in my little old iPad mini!
I had the same thought! I have tested it with a small project (and it turns out that size is not a factor; the crash can occur with a small project too), and also I’m going to copy only a section (probably a chapter) of the large project into that small project, and so edit one chapter at a time. Not ideal, but workable.
