You’re not getting an error threatening your work. The documents are/will still be there. It going into trial mode has zero impact on the project files.
Frustrating, yes, but L&L do seem to be working on it, though does seem to be dragging on.
I attempted to deactivate and reactivate, but it won’t let me. Seemingly for the same reason it is having the automatic reactivation issue in the first place.
That isn’t something that was clear or certain. I’m new to this product and have no idea what losing my license status would entail - that’s not at all an unfounded worry. The complete radio silence from the support department is not helpful/comforting 
.
The support department and developers have repeatedly said, including in this thread, that we are aware of the problem and are working on it.
Since part of the code in question is coming from our licensing service, actually fixing it involves a fair amount of back and forth with their support team, which is part of the reason why we aren’t able to give a definitive date for an updated version.
As repeatedly noted, you are in no danger of losing your work. The program will revert to trial mode in the unlikely event that we haven’t fixed this in two months, but our trial is full-featured and lasts for 30 days of actual use. In the even more unlikely event that we still haven’t fixed it by then, it is possible to extract your work from a Scrivener project even with no access to Scrivener itself.
Thank you for your patience.
Katherine
It would be helpful if you would merge the half dozen or so threads on this topic, since official responses from L&L team members are scattered throughout the threads. I’m kind of tired of having to read all of them to find out if there’s any new information on this problem.
I’m afraid I’m less sanguine than you about how “unlikely” it is that you won’t be able to fix this in two more months. Given your track record on Windows coding time frames, I think I’ll take all my work out of Scrivener now, before I’m thrust back into trial mode.
All of the tools that are available to extract your work now will still be available in trial mode.
Your point about time frames is certainly understandable. The difference is that this is a very specific problem localized in a relatively small piece of code, not the development of significant new functionality.
The “official announcement” that the problem has been fixed will be the release of the updated version. You shouldn’t expect any new information before that happens.
Katherine
I agree. I just don’t understand why the company is dealing with the licensing problem in this way.
Because users keep creating new threads. Or adding on to existing threads without reading previous posts. Or both.
Katherine
[quote=“kewms”
Because users keep creating new threads. Or adding on to existing threads without reading previous posts. Or both.
Katherine[/quote]
C’mon Katherine, you’re supposed to follow us around with a Hoover (showing my English heritage) and clean up our messy, multiple threads . 
I have a massive concern about the trial mode not working at all once the validation fails. 
Normally trials do not work when validations expire. They aren’t extended.
Losing work isn’t the real fear. NOT being able to work is.
Normal behavior is that the trial mode will work for whatever number of days were remaining when you purchased the program.
Our expectation, though, is that it will be a moot point because we’ll get the problem fixed first.
Katherine
The fact that your users are having a problem finding the answers to this problem is a failure on your part not theirs. As others have indicated you should be making a much greater effort to inform your users about this considering the magnitude of the problem. A lot of people make a living off of using your program and potentially losing access to it is a big deal.
I too have just started to have this problem and have just wasted the last 30+ minutes creating an account on this forum and reading through many posts looking to see if a solution has been posted. A simple message from you posted somewhere prominent would go a long way to making life easier for everyone.
Agreed, they are completely downplaying the issue. I received an email from tech support saying they’ve “seen a few similar reports” which led to the best laugh I’d had in months–considering it seems to be affecting the majority of Windows users. I cannot wait till they give all of us version 3 for free, because instead of spending time writing we’re combing through a forum trying to find a solution. A complete PR disaster for L&L.
I though that after Keith (the owner of LL) posted this in the latest blog post:
" I’d also like to apologise for the lack of communication - we should absolutely have posted this several days ago (…)."
I thought that they would become better in communicating things,
But that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Yes they could have been more communicative at times but What do you expect? There are multiple posts on the multitude of threads people have started stating they are working on it and will update.
You want them to fill the thread with endless hourly posts, ‘working on it still’?
As for the multiple threads, while it doesn’t impact me (seems it may not be ‘affecting the majority of Windows users’) when I first saw a post on the issue it took me all of 30 seconds looking on the forum to see yes there was an issue and yes they are working on it. The initially thread has remained near the top of the board consistently so the endless addition threads started on the same topic are a waste of space.
I’m on Windows 10 and have been seeing the “2 month blah blah blah” message sporadically. I just replaced the .exe file and reopened Scrivener. It worked just like it’s supposed to. If I see the message again, I’ll post again.
For non-techie people, basically copy your backups/change where you backup your files, then close Scrivener, download the file from the Dropbox link, open up File Explorer, click on “This PC” Then click on “Windows (C)” followed by Program Files (86x) OR Program Files. Scroll to the folder that says Scrivener, and copy/paste the file you downloaded into that folder. Scrivener should start working like normal again.
Well, as I stated earlier, an email would have been quite helpful. Or at least a blog post.
It’s not that they don’t communicate at all, it’s also about the quality level of their communication. And how easy it is to find the info. And how official something sounds.
LL can do what they want, of course. But better communication would make everything a lot easier, in my opinion.
Now, I’m scared. I got the critical update notice. I updated and now Scrivener won’t open at all. I was better off with the error message. At least I could still work.
What version of Windows are you on? This updated file is only meant as a temporary measure, so it is not digitally signed by L&L, so there are some security settings on Windows (and/or other security packages you may be running) that may keep it from running.
Here on my Windows 10 install, are a couple of things I would check:
- Is SmartScreen interfering with the launch? SmartScreen is a system level service that checks the digital signatures on executable files. Depending on how it is configured, it may warn you that you’re launching an unsigned app, or simply block it. This is what the dialog looks like on my build of Windows 10:
If this is what you’re seeing, click the More info link and you’ll see the following:
At that point, if you click Run Anyway, you should be able to launch Scrivener. Depending on your settings and Windows build, you may have to do this every time you launch Scrivener, at least until the new version of Scrivener that has the proper digital signature is downloaded.
- Is the file blocked because it came from another computer? This is another security measure that Windows incorporated a few version ago. To work around this, simply find the Scrivener.exe file you downloaded, right-click, and select Properties. You should see this:
Simply click Unblock, then OK, and if this is the problem, Scrivener should now start when you click on it. You only need to do this once.
issued fixed on version 1.9.14.0 - 13 Sep 2019
thank you