Hi Zoomer
- How did you install Balena Etcher? Appimage or other?
- What OS and desktop environment do you use?
Thank you!

I used apt to install Etcher. I may have also used AppImage but not sure. The problem remains.

Using Ubuntu 22.04.2 and Gnome.

Could not reproduce with Etcher installed as Appimage, on Ubuntu 20.04 with GNOME 3.36.8 and:

Version: 7.5.1.2 (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: fcbaee479e84c6cd81291587d2ee68cba099e129
CPU threads: 8; OS: Linux 5.15; UI render: default; VCL: gtk3
Locale: en-AU (en_AU.UTF-8); UI: en-US
Calc: threaded

More questions:
- Which component do you have open when pressing F1?
- Does pressing F1 when LibreOffice is not running also bring up Etcher?
- If installed from deb, did you use this PPA? https://github.com/balena-io/etcher?d_id=dab87555-be57-4d28-b915-88c8e569a760&s_id=1677488196722#debian-and-ubuntu-based-package-repository-gnulinux-x86x64
- Can you please paste here the link to the 404 page you get?

Thank you!

I use Base module.
Pressing F1 for no application -why would I do that? No, nothing.
Yes, I used that ppa.
Link is: file:///opt/libreoffice7.5/help/en-US/text/shared/05/err_html.html?System=UNIX&DbPAR=BASE&HID=.help:index

I should mention that I installed the help mpdule using gdebi, but it complained of duplicate modules.  With Ubuntu 22.04.2, I am unable to just double-click on the help module to install it. I use dpkg to install LibreOffice, and gdebi for the help module.  Should I use  dpkg for the help module?  No readme is given for it.

I don't know if someone there did something, but F1 works as expected now for Base.  Also tried it with Calc and it works there.  It wasn't working earlier today (Feb 27). Strange. I did nothing except try it.

Allan

I miswrote earlier. I forgot that I had uninstalled Balena Etcher yesterday so that is why the problem with LibreOffice Help did not occur.  When I reinstalled it, the problem reappeared.  I have since deleted the deb version of Balena Etcher and installed the AppImage version and the problem has disappeared.(again)

Allan

I installed the deb version of Etcher, and the helppack from:

https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/pre-releases/deb/x86_64/LibreOffice_7.5.1.2_Linux_x86-64_deb_helppack_en-US.tar.gz

And I could reproduce this very weird issue in:

Version: 7.5.1.2 (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: fcbaee479e84c6cd81291587d2ee68cba099e129
CPU threads: 8; OS: Linux 5.15; UI render: default; VCL: gtk3
Locale: en-AU (en_AU.UTF-8); UI: en-US
Calc: threaded

Clicking Help > LibreOffice Help or using F1 does open BalenaEtcher!
I could also reproduce in Writer.

---

Regarding the unrelated documentation 404, I can reproduce the general Base help page not being available for version 7.5:

https://help.libreoffice.org/7.5/en-US/text/shared/05/err_html.html?System=UNIX&DbPAR=WRITER&HID=DBACCESS_HID_APP_CREATION_LIST

I've reported the issue in bug 153879.

In the console, when pressing F1, I get:

[Axios v1.7.9] Transitional option 'clarifyTimeoutError' has been deprecated since v1.0.0 and will be removed in the near future
[Axios v1.7.9] Transitional option 'forcedJSONParsing' has been deprecated since v1.0.0 and will be removed in the near future
[Axios v1.7.9] Transitional option 'silentJSONParsing' has been deprecated since v1.0.0 and will be removed in the near future
libva error: vaGetDriverNameByIndex() failed with unknown libva error, driver_name = (null)
ready-to-show: 688.713ms
{"message":"Request failed with status code 404","stack":"Error: Request failed with status code 404\n    at createError (/opt/balenaEtcher/resources/app/generated/etcher.js:1:538018)\n    at settle (/opt/balenaEtcher/resources/app/generated/etcher.js:1:537708)\n    at IncomingMessage.handleStreamEnd (/opt/balenaEtcher/resources/app/generated/etcher.js:1:536494)\n    at IncomingMessage.emit (events.js:327:22)\n    at endReadableNT (internal/streams/readable.js:1327:12)\n    at processTicksAndRejections (internal/process/task_queues.js:80:21)","config":{"url":"https://balena.io/etcher/static/config.json","method":"get","headers":{"Accept":"application/json, text/plain, */*","User-Agent":"axios/1.7.9"},"transformRequest":[null],"transformResponse":[null],"timeout":0,"responseType":"json","xsrfCookieName":"XSRF-TOKEN","xsrfHeaderName":"X-XSRF-TOKEN","maxContentLength":-1,"maxBodyLength":-1,"transitional":{"silentJSONParsing":true,"forcedJSONParsing":true,"clarifyTimeoutError":false}}}

Noel Grandin in chat said it was an Etcher bug.

Active issue on GitHub: https://github.com/balena-io/etcher/issues/3808

Which references a closed issue: https://github.com/balena-io/etcher/issues/3374

And an xdg-utils bug report, which shows that the issue affects other Electron apps as well: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/xdg/xdg-utils/-/issues/180

Issue is that Etcher registers itself as the default HTML app for the system. This can be confirmed by opening a HTML file after installing Etcher.

Marking as "not our bug".

Created attachment 185644 [details]
shows help file not found

I should mention that when I press F1 and I am working with forms in Base, the Help screen works normally.  If I am at the point where it is the Base main screen and press F1, the 404 error comes up, but Help works mostly normally from the sidebar. Clicking help from the menu works as expected in all cases.

I have eliminated the Balena Etcher error by installing the AppImage.

(In reply to zoomer1 from comment #12)
> I should mention that when I press F1 and I am working with forms in Base,
> the Help screen works normally.  If I am at the point where it is the Base
> main screen and press F1, the 404 error comes up, but Help works mostly
> normally from the sidebar. Clicking help from the menu works as expected in
> all cases.
> 
> I have eliminated the Balena Etcher error by installing the AppImage.

Yes, that's consistent with what I described in bug 153879.
Help packs and online help both come from the same source.