Trouble Shooting

These are the most common sources of trouble

Command Not Found

If you get a "Bad Command" or "Command Not Found" type error when running pcgen.jar or pcgen.bat, then you most likely don't have java installed. http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/download.html will take you to a page where you can download java for most Oses (Mac users must go to apple.com). Download java for your OS and install it.

The initial splash screen appears, then PCGen dies

For most users this means that java couldn't find your Fonts directory. If your "Fonts" directory is not in the standard location (for windows users this is typically something like C:\Windows\Fonts or C:\Winnt\Fonts) then you need to specify where it is located with the environment variable "JAVA_FONTS". At a command prompt type

SET JAVA_FONTS=C:\Windows\Fonts

Replace C:\Windows\Fonts with the location of your Fonts directory if necessary.

 

Some users have had this trouble if they have too many true-type Fonts in their Fonts directory. This appears to be a java-related issue with 1.3 (hopefully it has been resolved in java 1.4). If you Fonts directory is in the standard location and you still have this fault, try removing some true-type fonts and see if that helps. The one Java looks for is Lucida, so don't remove that one.

 

I see the Source Tab, but it's empty

There are a number of reasons for this.
  1. You didn't unzip the part2of2.zip file of the release files (see Install.htm)
  2. You didn't unzip the part2of2.zip file into the same directory as the part1of2.zip file.
  3. Your unzipping application truncated the long filenames of the files (many files have over 32 character long names, and some zip/unzip apps have difficulty with this)
  4. Your unzipping application didn't unzip the files into their subdirectories. For WinZip users this means making sure the "Use folder names" option is checked.

I try to preview a character or bring up the Doc, and nothing happens

Since PCGen is cross-platform it's hard to assume what browser you're using. Click on the menu item File->Preferences->Browser Path... and select the path to your browser. For Windows users that will most likely be C:\Program Files\InternetExplorer\iexplore.exe

I click on the print icon and get a warning about missing files

The pdf.zip library is required if you want to print directly from PCGen - otherwise you can view the files in your browser or adobe acrobat (pdf files) and print from there. The pdf.zip file is located at http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/pcgen/pdf.zip and unzip it into the lib subdirectory where you installed PCGen. Then you'll need to re-launch PCGen for it to find it properly.