Troubleshooting

The engine did not start

Parallax runs a comparison engine alongside its window. When it starts, it shows “Starting the comparison engine…” and waits up to a minute for the engine to answer.

If the engine never answers, Parallax says “The Parallax service did not start.” and shows the last error, or “No response”. Choose Try again to wait again. If it still fails, open the log folder (see Logs) and include the log in your support request.

The engine stopped responding

If the engine stops answering while you work, Parallax says “Lost contact with the comparison engine”, and the footer shows Engine not responding in red. Parallax keeps trying every few seconds. When the engine answers again, the footer returns to Engine ready and the message goes away.

If this continues, restart Parallax. View > Reload (Ctrl+R) reloads the window and waits for the engine again.

Diagnostics

Open Diagnostics from the footer, or Help > Diagnostics…. It shows:

• Version
• Installed from: Microsoft Store, GitHub installer, or a development build
• Runtime
• System
• Data folder: where Parallax keeps its data
• Today’s log

Choose Copy details to copy them, then paste them into your support request.

Logs

Choose Open log folder in Diagnostics, or Help > Open log folder, to open the log folder in File Explorer.

To log more, turn on Verbose logging in Diagnostics, or choose Help > Toggle verbose logging. With it on, every request is written to the log. Turn it off again when you are done.

A connection fails

• Choose Test connection in the connection dialog, or Test on its card. The error comes from the server or the driver. Hover over a card’s red cross to see it again.
• Check the host, port and database. On SQL Server, a named instance goes in Instance name, with the port empty.
• On SQL Server with Windows (integrated), Parallax signs in as the Windows account running it.
• On MySQL, a caching_sha2_password login without SSL needs Allow public key retrieval.
• A certificate error means the server’s certificate did not pass the check you chose. See Encryption.
• If List databases fails, Parallax says “Could not list databases” with the error.

See Connections for every option.

A comparison leaves something out

If a comparison shows “Not everything was compared.”, the account could not see some objects. See Accounts with fewer rights.

A deployment failed

See After a failed deployment.

Updates

A copy installed from the Microsoft Store updates through the Store, which installs new versions on its own. Parallax does not look for or install updates itself. To update now, open the Store’s Library and choose Get updates.

Help > Check for updates… on a Store copy says so: “Updates come from the Microsoft Store”.

Diagnostics shows where your copy was installed from and its version.