Idle stopped working

[opapOj]

BPO	15658
Nosy	@bitdancer
Superseder	bpo-4625: IDLE won't open anymore, .idlerc unaccessible

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = None
closed_at = <Date 2012-08-15.01:09:02.147>
created_at = <Date 2012-08-14.22:41:17.264>
labels = ['expert-IDLE', 'type-bug']
title = 'Idle stopped working'
updated_at = <Date 2012-08-15.01:09:02.096>
user = 'https://bugs.python.org/opapOj'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2012-08-15.01:09:02.096>
actor = 'r.david.murray'
assignee = 'none'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2012-08-15.01:09:02.147>
closer = 'r.david.murray'
components = ['IDLE']
creation = <Date 2012-08-14.22:41:17.264>
creator = 'opapOj'
dependencies = []
files = []
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 15658
keywords = []
message_count = 2.0
messages = ['168244', '168249']
nosy_count = 2.0
nosy_names = ['r.david.murray', 'opapOj']
pr_nums = []
priority = 'normal'
resolution = 'duplicate'
stage = 'resolved'
status = 'closed'
superseder = '4625'
type = 'behavior'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue15658'
versions = ['Python 2.7']

[opapOj]

For some years I used Python with IDLE, including my Windows 7 machine. In January IDLE stopped working. Whenever I tried to open with file with IDLE, nothing happened. No error message. Nothing.

After some help from help@python.org I typed at the command line "C:\Python27\Lib\idlelib\idle.py -n" and I got this error:
IO Error: [Errno 13] Permission denied: 'C:\\Users\\Osk\\.idlerc\\recent-files.lst'

So I went to look at the directory .idlerc and found it empty. No recent-files.lst. (Though it may be because it is a hidden file)

Now I think the problem is fixed - or at least for the time being.

I went to the admin identity and found that IDLE does open up there. So I made a copy of the recent-files.lst file and emailed it to myself. Then I went to my wife's identity. And, again, IDLE opened OK.

Finally, I went back to my identity and renamed the file there to "recent-files-H.lst". Then I retrieved the file I had emailed to myself and placed it into the .idlerc directory of my account as "recent-files.lst".

Suddenly I could open IDLE and run Python, as before!

The mystery remains - what happened? When I compared the contents of the old recent-files.lst and the one I replace it with, the only difference I could find is that the old one had 17 entries, the new one had only one entry.

[bitdancer]

I believe this is a duplicate of bpo-4625.