I just spent some time chasing an error message that I was getting from a Windows Media component when I tried to open a Windows Media Stream. The error was NS_E_BAD_CONTROL_DATA which is defined as:
The server received invalid data from the client on the control connection
This is a very cryptic message because when dealing with COM objects, the terms “Server” and “Client” can have many many meanings. In this case, I had no real clue whether it was referring to a conventional network Server and Client or a COM server and client. That threw me off for a bit.
I ended up finding the problem and it wasn’t even remotely close to what the error claimed. The problem was that my destination folder where I planned on recording the stream TO didn’t exist. Yeah it’s a stupid mistake but what does that have to do with reading the stream? Remember it was WMASFReader that died not WMASFWriter.
In any case, it’s important to remember that sometimes errors will occur and they will not be caught for quite some time or sometimes not at all. If their effects cascade throughout your program, you may find them causing errors that don’t make sense. If you could peel back the layers of the onion enough to see Microsoft’s underlying code, maybe the error and how it got there would make sense however on the outside, they’ll often seem unrelated and can be VERY misleading.
Do NOT fixate on what the error SAYS. Work backwards and find out what triggered it.
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