Hello

I have found a bug with clock tables and even have localized the exact point in org-clock.el where it occurs. I don’t know enough of the Org Mode code base to figure out the best solution and submit a patch.

The general symptom is that if:

The Mark terminating the end of the region to be exported is carried into the org-clocktable-write-default formatting function and the call of (backward-delete-char 1) on line 2352 oforg-clock.el deletes a region (between the Mark of the initial call and point, which is immediately before the #+END: construct of the clock table). Deletion of the #+END: construct malforms the clock table and ultimately the export fails leaving the Org file is a corrupt state.

1 Detailed steps to reproduce

1.1 Emacs Initialization

Launch Emacs clean:


/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -Q

Add the update to org-export-first-hook by evaluating the follwing line in *scratch*


(add-hook 'org-export-first-hook 'org-update-all-dblocks)

Report versions (note this report is done from the non-Git-HEAD Org 7.8.09 included with Emacs, but the problem also exists in HEAD):


M-x emacs-version
GNU Emacs 24.1.50.1 (x86_64-apple-darwin, NS apple-appkit-1038.36) of 2012-04-27 on bob.porkrind.org

M-x org-version
Org-mode version 7.8.09

1.2 Baseline and Error Tests

1.2.1 Test File

Open the following test file


* Project A
#+BEGIN: clocktable :maxlevel 2 :scope subtree
Clock summary at [2012-04-27 Fri 14:30]

| Headline     | Time   |      |
|--------------+--------+------|
| *Total time* | *2:59* |      |
|--------------+--------+------|
| Project A    | 2:59   |      |
| Task A1      |        | 2:00 |
| Task A2      |        | 0:59 |
  #+END:
** Task A1
   CLOCK: [2012-04-26 Fri 11:58]--[2012-04-26 Thu 13:58] =>  2:00
** Task A2
   CLOCK: [2012-04-27 Fri 09:00]--[2012-04-27 Fri 09:59] =>  0:59
* Project B
** Task B1

1.2.2 Baseline test

Export the entire buffer as a baseline test


C-c C-e b

The result is as expected:

  • A valid HTML export
  • The Clock Summary line changes to reflect the current time (showing that org-update-all-dblocks) ran correctly

1.2.3 Reproduce the Error

Put the cursor on the Project A line and attempt to export just the Project A subtree


C-c C-e 1 b

The expected result is a (smaller than before) valid HTML export.

The actual result is:

  • org-map-dblocks: Dynamic block not terminated in the echo area
  • Lines between #+END: and Project B are deleted from the file resulting in the following invalid Org file

#+STARTUP: showeverything
* Project A
#+BEGIN: clocktable :maxlevel 2 :scope subtree
Clock summary at [2012-04-27 Fri 14:15]

| Headline     | Time   |      |
|--------------+--------+------|
| *Total time* | *2:59* |      |
|--------------+--------+------|
| Project A    | 2:59   |      |
| Task A1      |        | 2:00 |
| Task A2      |        | 0:59 |

* Project B

1.3 Diagnosis

Tracing through org-clock.el I found the culprit on line 2352, if I add a (debug) statement immediately before that line I see the following:

  • on a normal clock table update (C-c C-c on the #+BEGIN: line) the debugger enters and there is no region highlighted
  • when trying the subtree export the debuggers enters and there is a highlighted active region in test.org from the end of the table (Point) to the end of the entire Project Asubtree (Mark, from the selection made by the export subtree code)