Error Messages - what do they mean?

Questions about error messages arise frequently here. for example one current post mentions "Video Rendering Error 60". To me it would make sense to be able to find out more specifically what ... Error 60 (or any other number) means.

For other products, usually in the troubleshooting documentation, I've seen lists or tables of error messages, what they mean and suggested steps for how to fix the problem.

In the Apple Support I only found this: support.apple.com/en-ca/HT203477 titled: Final Cut Pro X 10.1 and later: Troubleshooting basics. I couldn't find more comprehensive or specific error message info. A quick Google search yielded nothing.

Is there anything like this available for FCPX? Would this be helpful?

Hey Ed,

Error messages are very general and quite often they are not generated from the application itself, but from inside the OS.
An error message only shows the consequence of a problem, not the cause. And the same problem can be caused by many different things. Error messages are like the symptoms of a disease, they can point you to a diagnose but they don't offer any cure.

It would be very difficult to list all the things that can cause certain errors. The only thing we can do is keep a record of threads that mention specific errors and then see how the issue gets solved. This gives a basic idea on the steps one can take in trying to find what may have triggered the error, then we can try to find a solution.

- Ronny

Hi Ronny,

I 'm sure you're right.

Somewhere someone at Apple must have this stuff documented but I suspect the info is scattered all over the different areas the development teams work in. So it's unlikely that detail will be available to us end users. It could probably save some confusion & frustration to have more specific info, like does ... Error 60 mean there are 59 other errors of this type?

As Ronny noted the error is a symptom. Something like rendering error 60 could mean that during rendering a system call timed out. System errors are listed in the file /usr/include/sys/errno.h. I don't know if it's on all machine or only those that have Apple developer tools installed. That file contains

#define ETIMEDOUT 60 /* Operation timed out */

However, the error you reported could have come from within FCPX and mean something entirely different.

Only Apple knows. I might even go as far as saying only the FCPX developers know!

In case your other personality isn't Patrick, read my reply here:
www.fcp.co/forum/4-final-cut-pro-x-fcpx/...ng-mov-clip-as-h-264