I ran "allele_call" and it failed without generating any error messages. What happended? [5/31/97]Since functions such as "prep_call", "image_call", "allele_call", and "allele_results" are designed for batch processing multiple gels and studies without supervision, we do not want FAST-MAP to crash and halt when one of the gels or studies failed. Because of Matlab's error handling limitations, FAST-MAP has to "absorbed" any error messages if it wants to proceed to the next gel/study without crashing. That is why you see no error messages even though "allele_call" failed on your gel (even if it is only a single gel).
We are always trying our best in FAST-MAP to catch as many errors and print out useful messages. However, in the event that there is a program bug, you can force the error message to be printed (and crashing) by using, instead of "allele_call", one of the following (depending on whether you are processing a gel or a study):
allele_call_GEL <gel>
allele_call_STU <study>
Similarly, for "image_call":
image_call_GEL <gel>
image_call_STU <study>
And the same rule applies for "prep_call" (use "prep_call_GEL" and
"prep_call_STU"), and "allele_results" (ditto).
Note that these error-generating functions ("allele_call_GEL", "allele_call_STU", and gang) only take in a single gel or study as they are not designed for batch processing.
Please also read the procedures for generating error messages for bug reports.