# \[openrefine 3.5.2 - win64\] Locked out

**URL:** <https://forum.openrefine.org/t/openrefine-3-5-2-win64-locked-out/429>\
**Category:** Support and Helpdesk\
**Created:** [February 7, 2023, 12:35pm UTC](https://forum.openrefine.org/t/openrefine-3-5-2-win64-locked-out/429 "2023-02-07T12:35:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![\_Cascafico](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex017/user_avatar/forum.openrefine.org/_cascafico/32/265_2.png) [@\_Cascafico](https://forum.openrefine.org/u/_Cascafico)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2023, 12:35pm UTC](https://forum.openrefine.org/t/openrefine-3-5-2-win64-locked-out/429/1 "2023-02-07T12:35:41Z")

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It happened loading a big csv, with separators badly formatted, generating (I suppose) a huge number of columns.

Now each time I try to start OP, I have an heap size memory alert, followed by almost a freeze of the machine running it, since allocated memory is about 80% of total available for operating system.

I tried to identify guilty data (windows appdata dir), without any success, since all projects are almost same modification time and have just numeric names.

I was able to change data dir (-Drefine.data\_dir) and restart a clean OR.

I have many projects which of course I urgently need to restore: how to do it?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![b2m](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex017/user_avatar/forum.openrefine.org/b2m/32/139_2.png) [@b2m](https://forum.openrefine.org/u/b2m)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2023, 2:12pm UTC](https://forum.openrefine.org/t/openrefine-3-5-2-win64-locked-out/429/2 "2023-02-07T14:12:55Z")

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You might also be affected by a bug that appeared to duplicate certain characters in the projects metadata in OpenRefine \< 3.6 every time OpenRefine is opened.

> <https://github.com/OpenRefine/OpenRefine/issues/4402>
>
> This issue describes problems with special characters in the project name and ot…her fields from \`metadata.json\`.
> 
> \### To Reproduce
> Steps to reproduce the behavior:
> 1. Create a project with special characters in the project name ("Testing äüöß").
> 2. Close OpenRefine and check \`metadata.json\` (everything ok!)
> 3. Reopen OpenRefine and check special characters in the project name ("Testing äüöß").
> 4. Close OpenRefine and check \`metadata.json\` (not ok!)
> 5. Reopen OpenRefine and check special characters in the project name ("Testing äüöß")
> 
> \### Current Results
> 
> The special characters are somehow completely wrong and their number doubles with each restart of OpenRefine.
> 
> \### Expected Behavior
> 
> Reading and writing metadata to \`metadata.json\` preserves special characters.
> 
> \### Screenshots
> 
> \#### After creating the project (step 1):
> 
> !\[openrefine\_special\_chars\_1\](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/135298/147916474-adc673c8-7f8a-45b5-9b30-7725135b77ae.png)
> 
> \#### First restart (step 3):
> 
> !\[openrefine\_special\_chars\_2\](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/135298/147916480-0ba3ebf8-f807-4609-bb68-563257f847a8.png)
> 
> \##### Second restart (step 5):
> 
> !\[openrefine\_special\_chars\_3\](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/135298/147916932-552aca94-6423-49ca-840d-84f279de8060.png)
> 
> \### Versions
> - Operating System: Windows 10
> - Browser Version: Firefox 95
> - JRE: 11.0.13 (using the bundled version "openrefine-win-with-java-3.5.1.zip")
> - OpenRefine: observed in 3.5.0, 3.5.1 and 3.5.2
> 
> \### Additional context
> 
> 1. The list of garbled up characters grows exponentially which results in realy large \`metadata.json\` files and OutOfMemory errors.
> 2. This might be related or even be the same problem as described in #3431.
> 3. I also observed this problem in \`metadata.json\` in the fields \`.importOptionMetadata\` and \`.preferences.entries."exporters.templating.template"\`.

In the ticket are some mitigation strategies on how to find affected projects and clean them.

These mitigation strategies will help you find the project that causes the problem, regardless of whether you are effected by the data duplication problem or not.