# Xdmf3ReaderT crashes if xdmf mesh file (plain text) exceeds certain number of elements
**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/xdmf3readert-crashes-if-xdmf-mesh-file-plain-text-exceeds-certain-number-of-elements/17333
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Created:** [November 25, 2025, 2:02pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/xdmf3readert-crashes-if-xdmf-mesh-file-plain-text-exceeds-certain-number-of-elements/17333 "2025-11-25T14:02:53Z")
**Posts on this page:** 2
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@violettinged](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/violettinged)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 2:02pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/xdmf3readert-crashes-if-xdmf-mesh-file-plain-text-exceeds-certain-number-of-elements/17333/1 "2025-11-25T14:02:53Z")
## Description
I have a `.xdmf` mesh file of a simple cube geometry with both the metadata and the definition of tetrahedral elements and node coordinates (heavy data) stored in the same plain text file using `XML`. Trying to open the original mesh of the entire cube geometry using the `Xdmf3ReaderT` caused Paraview to crash. I manually removed some element definitions from the file and found that the file is read correctly if the number of elements is smaller than same value (in my case it is roughly 425k).
The problem does not occur if the heavy data is stored in a `.h5` file but here I am specifically asking for the ASCII encoding.
I am using Paraview 6.0.1 and observed the same behaviour on MacOS, Linux and Windows.
Find below two zipped mesh files with the `NOT-OK.xdmf` file containing just one element more than the `OK.xdmf` file. As the name suggests, the first file causes a crash whereas the second one doesn’t.
[Meshes.zip](https://discourse.paraview.org/uploads/short-url/kHqnbwqMKDwx27x6yU7TSesquVU.zip) (6.9 MB)
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### Author:  [@violettinged](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/violettinged)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2025, 11:33am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/xdmf3readert-crashes-if-xdmf-mesh-file-plain-text-exceeds-certain-number-of-elements/17333/2 "2025-12-11T11:33:46Z")
Any updates here? I should have emphasized that the reported issue is a general issue with ASCII-based `.xdmf` meshes, and not specific to the attached meshes. The below image illustrates the two attached meshes. Both were created using FEniCSx. They just have a slightly different number of elements and there is so obvious reason to me why the larger one fails to open. Any help would be much appreciated.
