This just happened again, and I think I learned more about the cause. I was making many changes to a bunch of inter-dependent objects, including duplicating and renaming objects. Often, the
replace uses dialog box would simply not appear, so I replaced many object references manually. The little double-arrow indicator in the upper right-hand corner (
) was animating continually, as though the AE were still trying to catch up on some of the back-end tasks related to the changes I had been making.
I think the AE had not completed committing changes to the objects, and some object references were still pointing to the old objects. There was no indication in the objects as visible in the JUI that anything was amiss though, so I did not see the problem until I had executed the objects. After a few minutes, without making any changes, I ran the objects again. This time they worked as expected.
Very troubling.