all i see is a dashed line that is a square.  No circle.  The rectangle tool works, but the ellipse tool is blank.  I can select it, etc but it will not fill with a color.  I have tried over and over, but it wont draw a circle of any color.  I had it all set up, just one white dot, and i was using it for a pattern, and then inkscape  popped up a close error.

Now when i open it i cant draw a circle. well it thinks it drew one as above but nothing is there.  The fill is white, not X. 

I'd assign a color to the ellipse tool by clicking on a swatch in the palette before creating the ellipse, and ensure the full-ellipse button is clicked (Start and End are at 0).

A white ellipse with no stroke will look invisible on a white background... checkerboard background in the Document Properties dialog may be helpful.

Also check that object, layer, and fill opacity are not zero

yeah did that its red, still doesnt draw it.  Ok i clicked on the link to upload a file with nothing in it, just the setup showing the red circle for you to try it.  I clicked upload file, selected it, and nothing happens. so i dont know.  oh it finally shows it.

trying again

Object opacity is at zero.

Thanks thats the second time the opacity was turned off, why does inkscape do that?  How do i get back to a circle?  i set it to use the tools default not last used, but it still has the shape?  So when inkscape crashes out, it screws up all the settings? 

Tyler? how did you do that gif so quickly? just curious.

To get back to a closed ellipse, you can use the button on the end of the ellipse controls bar.

If you crash out, Inkscape will not save the current settings.

I use Sharex, an open source recorder.