xLights crashes while save is in progress

[gadgetsmith]

I've tried and tried to lay off clicking anything when xLights is saving, but I keep running into this problem.  My finger has a mind of it's own and clicks something while xLights is saving.  This always causes the program to crash.  It there anyway for the program to ignore mouse/keyboard presses while saving?

Generally, i've not lost more than a few minutes work, but not sure if others have this issue or if it's just me.

Thanks
Charlie

[dkulp]

You shouldn't have lost any work.  The very first thing that is saved is the xml file for the sequence.  And that's done right on the main thread and thus it could not have been processing key events either.   

That said, you could turn off the multi-threaded save.  That may prevent some of this.  Not sure.   I cannot reproduce any of these crashes which makes it hard to diagnose.  We've started trying to investigate options for getting better crash info, but that's for a future version.

[Lights On Fifth]

I've tried and tried to lay off clicking anything when xLights is saving, but I keep running into this problem.  My finger has a mind of it's own and clicks something while xLights is saving.  This always causes the program to crash.  It there anyway for the program to ignore mouse/keyboard presses while saving?

Generally, i've not lost more than a few minutes work, but not sure if others have this issue or if it's just me.

Thanks
Charlie

Charlie have you ever thought about cutting your fingers off when in save mode. 

[gadgetsmith]

Yes!

Ok. It's something with my PC. After a reboot (haven't rebooted the pc in about two months) I don't have the problem any more. Go figure.

[Lights On Fifth]

Well that is good news

[flyinverted]

I have started many screen recording sessions to show how to crash XL/NC. Of course it won't crash when you want it to, just when you're working late at night trying to finish a sequence.

What I found is that the most likely culprit is lack of memory. Each time I started recording I had a fresh reboot and not several hours worth of browsing data in cache memory.

I have tried on 3 different computers that have all crashed NC easily and ever since they've been rebooted and Chrome closed when using NC, I haven't been able to crash it.

-Steve

[dkulp]

Interesting... that COULD be one reason why I cannot reproduce things like this.   On the Mac, xLights is a 64bit application and thus has access to gobs and gobs of memory.  :-)

[drlucas]

I am very glad of the progress on the Mac side the last 2 months with xlights....I was running windows under bootcamp and had SERIOUS memory issues...since i've gone back to native OS X it's been WAY better. way way better.

.....please don't cut your fingers off. it is impossible to scratch your head when trying to figure out why xlights is crashing on you. oh wait you solved that problem.....if you are looking for things to do when your show is saving, then consider having another PC or smartphone sitting beside the sequencing machine and read up on your favourite forums and resist the temptation to hit alt-tab and multitask

[jnealand]

if you are looking for things to do when your show is saving, then consider having another PC or smartphone sitting beside the sequencing machine and read up on your favorite forums and resist the temptation to hit alt-tab and multitask

Now you have come upon one of the great uses of having dual monitors, I just play a quick game of solitaire on the other monitor or read some email.  I also have my desktop connected via KVM switch to 2 other computers and a PI.  Too many toys.  LOL