[solved] Opensesame minimizing

WouterW

I'm programming a response time experiment in opensesame, but every now end then (the occasion seems to be quite random) the Opensesame experiment screen minimizes. If I click the correct icon on the task bar it goes back to the experiment screen again, so it's not a massive disaster, but its a bit annoying if the program minimizes in the middle of a participant doing the experiment (because I'll have to run there to put it back on the screen, causing a bit of a delay relative to the other participants simultaneously doing the experiment).

So does anyone has any idea as to why opensesame sometimes minimizes?

Cheers

sebastiaan

Hi Wouter,

The only situation in which I've seen this happening is when PsychoPy and PyGame functions are mixed. For example, calling the PsychoPy timing functions when using the legacy and xpyriment back-ends is relatively harmless, but for some reason it occasionally causes the screen to minimize.

Could that be it? Other than that, it could be anything, really. Maybe some other application that interferes?

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

WouterW

Euhm, that could be it I suppose, I'm using the legacy back-end.
I'm not sure which PyGame function interferes (I'm using both mouse and response box based response collection). Are there PyGame functions in there?

And would it help to choose a different back-end?

cheers

PS I'm not using any other applications during the experiment, so that can't be it.

sebastiaan

Hi Wouter,

If you're not explicitly calling any PsychoPy routines from an inline script, then, no, that's not the problem. I really don't know what it can be then. I suspect it is triggered by some other process running in the background—even if you are not running any actual programs at the same time, there are always plenty of processes running in the background, ranging from virus scanners to system processes to (if you're unlucky) viruses.

If you find some pattern in when exactly the minimization happens, then please let me know. Without a clear pattern, it will be difficult to get to the bottom of it.

Cheers!
Sebastiaan

WouterW

What kind of routines are PsychoPy based?

I've got an

exp.get("Condition") command in the first half of the experiment, and in the second half of the experiment (which is a different file) I have response boxes with quite extensive python coding.

However, the pattern seems quite random. It sometimes happens in the first questions (condition, participant nr etc.) and sometimes in the middle of the tasks (although sometimes it's just fine).

It's quite annoying, because the experiment is about the interaction during the task, and the program minimizing is therefore a big problem.

Cheers

sebastiaan

What kind of routines are PsychoPy based?

If you have not selected the psycho back-end, then it's just inline scripts that go from psychopy import [...]. So in your case that's probably not it.

I'm afraid I can't really say much about your problem, except reiterating my suspicion that there may be some other process that occasionally grabs the focus, thus causing OpenSesame to minimize. Such a process could be anything, such as an update checker.

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

WouterW

Hmm, it seems to be something that has to do with the computers in the lab.
The program works fine on my PC at home and in my room at the department. So we're figuring out if we can use a different computer in the same room.
I guess it's something in the background that's interfering.

Thanks anyway :-)