[solved] Problem with opening experiment in OpenSesame runtime for Android

hmarteli

Hi!

I am having problems opening my experiment in my Android tablet. Opensesame only shows the example experiments, and doesn't detect my experiment that is saved on the SD-card. When it asks where my experiments are, I can't remove the "examples_" line, I can only type in a location after this, and after pressing enter it only shows all the example experiments.

The experiment has the droid back-end and the path is: /External Storage/IAT_SV_android.opensesame.tar.gz. On my computer it shows the same pathway as sdcard instead of external storage when the tab is connected. My tab also shows a message that I don't have a "suitable program to open this file" when I try to open it.

Does anyone know whether there might be a problem with the experiment file itself or the app, or something wrong with how the file is saved? Any suggestions how to solve this?

Thanks,

Heidi

sebastiaan

Hi Heidi,

What device + what version of Android are you using?

When it asks where my experiments are, I can't remove the "examples_" line, I can only type in a location after this, and after pressing enter it only shows all the example experiments.

There is a known problem where you cannot provide any keyboard input on some devices. Your problem sounds a bit like that, although it's odd that you only have trouble backspacing, but are able to enter new characters. At any rate, what you could do is install a third-party keyboard, which (for me and others) has fixed the issue:

• http://osdoc.cogsci.nl/getting-opensesame/android/#know-issue-frozen-virtual-keyboard

Alternatively, you could create an autorun file that automatically launches your experiment, as described here:

• http://osdoc.cogsci.nl/getting-opensesame/android/#automatically-start-an-experiment

But that's probably not ideal, because you would have to change the autorun file each time that you want to change the subject nr, logfile, etc.

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

hmarteli

Hi Sebastiaan,

Thanks for your reply! I am using Lenovo IdeaTab A10-70 and Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

I installed the third party keyboard (Swiftkey) and now I can erase the example line and type in another location. However, my experiment is still not found eventhough I typed in the correct location (but without capitalized letters, the keyboard doesn't allow me to type them?).

Cheers,
Heidi

sebastiaan

Hi Heidi,

However, my experiment is still not found eventhough I typed in the correct location (but without capitalized letters, the keyboard doesn't allow me to type them?).

Well, you'd have to get the capitalization right! An approximate folder doesn't work.

But you're right, uppercase characters are not recognized, and simply interpreted as lowercase. That's a pretty major issue, which I filed here. For now, what you could do is create a folder that has a lowercase name (with some explorer app), and put you experiment there.

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

sebastiaan

Fyi: I just uploaded a prerelease for 2.9.7, which should fix this issue. (At least partly, some characters are still not recognized.) You won't receive the update automatically through the Play Store; not until 2.9.7 is officially released anyway. But you can get the apk from here:

• http://files.cogsci.nl/software/opensesame/pre-releases/

If you try it, let me know if it works for you!

hmarteli

Hi!

Yesterday I tried to open the file on my phone (Samsung, also using Android) to figure out if there was a problem with the experiment file. On the phone it was possible to save the experiment in a folder where the path didn't include any uppercase characters, and the experiment was also found (although I wasn't able to open the experiment, but I think this probably isn't a problem since I only need the experiment to work on the tab).

Today I downloaded the 2.9.7 version, where the capitalization worked correctly, but this time the experiment wasn't found! Any ideas what I could try? On the tab I have to save the file in either External Storage or Internal Storage, both capitalized.

Thanks,
Heidi

sebastiaan

Today I downloaded the 2.9.7 version, where the capitalization worked correctly, but this time the experiment wasn't found! Any ideas what I could try? On the tab I have to save the file in either External Storage or Internal Storage, both capitalized.

If the experiment is not found, then it is 99% sure that you haven't indicated the correct folder name. Have you checked with an explorer app what the actual Linux name of the folder is? Many apps will use some kind of description, rather than the actual folder name. For example, on my Galaxy Tab 3 there is a My Files app, which refers to /storage/emulated/0/ (folder name) as 'Device Storage' (description).

A real folder name starts with a /, and in your case might be something like /External Storage/ (although that's a very unusual name).

hmarteli

Thanks, with the file manager app I found the right path!

So, now the problem remains that after asking for subject number and location for logfile, the experiment doesn't open? I have tried continuing with the suggested /sdcard/subject-1.csv as well as with typing in various locations. In the latter case I can't type the hyphen mark, could this be the problem?

Cheers, Heidi

sebastiaan

Hi Heidi,

If the experiment doesn't seem to open, it probably crashes for some reason. You'll find debug information in /sdcard/opensesame-debug.txt (i.e. what would normally be printed to the debug window), as described here:

• http://osdoc.cogsci.nl/getting-opensesame/android/#debugging

What's in that file?

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

hmarteli

Hi Sebastiaan!

It contains the following text:

/sdcard/opensesame-autorun.yml
/mnt/sdcard/opensesame-autorun.yml
Launching resources/android/menu.opensesame
openexp.sampler._legacy.init_sound(): sampling freq = 48000, buffer size = 1024
experiment.init_log(): using 'resources/android/defaultlog.csv' as logfile (utf-8)
experiment.run(): experiment started at Wed Jul  8 17:30:02 2015
opened /sdcard/opensesame-settings.txt for reading
experiment_folder = /sdcard/
logfile_folder = /sdcard/
opened /sdcard/opensesame-settings.txt for writing
experiment.run(): experiment finished at Wed Jul  8 17:30:11 2015

Thanks,
Heidi

sebastiaan

Hi Heidi,

Ah, I see. It seems that the actual debug info is not in there (i.e. nothing after the menu experiment finished). That's an annoying little issue; I'm not sure why that happens sometimes.

I assume you tried to run the experiment on a PC, right? And this worked fine? Perhaps you can post a link to the experiment here so I can take a look at it.

Cheer,s
Sebastiaan

hmarteli

Hi Sebastiaan!

Yes, the experiment works fine when using a PC, but not when using a tab or a phone. Here's a link to the experiment:. Does the downloading work with these Drive settings? Unfortunately the experiment is in Finnish, I hope it's not too confusing!

Cheers,
Heidi

sebastiaan

Hi Heidi,

I traced down the issue, or rather issues.

• The Android runtime chokes when extracting file names with special characters from the file pool. (Issue #345)
• This error is not visible in the regular debug output, for a reason that I don't yet understand. (Issue #346)

For now, I think you can work around these problems as follows:

• Replace all special characters from your file names. So 'Tyhmä.wav' would become 'Tyhma.wav' (ascii only) etc.
• Refer to the sound files with their ascii-only names.
• If necessary, you can create two columns in your loop items. One with special characters, to show words on the screen correctly. And one without special characters (ascii only), to refer to sound files.

I hope this helps! And thanks for helping to spot these nasty bugs.

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

hmarteli

Hi Sebastiaan!

Changing the file names and adding a separate soundcolumn to the loop using only ascii solved the problem! (The column was necessary, the experiment didn't open when only the filenames were edited.)

Thank you so much for helping!!

Cheers,

Heidi

sebastiaan

Hi Heidi,

Would mind checking out the latest 2.9.7 prerelease (currently pre3)? The issue with special character should be fixed now. (I know you've worked around it now, but for future reference.)

• http://files.cogsci.nl/software/opensesame/pre-releases/

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

hmarteli

Hi,

I'm sorry I haven't noticed your last comment before! I just tried an experiment with a few special characters in the sound files and their variable names, but OpenSesame wasn't able to open the experiment at all. But maybe you have fixed this issue already!

Cheers,

Heidi