[OSX] OpenSesame crashes on sleep

jtpar

Hi there,

I can't reproduce this bug reliably yet, so I'm not sure what the exact conditions are that cause it, but a number of times I've had OpenSesame crash when my Macbook Pro sleeps. I found someone having this issue in an earlier version of OpenSesame: http://forum.cogsci.nl/index.php?p=/discussion/384/opensesame-0-27-1-for-os-x-available

I'll pay closer attention from now on and try to note any error report that I get--and I'll post again here when I do. In the meantime I just wanted to check if anyone else has had this experience / knows what might be going on?

Thanks!
-Jonathan

jtpar

Hi again!
It just happened -- I think it may only happen when the computer sleeps for a while?
I'm attaching the crash log -- I have no idea what it means, but hopefully it will help...
Thanks,
-Jonathan

Daniel

Hi Jonathan,

Thanks for this bug report. It appears as if the crash is caused by libSDL-1.2.0.dylib, which is the library used to draw stimuli in the Legacy and Expyriment backends. I have a couple of questions:

• Do you happen to have an experiment opened while the system goes to sleep?
• If not, does it only happen after you have run (and completed/closed) an experiment?
• If yes, can you tell me which runner you are using (you can find this in preferences, and should be inprocess or multiprocess)

jtpar

Hi Daniel,

Thanks for your speedy reply! Yes, I believe that each time I've had an experiment opened before the system goes to sleep. The runner selected in preferences is inprocess.

jtpar

Hi again,

I just noticed something else--the crash seems to only occur when the dock icon has changed from the usual OpenSesame logo to a yellow dinosaur with an SNES controller in its mouth... I was wondering what that was about. I guess its related to one of the things you mentioned above?

Daniel

That clears things up then. It appears as if the pygame library doesn't support sleeping. You should be fine as long as you do not have an experiment opened if you put the computer to sleep; OpenSesame itself should survive a nap. You can also change "Inprocess" to "Multiprocess" in the runner mode. This causes the experiment to be run in its own separate process, preventing the experiment from dragging OpenSesame down with it when it crashes.
The snake with the SNES controller in its mouth is the icon of pygame, which is the library behind the legacy backend. If you change the runner to multiprocess, the OpenSesame icon should no longer change.

jtpar

aha! i get it now. Thanks, Daniel!