Crashing and credit use

[ScAtMaN]

Despite putting in countless hours to clean up my collection I am still getting the odd crash, sometimes with runtime error 55 messages and sometimes with no error just dropping me back to the desktop.

They seem to happen when searching for music, in fact the Juke can be on random play all day with not a hitch but a search will every once and a while crash it.  Re-loading and performing the exact same search again and no problems, until a few hours, sometimes days pass and again a crash.

I have scanned and re-scanned my collection for errors using 'mp3val' and 'mp4test', manually checked every track tag in 'tag and rename' and done everything I can think of to ensure my collection is clean and usable but without a clear meaning to the error I am getting a bit frustrated now as I don't know what is causing it.

I had hoped to enable the charging as it seemed to have been stable for a good few days but within an hour someone crashed it.  A restart is easy but unfortunately the queue is lost and so is the amount of credits left on the system, making it hard to refund the customer and inconvenient for them to have to re-do all there selection.

So my main bugbears are:
1. Random crashing with no logging of what the problem is.  Could this be improved or at the very least a little more tolerant so it does not bring the whole system down when an error is found.

2. Credit system, as well as the problem above I have found that the first credit does not always register, you insert a coin, its excepted the key press is sent but nothing registers in freebox until a second coin is inserted.  It then appears to be ok for the remainder of the session.

3. Remember credits when closed.  Similar to the 'save queue on exit' option is needed,  but of course if there is a crash that does not work as it did not have time to save the queue!

4. Wrong artists and genres still shown in the artists list under random play.  Despite deleting and rebuilding the library from scratch everytime I have worked on the library these lists still seem to contain junk and errors I have fixed.  Where are these stored and how do I update them?  Also the use artist list tick box keeps becoming unticked after a restart meaning it starts random playing from the whole library and not just the list I have selected.

Sorry for the long rambling post but I am really trying to get this stable and robust for public use and feel I still have some way to go.

[Cary_B]

Sorry to hear about the problems you are having.  I had a few of the same problems when I first started.  What I found was that just rebuilding the library didn't help much. I had to actually delete all the files associated with the library in the Freebox folder first, then rebuild.  I deleted all the folders, Artists, Genres, and Years, and all the files, .CVR, .REC.  I think I also deleted the QUE and HISTORY files to make sure I started from scratch.  I think some of the bad data I had from before when I fixed my MP3 files got through the rebuild somehow.  Oh, I also got rid of regular WinXP, and used TinyXP.  Since doing that, I have had the Jukebox run days without a crash.  Hope this helps. 

P.S. I don't use the credit version, so not sure if that has anything to do with it.

[Novalak]

i think there should be an error dump to help fix problems

is there one Barry?

[ScAtMaN]

Thanks Cary_b, I had been deleting the .REC anf .cvr files as a matter of course, will try deleting the other folders and files you mention but I have also tried a complete un-install and re-install before without much help.

To make matters worse I turned on the Juke this morning and freebox will not even start, Fails with a Runtime 62 error 'Input past end of file'

Will Try re-building again and see what happens.

Barry can you offer any ideas?

[Barcrest]

Well runtime 55 is a file already open error. You say it's tied in with the search so i'll take a look. What version are you using? All it is doing when searching is opening a file. I think people might be searching then clicking something else before the search has ended or freebox is trying to do something like change song. If you can give me a little more info on the crash it will help me lock it down.

[ScAtMaN]

Using 4.19

The only other relevant info I can give you is that it accesses the music from a network share and drive mapping. ie:
PC 'A'  behind bar with a drive dedicated to music files.
Jukebox PC in bar with a wired connection to PC A and music share mapped to drive 'Z'
It should be the only machine using it though.

I have rulled out dodgy cabling and switches as I have replaced both.  And when freebox crashes the network share is still there, and freebox can restart straight after with no problems.

I have had it happen to me when I have typed in an artist for instance and clicked search, the error appears instantly in a windows box.  clicking ok exits freebox and any music playing and sends me back to the desktop, usually without any desktop icons as it was in fullscreen mode when it crashes.  I can immediately restart freebox ok  but the queue is lost, as well as any credits. 
Changing track just as you are hitting the search button may have happened once or twice but its happened to many times to be a coincidence I think.

In other news even after deleting all my user files this morning I still got Runtime 62 error so had to re-install from scratch.  At least my artist list and genres are correct now (see point 4 above) so that one can be crossed off.

I will monitor it closely for the next day or so but I have been forced to put it back on freeplay for now.

EDIT: the artist tick it still not being remembered on the random play page.

[Barcrest]

I have fixed the bug with the ticks being saved. I will try and fix the search bug.

[Barcrest]

Try the latest beta if you can, see if that sorts out your issues. It's beta but the bugs you reported should be fixed. I have just uploaded it over the top of the last beta as i only made a couple of changes.

[ScAtMaN]

Thanks for the quick service!
Will give it a try and report back.

As a matter of interest what did you fix with the search bug?

[Barcrest]

Actually leave it five minutes i'm uploading a new one that fixes the queue issue you were having when it was crashing....