Running->Stopped bug

Hi Daniel,

I have responded via your e-mail support ticket. We have previously been able to reproduce the problem here and the Development team have already been notified about the issue.

I hope to provide an update once we have any further information.

Regards,

After trying a bunch of things it seems to be working again. I'm not sure what fixed it or if it is fixed permanently, time will tell. Here is what I did:
- Uninstalled picoscope with "sudo apt remove picoscope"
- Uninstalled dependencies with "sudo apt autoremove"
- Installed older version of Picoscope by downloading individual packages (libpicoipp, libpl1000, libps2000, libps2000a, libps3000, libps3000a, libps4000, libps4000a, libps5000, libps5000a, libps6000, libusbdrdaq, and picoscope) from https://labs.picotech.com/debian/pool/main/ from around January 2015 and installing with "sudo dpkg -i *.deb"
- Marked picoscope to hold at older version: "sudo apt-mark hold picoscope"
- Installed older picoscope dependencies: "sudo apt -f install"
- Discovered that older picoscope would not detect my PicoScope 2205MSO hardware for some reason
- Uninstalled older picoscope: "sudo apt remove picoscope" and "sudo apt autoremove"
- Found that picoscope package configurations were still installed
- Performed a purge on all picoscope related packages: "sudo apt purge libpl1000 libps2000 libps2000a libps3000 libps3000a libps4000 libps4000a libps5000 libps5000a libps6000 libusbdrdaq picoscope"
- Reinstalled latest picoscope packages: "sudo apt install picoscope"

I suspect the purge operation may have actually been what fixed it, but I'm unable to confirm this. Perhaps someone else who is having this issue can try just the last 2 steps (purge and reinstall) and see if it fixes the issue for them.

In the process I also changed the USB cable to the original blue one that came with it. But I changed it back to the previous cable and it is also working fine, so I don't think that was it.

At any rate, I'm very happy that it is working again, since it was severely impacting my ability to troubleshoot. I'll be sure to post any updates if I have any more information. Keeping my fingers crossed that it continues to work..

Best regards,

Element Green

My PicoScope was working great for over a week without issue. This morning unfortunately, the issue has returned. I tried purging the PicoScope related packages again and re-installed them, without success. Every time I enable triggers, the scope LED goes out and I'm forced to go to File->Connect Device or restart the PicoScope application.

This is very very unfortunate, since it stops me dead in my tracks with my work. Wish I knew how to resolve this permanently.

Is there a way to enable debugging output for the PicoScope application? It's obvious it is having communication issues with the scope (for example, clicking the Run does nothing after the scope LED goes out, so I'm sure there is some application error associated with this).

Out of curiosity I checked what kernel module is being used for the PicoScope. It looks like it is using usbfs. Not sure if that is the proper module or not or if something changed in this regard.

Element Green

Hi Element Green,

Are you running the PicoScope application as a super user or with a user account with non-administrator privileges?

Regards,

I've done both. After it broke again, I attempted to use "strace" to see if there was any sort of I/O errors happening which would cause the scope to disconnect. The application quit immediately unless I ran it as root, when using strace. When I did this, it started working again and has worked ever since (whether running as root or not). It seems like a moving target and I'm not yet sure what the cause is. I'm glad it is working again though at least. I'll be sure to post more information if and when I discover it.

Best regards,

Element Green

It seems like running picoscope as root (using sudo) does indeed fix the issue, from what I have seen so far. I have not tested this enough yet to know for sure, but the times where I started up picoscope and it stopped working after enabling triggers, if I quit the application and started it with sudo it would continue to work as it should after enabling digital triggering.

Best regards,

Element Green

Hi all
I installed mono from official repository and all seem to work. Can you confirm?
(Debian stable amd64)

Had the same problem yesterday (Picoscope 2205A MSO) on Ubuntu, find my psdata-file here.

We are hoping to have a new release for Linux shortly, please keep checking for updates.

A fix for this will be greatly appreciated.

After using the PicoScope application more on Linux, I just wanted to reiterate that it does look like running the picoscope application as root (with sudo for example) fixes this issue. So I would assume there is some sort of resource or API which is being affected by the difference in user permissions.

It's likely this issue could be tracked down using strace, to try and see what sort of Linux syscall or other function is failing when running it non-privileged.

Best regards,

Element Green

Hi Element Green,

Thanks for the update.

I have added your comments to the bug report.

Regards,

I upgraded to Ubuntu 16.10 on a new computer, fast and powerful.
Picoscope starts fine and I can do TWO captures. Then it stays stopped, won't start again.
Very consistent.
Software version 6.11.13.3
It runs fine on my HP windows 10 netbook, 6.11.12.1692
I have to work with two computers on the desk, most inconvenient.
On the big Ubuntu system it seems to stagger a bit, suspect memory management faulty.
George Shering

Try running it as root with "sudo picoscope", as mentioned in my previous post. Works for me.

Ububtu sequel
I found I had the same version on an older 32 bit 16.04 2Mbyte netbook. It works, visually identical to the Windows 10 machine.
The new 64 bit 16.10 machine is 8 Gbyte memory, the netbooks are 2 Gbyte.
Could it be that Picoscope asks for more memory to store traces but falls over if it is given more than 4Gbyte (32 bits worth)?
George Shering.