# Ground control opens to blank screen

**URL:** <https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638>\
**Category:** Troubleshooting\
**Created:** [April 22, 2019, 11:48pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638 "2019-04-22T23:48:49Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 15\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [April 22, 2019, 11:48pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/1 "2019-04-22T23:48:49Z")

</div>

Hi all,

Totally new user here. When I try to double click “Launch Ground Control.bat”, all I get is a black screen with a white rectangle in the middle.

The cmd window shows the following:

```
[INFO] [Logger] Record log in C:\Users\talyr\.kivy\logs\kivy_19-04-22_2.txt
[INFO] [Kivy] v1.10.0
[INFO] [Python] v2.7.14 (v2.7.14:84471935ed, Sep 16 2017, 20:19:30) [MSC v.1500 32 bit (Intel)]
[INFO] [Factory] 194 symbols loaded
[INFO] [Image] Providers: img_tex, img_dds, img_sdl2, img_pil, img_gif (img_ffpyplayer ignored)
[INFO] [OSC] using <thread> for socket
[INFO] [Window] Provider: sdl2
[INFO] [GL] Using the "OpenGL" graphics system
[INFO] [GL] GLEW initialization succeeded
[INFO] [GL] Backend used <glew>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL version <4.4.0 - Build 21.20.16.4542>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL vendor <Intel>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL renderer <Intel(R) HD Graphics 620>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL parsed version: 4, 4
[INFO] [GL] Shading version <4.40 - Build 21.20.16.4542>
[INFO] [GL] Texture max size <16384>
[INFO] [GL] Texture max units <32>
[INFO] [Shader] fragment shader: <WARNING: 0:7: '' : #version directive missing>
[INFO] [Shader] vertex shader: <WARNING: 0:7: '' : #version directive missing>
[INFO] [Window] auto add sdl2 input provider
[INFO] [Window] virtual keyboard not allowed, single mode, not docked
[INFO] [Text] Provider: sdl2
[INFO] [Base] Start application main loop
[INFO] [GL] NPOT texture support is available
[INFO] [GL] Unpack subimage support is available

```

I’m running Windows10. Any idea what I can do to get it to load? Any additional information I can provide?

Edit: I do have python 3.3.5 installed on this laptop. Is there any chance that’s causing an incompatibility?

–Tal

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![bar](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/bar/32/10_2.png) [@bar](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/bar)\
**Post date:** [April 23, 2019, 1:48am UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/2 "2019-04-23T01:48:55Z")

</div>

> [@talyrath](#):
>
> I do have python 3.3.5 installed on this laptop. Is there any chance that’s causing an incompatibility?

I haven’t heard of that before, but it is a possibility. I have had python do a lot of strange things in the past with different version, but it looks like it is loading with 2.7 from the log. I’m a little stumped, I haven’t seen anything like that before. If you feel comfortable trying I would recommend the “run from the source” approach which might give us more information about what is doing on

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [April 23, 2019, 2:15pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/3 "2019-04-23T14:15:50Z")

</div>

I uninstalled my other Python versions to see if that would solve the issue, but no change.

I can try to install Python 2.7, kivy and the other dependencies tonight and see what running from source code does.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 5:59pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/4 "2019-05-28T17:59:44Z")

</div>

So, I finally did this. Got the following error message:

> C:\GroundControl\GroundControl\>python main.py  
> [INFO] [Logger] Record log in C:\Users\talyr.kivy\logs\kivy\_19-05-28\_3.txt  
> [INFO] [Kivy] v1.10.1  
> [INFO] [Python] v2.7.15 (v2.7.15:ca079a3ea3, Apr 30 2018, 16:30:26) [MSC v.1500 64 bit (AMD64)]  
> [INFO] [Factory] 194 symbols loaded  
> [INFO] [Image] Providers: img\_tex, img\_dds, img\_sdl2, img\_gif (img\_pil, img\_ffpyplayer ignored)  
> [WARNING] [Input] WM\_Touch/WM\_Pen not supported by your version of Windows  
> [INFO] [Window] Provider: sdl2  
> [INFO] [GL] Using the “OpenGL” graphics system  
> [INFO] [GL] GLEW initialization succeeded  
> [INFO] [GL] Backend used   
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL version \<4.4.0 - Build 21.20.16.4542\>  
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL vendor   
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL renderer \<Intel(R) HD Graphics 620\>  
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL parsed version: 4, 4  
> [INFO] [GL] Shading version \<4.40 - Build 21.20.16.4542\>  
> [INFO] [GL] Texture max size \<16384\>  
> [INFO] [GL] Texture max units \<32\>  
> [INFO] [Window] auto add sdl2 input provider  
> [INFO] [Window] virtual keyboard not allowed, single mode, not docked  
> [INFO] [Text] Provider: sdl2  
> Traceback (most recent call last):  
> File “main.py”, line 32, in   
> from UIElements.frontPage import FrontPage  
> ImportError: No module named UIElements.frontPage

Any chance there’s a file missing from this installer?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Gero](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/gero/32/17487_2.png) [@Gero](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/Gero)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 6:04pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/5 "2019-05-28T18:04:27Z")

</div>

No idea if this helps someone, for comparison the linux report on running GC v1.26:

> [INFO] [Logger] Record log in /home/whoareyou4/.kivy/logs/kivy\_19-05-28\_2.txt  
> [INFO] [Kivy] v1.10.1  
> [INFO] [Python] v2.7.15rc1 (default, Nov 12 2018, 14:31:15)  
> [GCC 7.3.0]  
> [INFO] [Factory] 194 symbols loaded  
> [INFO] [Image] Providers: img\_tex, img\_dds, img\_sdl2, img\_pil, img\_gif (img\_ffpyplayer ignored)  
> [INFO] [Window] Provider: sdl2([‘window\_egl\_rpi’] ignored)  
> [INFO] [GL] Using the “OpenGL” graphics system  
> [INFO] [GL] Backend used   
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL version \<3.1 Mesa 18.2.8\>  
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL vendor \<[X.Org](http://X.Org)\>  
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL renderer \<AMD REDWOOD (DRM 2.50.0 / 4.15.0-50-generic, LLVM 7.0.0)\>  
> [INFO] [GL] OpenGL parsed version: 3, 1  
> [INFO] [GL] Shading version \<1.40\>  
> [INFO] [GL] Texture max size \<16384\>  
> [INFO] [GL] Texture max units \<16\>  
> [INFO] [Window] auto add sdl2 input provider  
> [INFO] [Window] virtual keyboard not allowed, single mode, not docked  
> [INFO] [Text] Provider: sdl2  
> [INFO] [Base] Start application main loop  
> [INFO] [GL] NPOT texture support is available  
> [INFO] [GL] Unpack subimage support is available

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Gero](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/gero/32/17487_2.png) [@Gero](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/Gero)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 6:09pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/6 "2019-05-28T18:09:52Z")

</div>

Are this files at their place?

 ![image](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/uploads/maslowcnc/original/2X/5/541190db453a950ccfd3990d2c2285f31c6a20da.png)  
The dark green…

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 6:33pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/7 "2019-05-28T18:33:09Z")

</div>

This is a copy of the contents of the zipfile. It looks like a bunch of files are missing.

 ![image](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/uploads/maslowcnc/original/2X/8/8e2a18095e549b31ea1179dbdcad29502765b3f9.png)

EDIT 05-28-19 14:35 - It looks like they’re missing from the 1.25 Windows Portable Zipfile too.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Gero](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/gero/32/17487_2.png) [@Gero](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/Gero)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 6:55pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/8 "2019-05-28T18:55:20Z")

</div>

Its the same on v1.20. Comparing linux to win is not helping… :-/

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 6:57pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/9 "2019-05-28T18:57:08Z")

</div>

Yeah, I’m currently faffing about with trying to combine the source code download with the Windows Portable zipfile installer to see if I can Frankenstein together a working directory.

So far, I’m just finding creative ways to get different error messages.

EDIT: So to confirm - is the next step here to wait for @Bar to come to the rescue? 😃

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2019, 8:23pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/10 "2019-05-28T20:23:31Z")

</div>

Here is my current status:  
Trying to run python main.py on the folder generated by GroundControl-Windows.Portable.v1.26 (1).zip

```
[INFO] [Logger] Record log in C:\Users\talyr\.kivy\logs\kivy_19-05-28_8.txt
[INFO] [Kivy] v1.10.1
[INFO] [Python] v2.7.15 (v2.7.15:ca079a3ea3, Apr 30 2018, 16:30:26) [MSC v.1500 64 bit (AMD64)]
[INFO] [Factory] 194 symbols loaded
[INFO] [Image] Providers: img_tex, img_dds, img_sdl2, img_gif (img_pil, img_ffpyplayer ignored)
[WARNING] [Input] WM_Touch/WM_Pen not supported by your version of Windows
[INFO] [Window] Provider: sdl2
[INFO] [GL] Using the "OpenGL" graphics system
[INFO] [GL] GLEW initialization succeeded
[INFO] [GL] Backend used <glew>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL version <4.4.0 - Build 21.20.16.4542>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL vendor <Intel>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL renderer <Intel(R) HD Graphics 620>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL parsed version: 4, 4
[INFO] [GL] Shading version <4.40 - Build 21.20.16.4542>
[INFO] [GL] Texture max size <16384>
[INFO] [GL] Texture max units <32>
[INFO] [Window] auto add sdl2 input provider
[INFO] [Window] virtual keyboard not allowed, single mode, not docked
[INFO] [Text] Provider: sdl2
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "main.py", line 32, in <module>
     from UIElements.frontPage import FrontPage
 ImportError: No module named UIElements.frontPage

```

Trying to run python main.py on the folder generated by GroundControl-1.26.zip:

```
[INFO] [Logger] Record log in C:\Users\talyr\.kivy\logs\kivy_19-05-28_9.txt
[INFO] [Kivy] v1.10.1
[INFO] [Python] v2.7.15 (v2.7.15:ca079a3ea3, Apr 30 2018, 16:30:26) [MSC v.1500 64 bit (AMD64)]
[INFO] [Factory] 194 symbols loaded
[INFO] [Image] Providers: img_tex, img_dds, img_sdl2, img_gif (img_pil, img_ffpyplayer ignored)
[INFO] [Window] Provider: sdl2
[INFO] [GL] Using the "OpenGL" graphics system
[INFO] [GL] GLEW initialization succeeded
[INFO] [GL] Backend used <glew>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL version <4.4.0 - Build 21.20.16.4542>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL vendor <Intel>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL renderer <Intel(R) HD Graphics 620>
[INFO] [GL] OpenGL parsed version: 4, 4
[INFO] [GL] Shading version <4.40 - Build 21.20.16.4542>
[INFO] [GL] Texture max size <16384>
[INFO] [GL] Texture max units <32>
[INFO] [Window] auto add sdl2 input provider
[INFO] [Window] virtual keyboard not allowed, single mode, not docked
[INFO] [Text] Provider: sdl2
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "main.py", line 33, in <module>
     from UIElements.screenControls import ScreenControls
   File "C:\GroundControl\UIElements\screenControls.py", line 7, in <module>
     from UIElements.backgroundMenu import BackgroundMenu
   File "C:\GroundControl\UIElements\backgroundMenu.py", line 8, in <module>
     from PIL import Image as PILImage
 ImportError: No module named PIL

```

I have tried combining the contents of the various directories in order to replace missing files, but no attempt has been successful.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![bar](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/bar/32/10_2.png) [@bar](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/bar)\
**Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 3:49am UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/11 "2019-05-30T03:49:42Z")

</div>

That is after following the steps here: [https://github.com/MaslowCNC/GroundControl/wiki/Windows#how-to-install-and-run-ground-control-from-the-source-code](https://github.com/MaslowCNC/GroundControl/wiki/Windows#how-to-install-and-run-ground-control-from-the-source-code)

It should be using the files from the GitHub repository instead of the installer. Please forgive me if that is what you did and I just misunderstood.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 12:31pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/12 "2019-05-30T12:31:07Z")

</div>

Correct. All of the relevant packages are installed.

I’ve tried running main.py in both the directories generated by the Windows Portable install file and the source code zipfile. The results are posted above.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 5:01pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/14 "2019-05-30T17:01:22Z")

</div>

@Bar Aha. I was missing Pillow. You may want to add that to the installation requirements for Windows.

After manually installing that, I’m getting the UI to come up. I can’t validate whether it _works_ until I get home and can hook up to some hardware.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![bar](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/bar/32/10_2.png) [@bar](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/bar)\
**Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 2:31am UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/15 "2019-05-31T02:31:15Z")

</div>

Would you be willing to add that to the wiki page? Since you’ve just found it you know exactly what is missing and where

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![talyrath](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/forums.maslowcnc.com/talyrath/32/12810_2.png) [@talyrath](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/u/talyrath)\
**Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 5:40pm UTC](https://forums.maslowcnc.com/t/ground-control-opens-to-blank-screen/9638/16 "2019-05-31T17:40:52Z")

</div>

In the Github wiki page? I don’t think I have the necessary permissions or login.

I think that the install dependencies line needs to be changed to:

```
python -m pip install docutils pygments pypiwin32 kivy.deps.sdl2 kivy.deps.glew Pillow

```

However I don’t have an easy way to test that without blowing away my existing Python installation and starting from scratch.