Ground Control v1.23 not starting

Troubleshooting
1

Hi there,

We are assembling our frame and trying to get the hardware and software up in tandem.

I installed v1.23 firmware on the Arduino, and I am trying to run v1.23 Ground Control.

The PC is a Windows tablet running 32-bit Windows 10 Home on an Intel Atom Z2670 @ 1.8GHz.

The firmware installed ok, and I used the Arduino serial monitor to verify it is sending data back to the PC regularly.

When I start Ground Control I get a command prompt with a list of diagnostic startup information (which I found recorded in the .kivy directory log files). These include messages about Kivy, Python, OpenGL, Shader etc.

I get one Warning: 0:20: ā€˜function_call_constructor@vec4_vec4@0ā€™ : used without being initialised

Then

Success.>

Then a couple more info messages.

The GUI starts, which is a full-screen window with a title bar. The window is mostly black, with a smaller white rectangle within it. Thatā€™s all I see.

Then Windows helpfully tells me ā€˜GroundControl.exe has stopped working. A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available.ā€™

Spoiler: no solution is notified.

I downloaded the previous version v1.22, but I get the same error.

What to try next? Suggestions appreciated. Thanks.

2

Try updating windows, and the video driver.

Thank you

2 Likes
3

Checking for updatesā€¦
Updates are availableā€¦
Downloading updatesā€¦

This could take a while. No spoilers yet. :slight_smile:

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4

Video driver is the Intel driver. Itā€™s up to date.

5

I think weā€™re hosed. Weā€™re ā€œGetting Windows ready. Donā€™t turn off your computer.ā€

I unreservedly despise Microsoft.

3 Likes
6

Thereā€™s a fix run Ubuntu!

Check out POP OS from system 76.

Thank you

1 Like
7

Yes. Unfortunately Samsung and Microsoft have conspired* to make it impossible to put Linux on this tablet (otherwise I assuredly would have done it).

The reboot after the partial update finally happened. Ground Control still doesnā€™t work, but there are still more updates, so Iā€™m eagerly anticipating the conclusion of that operation (10% downloaded already! And itā€™s still only afternoon!).

If it doesnā€™t work Iā€™ll get another laptop or tablet and try it, although I would like to know why itā€™s not actually working. The Kivy logs tell me just what I wrote above. The Ground Control log is empty, so no clues there.

Cheers.

* Probably by incompetence rather than bad faith.

8

My Suface pro 2 happily boots Linux on a regular basis.

just my 2 cents

Thank you

9

Thatā€™s as may be, but this tablet is known to not work with Linux. Itā€™s impossible to get it to boot from a USB stick.

I didnā€™t believe it, but after much wailing and gnashing of teeth I concurred that indeed that is the case. Thatā€™s why itā€™s relegated to Maslow duty.

10

Iā€™m sure everyone will be excited to know the current status.

All updates applied. GroundControl.exe has stopped working. :frowning:

The behaviour is exactly as it was.

Any other suggestions? Thanks.

11

Iā€™m going to try running the source code. Weā€™ll see if that gets me any further (or gets any more info).

1 Like
12

Oh. This time ā€œpython.exe has stopped workingā€.

Le sigh.

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13

is that progress?

14

Well, not really. I was hoping that python would barf and spit out an error message. It must be something more fundamental.

The tablet has decided to do more updates, despite telling me I was all up to date.

The result: no difference.

1 Like
15

Ok. The error occurs in Lib/site-packages/kivy/core/window/window_sdl2.py at line 389

self._win.flip()

When that is executed, the program dies.

Itā€™s probably something about this tablet, and Kivy, but I donā€™t know what.

16

See if you can download a newer video driver from Intel.com

Thatā€™s about a 6 year old chip that giggle says supports OpenGL 2.0. I donā€™t recall what Kivy/Ground Control require but it shouldnā€™t be hard to search it on this forum

1 Like
17

thank you

18

No dice Iā€™m afraid. The Intel upgrade utility (from their website) tells me I have the latest version of the driver.

OpenGL is detected by Kivy as version 2.1

I think thereā€™s something more subtle going on. This tablet was probably dropped on its head as a child.

1 Like
19

I just tried one of the Kivy demos. It crashes identically. I expect itā€™s this tablet, but none of the obvious solutions have worked.

In the trash, I thinkā€¦

20

Same software, different tablet. Installed and working in about 30 seconds. I am disappoint.

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