Maslow 4 freezes randomly in AP mode when multiple devices are connected

Troubleshooting
1

This post is more of a JFYI, observation rather than a request for help. I wasn’t sure whether to create a new post or add to an existing one about connection troubleshooting, but I decided to go ahead with a new post.

In my shop, I don’t have WiFi available, so I use Maslow in AP mode. What I’ve noticed is that Maslow may randomly freeze (requiring a power cycle to recover) if I forget to turn off WiFi on my phone while working with my laptop.

Here’s an example of what happens:

  1. Power on Maslow.
  2. Power on the laptop.
  3. Connect to Maslow from the laptop.
  4. Start a retract/extend cycle from the laptop.
  5. During the extend cycle, Maslow may suddenly stop extending the belts at a random moment.

When this happens, I check my phone and notice that I forgot to disable WiFi, and it has auto-connected to Maslow’s AP. This behavior is repeatable - each time my phone connects, Maslow fails in a similar way. Once I disable WiFi on my phone, everything works perfectly.

It seems that Maslow gets confused when multiple devices are connected to it, even if only one device is actively controlling it, and the other device (e.g., my phone) isn’t even running a browser session.

If this is already a known or expected issue, it might be worth adding to the troubleshooting documentation or FAQ. If it’s not well-known, maybe this information can help pinpoint a problematic part of the code.

P.S. Why does my phone connect to Maslow at all? Sometimes it’s more convenient to perform simple operations like retracting/extending from my phone before setting up a workspace with the laptop. Initially, I thought I could do everything from my phone (since I prepare G-code files in advance and store them in Google Drive, making them accessible from any device). However, I’ve found that the connection from my phone is unreliable and often drops. I’m not sure when a stable connection is critical, but, for example, during calibration, the connection must remain stable because part of the computation appears to happen in the browser. If the browser session is interrupted, calibration freezes.

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we know this has been a problem in the past while calibrating, not so much at
other times.

P.S. Why does my phone connect to Maslow at all? Sometimes it¢s more
convenient to perform simple operations like retracting/extending from my
phone before setting up a workspace with the laptop. Initially, I thought I
could do everything from my phone (since I prepare G-code files in advance and
store them in Google Drive, making them accessible from any device). However,
I¢ve found that the connection from my phone is unreliable and often drops.
I¢m not sure when a stable connection is critical, but, for example, during
calibration, the connection must remain stable because part of the computation
appears to happen in the browser. If the browser session is interrupted,
calibration freezes.

Yes, Calibration is a very interactive task with the browser (most of the work
is actually done in the browser, I wish we could move more there). If the
browser connection is interrupted during calibration, it fails.

David Lang

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This isn’t a known issue, thank you for bringing it up. I will keep an eye on it and see if we can make that more stable!

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