Graphics

Hey all, hoping I can get some direction with one, but it's a pretty difficult issue to explain.

I've had this problem basically crop up with each new project I've made lately that are utilizing similar bones to each other. The issue seems related specifically to a crawl system (scene group with two duplicate children).

The scene shows one string at the start, an Unofficial; and after some time when new data comes in, switches to different string, an Official. The issue seems to stem from this event, but it isn't consistent.
Generally, the crawl (and other graphics) will freeze and/or no longer get Live Updates. Usually, you can clear the framebuffer to clear the screen, but you can no longer take any new graphics. The Sequencer and Output Monitors seem like they're working, but no graphics will manifest. Also, using the Force Engine Unlock won't do anything to rectify (not sure if it should, just seems appropriate based on what I've read). The only way to return to functioning is to close and reopen XPression and reload the project.

I've seen a few different errors in the log around this time; either Access Violation, List Index Out of Bounds, and more rarely an Exception While Rendering. Again, these errors aren't consistent, usually one showing up each time there is an instance of this issue.
Additionally; while I can also get the crashes on my offline Designer system; I don't seem to have a Logs file in Program Files/XPressionDesigner ? And the LiveLog isn't giving me the same errors (really no errors at all), so seems to be some difference there between a Virtual and real FrameBuffer, but the outcome is the same.

The exceedingly difficult part of this is the event itself; data changing from Unofficial to Official only happens live. I don't have a way to recreate this without a live event. Makes it very frustrating to test things.

Like I said at the top; I've had this happen a number of times lately, but always seem to weed out something and the project settles in and works as intended. Then, literally taking that project and building something new from it, the problem resurfaces. Super weird!

If anybody has run into issues like this before, would love to hear what you found out about them and how to avoid them. I haven't figured it out, but there must be some aspect to my design that isn't playing nice. Appreciate any insight!

Starting in version 11.0, all config files and logs for XPression have been moved to C:/Program Data/Ross Video/XPression*

This was done to support current and future industry security standards. 

Access Violations are either bugs, or a side effect of operating a feature in a totally unintended way. It is not unusual for them to generate each time the issue occurs, or only the first time the issue occurs. 

Ultimately access violations issue like this are generally only resolvable if they are reported and and we can figure out how to reproduce them consistently.  If we have the Project file we could identify if something unsupported is being done. 

If you just want some ideas thrown out.....are you using word wrap in your crawl? Word wrap can be quiet hard on the crawl system inside of XPression. 

Hey all, hoping I can get some direction with one, but it's a pretty difficult issue to explain.

I've had this problem basically crop up with each new project I've made lately that are utilizing similar bones to each other. The issue seems related specifically to a crawl system (scene group with two duplicate children).

The scene shows one string at the start, an Unofficial; and after some time when new data comes in, switches to different string, an Official. The issue seems to stem from this event, but it isn't consistent.
Generally, the crawl (and other graphics) will freeze and/or no longer get Live Updates. Usually, you can clear the framebuffer to clear the screen, but you can no longer take any new graphics. The Sequencer and Output Monitors seem like they're working, but no graphics will manifest. Also, using the Force Engine Unlock won't do anything to rectify (not sure if it should, just seems appropriate based on what I've read). The only way to return to functioning is to close and reopen XPression and reload the project.

I've seen a few different errors in the log around this time; either Access Violation, List Index Out of Bounds, and more rarely an Exception While Rendering. Again, these errors aren't consistent, usually one showing up each time there is an instance of this issue.
Additionally; while I can also get the crashes on my offline Designer system; I don't seem to have a Logs file in Program Files/XPressionDesigner ? And the LiveLog isn't giving me the same errors (really no errors at all), so seems to be some difference there between a Virtual and real FrameBuffer, but the outcome is the same.

The exceedingly difficult part of this is the event itself; data changing from Unofficial to Official only happens live. I don't have a way to recreate this without a live event. Makes it very frustrating to test things.

Like I said at the top; I've had this happen a number of times lately, but always seem to weed out something and the project settles in and works as intended. Then, literally taking that project and building something new from it, the problem resurfaces. Super weird!

If anybody has run into issues like this before, would love to hear what you found out about them and how to avoid them. I haven't figured it out, but there must be some aspect to my design that isn't playing nice. Appreciate any insight!

Ah, that explains it. Thanks Garner.

That's always been the difficult part; I can share the project files and everything, but so many of the errors like this seem related to when live data is running through the project, and that makes it very difficult to both recreate myself (since everything is very time sensitive) and even further to have you guys recreate without access to or understanding of the data stream.

Word Wrap...no. I have no doubts I'm not going about the crawls we use in the best way. Ideally, I'd get the full crawl text itself over a data feed and feed it right into a text object, but not really something I have available. I use a lot of Visual Logic to construct the two strings that will be the crawl, so they're constructed in real time, and in the case of the official, goes from being an empty string to a quite long one.

My thoughts have always been that the transition of a string one size to a longer string might be throwing off the way the crawl group determines when to go to the next iteration, but I also have so many instances of this working, I've never found anything definitive. 

Starting in version 11.0, all config files and logs for XPression have been moved to C:/Program Data/Ross Video/XPression*

This was done to support current and future industry security standards. 

Access Violations are either bugs, or a side effect of operating a feature in a totally unintended way. It is not unusual for them to generate each time the issue occurs, or only the first time the issue occurs. 

Ultimately access violations issue like this are generally only resolvable if they are reported and and we can figure out how to reproduce them consistently.  If we have the Project file we could identify if something unsupported is being done. 

If you just want some ideas thrown out.....are you using word wrap in your crawl? Word wrap can be quiet hard on the crawl system inside of XPression. 

Hey all, hoping I can get some direction with one, but it's a pretty difficult issue to explain.

I've had this problem basically crop up with each new project I've made lately that are utilizing similar bones to each other. The issue seems related specifically to a crawl system (scene group with two duplicate children).

The scene shows one string at the start, an Unofficial; and after some time when new data comes in, switches to different string, an Official. The issue seems to stem from this event, but it isn't consistent.
Generally, the crawl (and other graphics) will freeze and/or no longer get Live Updates. Usually, you can clear the framebuffer to clear the screen, but you can no longer take any new graphics. The Sequencer and Output Monitors seem like they're working, but no graphics will manifest. Also, using the Force Engine Unlock won't do anything to rectify (not sure if it should, just seems appropriate based on what I've read). The only way to return to functioning is to close and reopen XPression and reload the project.

I've seen a few different errors in the log around this time; either Access Violation, List Index Out of Bounds, and more rarely an Exception While Rendering. Again, these errors aren't consistent, usually one showing up each time there is an instance of this issue.
Additionally; while I can also get the crashes on my offline Designer system; I don't seem to have a Logs file in Program Files/XPressionDesigner ? And the LiveLog isn't giving me the same errors (really no errors at all), so seems to be some difference there between a Virtual and real FrameBuffer, but the outcome is the same.

The exceedingly difficult part of this is the event itself; data changing from Unofficial to Official only happens live. I don't have a way to recreate this without a live event. Makes it very frustrating to test things.

Like I said at the top; I've had this happen a number of times lately, but always seem to weed out something and the project settles in and works as intended. Then, literally taking that project and building something new from it, the problem resurfaces. Super weird!

If anybody has run into issues like this before, would love to hear what you found out about them and how to avoid them. I haven't figured it out, but there must be some aspect to my design that isn't playing nice. Appreciate any insight!

You might want to try building your crawl with 3 or more child scenes. XPression does crawls by lining up all the child scenes horizontally in a row and the width of each child scene is automatically set to whatever width is required to show all the bounding boxes in the child scene. For example, if Datalinq sets text in a child scene, and the text is 2000 pixels wide, the child scene will be 2000 pixels in width. 

So if your word wrap/project/script/API/datalinq/etc...is changing the width of the child scene that is next being crawled horizontally across the parent scene, you can cause XPression to hang up/crash/AV - because its trying to set the width of the child scene at the same time its trying to render it across the parent.  So ideally you want to make sure you are only modifying child scenes that are not next up, or currently being crawled.

This is a bad explanation of this, but hopefully gives a rough idea of what might be happening. 

Ah, that explains it. Thanks Garner.

That's always been the difficult part; I can share the project files and everything, but so many of the errors like this seem related to when live data is running through the project, and that makes it very difficult to both recreate myself (since everything is very time sensitive) and even further to have you guys recreate without access to or understanding of the data stream.

Word Wrap...no. I have no doubts I'm not going about the crawls we use in the best way. Ideally, I'd get the full crawl text itself over a data feed and feed it right into a text object, but not really something I have available. I use a lot of Visual Logic to construct the two strings that will be the crawl, so they're constructed in real time, and in the case of the official, goes from being an empty string to a quite long one.

My thoughts have always been that the transition of a string one size to a longer string might be throwing off the way the crawl group determines when to go to the next iteration, but I also have so many instances of this working, I've never found anything definitive. 

Starting in version 11.0, all config files and logs for XPression have been moved to C:/Program Data/Ross Video/XPression*

This was done to support current and future industry security standards. 

Access Violations are either bugs, or a side effect of operating a feature in a totally unintended way. It is not unusual for them to generate each time the issue occurs, or only the first time the issue occurs. 

Ultimately access violations issue like this are generally only resolvable if they are reported and and we can figure out how to reproduce them consistently.  If we have the Project file we could identify if something unsupported is being done. 

If you just want some ideas thrown out.....are you using word wrap in your crawl? Word wrap can be quiet hard on the crawl system inside of XPression. 

Hey all, hoping I can get some direction with one, but it's a pretty difficult issue to explain.

I've had this problem basically crop up with each new project I've made lately that are utilizing similar bones to each other. The issue seems related specifically to a crawl system (scene group with two duplicate children).

The scene shows one string at the start, an Unofficial; and after some time when new data comes in, switches to different string, an Official. The issue seems to stem from this event, but it isn't consistent.
Generally, the crawl (and other graphics) will freeze and/or no longer get Live Updates. Usually, you can clear the framebuffer to clear the screen, but you can no longer take any new graphics. The Sequencer and Output Monitors seem like they're working, but no graphics will manifest. Also, using the Force Engine Unlock won't do anything to rectify (not sure if it should, just seems appropriate based on what I've read). The only way to return to functioning is to close and reopen XPression and reload the project.

I've seen a few different errors in the log around this time; either Access Violation, List Index Out of Bounds, and more rarely an Exception While Rendering. Again, these errors aren't consistent, usually one showing up each time there is an instance of this issue.
Additionally; while I can also get the crashes on my offline Designer system; I don't seem to have a Logs file in Program Files/XPressionDesigner ? And the LiveLog isn't giving me the same errors (really no errors at all), so seems to be some difference there between a Virtual and real FrameBuffer, but the outcome is the same.

The exceedingly difficult part of this is the event itself; data changing from Unofficial to Official only happens live. I don't have a way to recreate this without a live event. Makes it very frustrating to test things.

Like I said at the top; I've had this happen a number of times lately, but always seem to weed out something and the project settles in and works as intended. Then, literally taking that project and building something new from it, the problem resurfaces. Super weird!

If anybody has run into issues like this before, would love to hear what you found out about them and how to avoid them. I haven't figured it out, but there must be some aspect to my design that isn't playing nice. Appreciate any insight!