The camera is working well under Ubuntu an a PC with opencv and pyqt.

On the TXT the same program results in the first few lines of the image repeating over and over again:

This happens with opencv2 and opencv3. The repeating lines differ if the image changes. So these lines are not from the same image. It seems like the frame data is updated while the frame is being read.

When trying to play Sounds via ftrobopy, this is only possible, if the ft-GUI open. If ft-GUI is closed, maybe the first sound will be played and then you can listen to the silence.

Raphael

Oh,
I only can Ssee the Boot up screen in the Webbrowser

Raphael

As ski7777 pointed out in the forum, text-mode apps cannot be terminated via home-button - one has to touch the X in the corner to close the app. Pressing the blue-lit home button has no effect on the running text-mode app.

Also, a running text-mode app is not shown in the WebIF as running and cannot be terminated via the web-IF

If another app is launched via the WebIF, while the text-mode app is running, the text-mode app shows up again after the other app is terminated via WebIF.

In the WiFi-App: If only exactly one WiFi network is found the list networks[] remains empty.

[I have a whole bunch of WiFi networks around me - no chance of verifying...]

by jona2004; cf here: https://forum.ftcommunity.de/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=3525&#p24667

The sound support introduced with the direct mode is unstable. After playing a few random sounds for about half a minute no audio is generated anymore. The txtsndcat based programs then alyo don't work. But starting the original gui via launcher restores audio functionality.

Version 0.9.3 will have a number of changes from version 0.9.2:

• A new version of ftrobopy that can access the TXT I/O pins without the using the Fischertechnik GUI from original firmware
• Changed look and feel of the launcher
• Changes in some system apps (e.g. WiFi)
• ...

The documentation (especially the wiki) needs to be updated to reflect these changes.

Affected pages (check mark means "updated for 0.9.3"):

• https://github.com/ftCommunity/ftcommunity-TXT/wiki (image displaying the launcher)
• https://github.com/ftCommunity/ftcommunity-TXT/wiki/%5BEN%5D-Tutorial%3A-Setting-up-the-ftcommunity-TXT-Firmware
• https://github.com/ftCommunity/ftcommunity-TXT/wiki/%5BDE%5D-Anleitung%3A-Einrichtung-der-ftcommunity-TXT-Firmware
• https://github.com/ftCommunity/ftcommunity-TXT/wiki/Tutorial-3%3A-Controlling-a-model (changed init parameters for ftrobopy)
• ...

Note: Documentation/Wiki changes should ideally be made all together and at the same time as the release of v0.9.3 itself in order to not confuse our users. Question: How to best organize this?

Most is said in the title.
After upgrading the stock firmware to an beta version, I tried to run the ft-GUI in the Community firmware. Mainly it works fine, but after starting a program, which was stored on the SD-Card and which was compiled for RoBoPro 4.2.3, the ft-GUI crashed an started again. After re downloading (and compiling) the program to the TXT the Program works fine. The update script for the stock firmware deletes all downloaded program on the TXT´s Flash.
We need to check, whether the RoBoPro version changed and delete all Programs on the SD-Card.

Raphael

Due to some built issues a new set-up have been used:

• Oracle VM VirtualBox
• Ubuntu-16.04 LTS.
  Unfortunately following error appears during built:
  Download error on https://pypi.python.org/simple/vcversioner/: unknown url type: https -- Some packages may not be found! Couldn't find index page for 'vcversioner' (maybe misspelled?) Download error on https://pypi.python.org/simple/: unknown url type: https -- Some packages may not be found! No local packages or download links found for vcversioner Traceback (most recent call last): File "setup.py", line 44, in <module> vcversioner={"version_module_paths" : ["jsonschema/_version.py"]}, File "/home/christian/ftcommunity-TXT/output/host/usr/lib/python3.5/distutils/core.py", line 108, in setup _setup_distribution = dist = klass(attrs) File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/setuptools/dist.py", line 268, in __init__ File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/setuptools/dist.py", line 313, in fetch_build_eggs File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/pkg_resources/__init__.py", line 846, in resolve File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/pkg_resources/__init__.py", line 1091, in best_match File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/pkg_resources/__init__.py", line 1103, in obtain File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/setuptools/dist.py", line 380, in fetch_build_egg File "build/bdist.linux-x86_64/egg/setuptools/command/easy_install.py", line 633, in easy_install distutils.errors.DistutilsError: Could not find suitable distribution for Requirement.parse('vcversioner')
  A manual installation with following commands did not solve the problem:
  sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install python-vcversioner
  Any idea?

When installing the MP3-Player app, the waiting indicator gets slower and slower until it eventually stops moving at all, giving the impression that the system hangs. However, this is in fact not the case: Just waiting finishes the installation of the MP3-Player and returns to the app list of the store as expected.

Pushing the main TXT-button while the waiting indicator "hangs" terminates the store - but leaves the waiting indicator on the screen...

Fiddling around I even managed to corrupt the list of installed apps somehow (none of the previously installed apps showed up any more and any action in the store gave me a "could not delete app" or "could not create directory" error (to fix it, I deleted the whole app-directory from the SD-card.

I'm using the advanced setup of the SD-card and the 0.9.2-1-g8361410 firmware I built from scratch today.

Just noticed that in the Colorange/Camera/ZBar/WeDo apps, the error message about the missing USB-Device asks the user to attach a camera to the "host port".
While this is obviously clear for techies (and for most parts by the shape of the connector) I'd still suggest adding (or even replacing "host port" wiith) "USB1" - as the TXT is clearly labelled, we may as well make use of it.

The new folder based launcher introduced in 6c4daa7 allows running specially prepared apps in the same python process as the launcher itself, which cuts down the launch time for these apps from approximately five seconds to less than one second - although at the risk that a defective app can kill or block the launcher.

Because system apps are usually not too complicated, pretty well tested, and can benefit vastly from the enhanced startup times, convert all system apps to this new "launcher-plugin" style.

Most is said:
After adding an App I come back to MainPage but without the new App. After pressing F5 it is visible.
After deleting an App I come back to MainPage but with html "No Image"-Placeholder and Name of the App on Positon. It goes away by pressing F5.

When I will play sound at the moment I have to use the txtsemdcat and mpg123. I have seen that alsa is installed on the TXT but no output device is configured. Could we add the internal speaker to alsa?

Raphael

Text or control elements from RoboPro not visible on TXT LCD.

In Wifi-Setup i cant use the keyboard to write the WPA KEY.
In Test Gallery it is working

If I reboot with sudo reboot the TXT doesn´t reboot. I stocks somewhere in u-boot:

Stopping DHCP server: OK
Stopping sshd: OK
Stopping lighttpd: OK
Stopping ntpd: OK
Stopping network: ifdown: interface eth0 not configured
FAIL
Stopping system message bus: done
Saving random seed... done.
Stopping thd: OK
Stopping logging: OK
umount: /dev/mmcblk0p1 busy - remounted read-only
The system is going down NOW!
Sent SIGTERM to all processes
Sent SIGKILL to all processes
Requesting system reboot
[ 4167.119566] reboot: Restarting system

U-Boot SPL 2013.10 (Jul 04 2015 - 08:30:17)
>>> I2C0 On
Could not probe the EEPROM; something fundamentally wrong on the I2C bus.
Could not get board ID.
>>> setup_dplls vor do_setup_dpll
>>> setup_dplls nach do_setup_dpll
Could not probe the EEPROM; something fundamentally wrong on the I2C bus.
Could not get board ID.
>>> Setting MUX Start
>>> Setting MUX End
Could not probe the EEPROM; something fundamentally wrong on the I2C bus.
Could not get board ID.

For the new update App, a reboot feature would be perfect. I think we need to reset the CPU by itself. Maybe we need to add something in the dts.

Raphael

Make basic features configurable via config-file placed on FAT partition so the config can easily be edited and saved to survive firmware updates.

I'd particularly like to use this to set up WiFi so I can enter the WPA/WEP-Key on the desktop computer.

Running the app store without network access leads to "Unknown Error: 3".

As "no network connection" seems to be a problem that could be common, it would be great to have a descriptive error message in this case.

Everything is said

It's rather onerous to always check with the NetInfo-App whether errors occuring are due to a missing network connection.

Suggested solution would be to also give the launcher a sandwich menu so the right part of the header could be used for status icons.
In the meantime the NetInfo app could be changed to display wlan0-info when launched (instead of the rather irrelevant Io-device) so at least the info on a potentially broken wlan0-configuration is visible immediately.

The update script was finished a few weeks ago by me, but it only worked by using a shell with root. But currently the users have to put the SD-Card in the compute or use the root-access to update the operating system. I don´t think that this is the best solution, we have to search another Solution. In my opinion we should run the Launcher with root rights. Normal apps will be started with "ftc"-rights and apps with root: True in the manifest will only be started after the user have acknowledged, that the TXT could be destroyed.
What do you think?

Raphael

Re: readme.md: The name of the image-file should be output/images/rootfs.img (not: .image as it says in the text)
I'd also suggest to add a note that the first startup with the "Simple Layout" might take quite some time - at least for me it did. Subsequent startups felt a lot faster.

Re: Use: After startup the launcher hangs. I get to see the full launcher with all icons as I'm used to, but it doesn't react to any touches on the display.
The Web-Interface is however available, as is the SSH-Login. On the Web-IF it says "Launcher not responding".

When I install the firmware from the same build-process in the classic setup on my partitioned SD, everything works fine.

I woluld like to add a wiki page about the Vm (currently making) (Upload will take long). But i cant add a page.

NetInfo-App doesn't show current network status. Even if the connection is broken, the wlan0 entry still shows the last valid IP-Information but gives no indication that the link is no longer active.

The same is true btw for usb0 - it still shows an IP although it didn't have a USB link for several reboots in my case.

Strange issue: Once the Hello-App is installed, I cannot uninstall it any more via the app store because tapping on the "Hello" line doesn't open the details-page of the app with the uninstall link.

I tried moving the list up and down to make sure it's no issue with the touchscreen. It is not - the problem persists no matter where I have to tap. And property pages of other apps can be opened no matter where.

Closing and reopening the app-store didn't help either; deleting the Hello-App was possible with the webIF.

When the app was deleted, I could open the properties-page in the app store again and install it - thereby reproducing the effects described above - uninstall only possible via webIF

No I2C Communication with RoboPro.

New apps are only listed in the "all" category, if they belong to a category not yet existing in the launcher. Also, empty categories are not deleted when the last app belonging to them is removed.

(Lists are however updated upon reboot)

• allow categorizing the apps into subfolders via WebIF
• allow renaming of apps
• allow deletion of apps

I´ve tried to login via SSH witch crdicals ftc, ftc but

20:57:11.950 Attempting password authentication.
20:57:11.963 Authentication failed. Remaining authentication methods: 'publickey,password,keyboard-interactive'.

it say that password is wrong.

With the new SD card file system layout introduced in 79e363f and the system update script from 8c1f14f, we have the necessary functionality for "Over-the-Air" automatic system updates for the community firmware — we just need a launcher status bar plugin that periodically checks if a new version is available, and a GUI app that displays update metadata (version number etc.) and provides an "Install Update" button.

After pressing the Stop this application on the TXT-Button on the webinterface while Running the ft-GUI, it looks like this:

After reopening the ft-GUI and closing it via the 'Home'-Button, it closes the right way.

Raphael

P.S. The application in the first line in the first row, will be presented by me at the Convention.

When a previously downloaded RoboPro file is loaded and run in the TxtControlMain GUI, TxtControlMain crashes with a SIGILL (attempt to execute an illegal or privileged instruction).

The same RoboPro file runs fine when run in RoboPro online mode or downloaded and directly exceuted from RoboPro.

Just determined by laziness of me: The locking-mechanism for SSH-Sessions and root-acces can be bypassed via vnc, so the protection from remote-access is almost useless. Is it a bug, or a feature for lazy programmers? ;)

Request use of newest ftrobopy

fakeroot: preload library `libfakeroot.so' not found, aborting.
fs/tar/tar.mk:13: recipe for target '/ftcommunity-TXT/output/images/rootfs.tar' failed

I tried to build yor update but make gives me the following error. I didnt change anything on the VM.

Raphael

See screenshot - the blue line highlights the missing section.

Currently /sys/class/rtc/rtc1/wakealarm is not writable for the ftc user.
For some applications it would be great to wake up the TXT periodically. I think we have two ways:

• Everybody can set his wakealrm and destroys the wakewalrm of another person. With this we doesn´t know which app to start after boot
• We have a app autostart handler, on which apps can register and unregister autostarts. If system is running it will start the apps the normal way. If it recognises that the TXT was bootet by RTC it will run all missed autostarts. But what to do if another (maybe autostarted) app is running? Maybe we could send also arguments via launches launch command, so the app could recognise, that it was autostarted.

Raphael

@harbaum suggested in a comment to PR#58 to change the app categories for the launcher to:

• system (also used for the settings)
• models (for everything controlling models)
• tools (for things like clocks, calculators, ...)
• test (For demo and test stuff)

This issue is intended to discuss and hash out these changes.

If no sensor is attached, the app extends the red line below the "bubble" - see attached image. (Thanks for the screen-shot tool!)

Maybe a "no compatible sensor found" message could be displayed if the readings are way out of any plausible range.

I have started to do some i18n work.

This is based upon usual LANG/LANGUAGE/LC_XXX environment variables. The settings are stored in /etc/locale. I also added an app to change this setting. Currently that app only supports four languages (english, german, dutch and french). Further languages can easily be added. The language app itself is the only one that's fully translated into all four languages. Language changes have immediate effect and are also reported to the launcher. The i18n mechanisms supported by Qt are not limited and would also cope with asian languages etc. Thus adding support for a new language only required minor changes to the language app itself.

The launcher reloads its language settings whenever requested to do a "rescan". Thus the language app alse requests a rescan if the language was changed.

All other apps don't use any special mechanisms. Since only one app can run at a time and since the language is changed using an app the language cannot change while a different app than the language app runs. Therefore switching language still feels "immediate" to the user.

This issue is meant to be used to discuss the pro and cons of the current approach and to improve it.

Which languages do we want to support by default? Any good suggestions for the i18n of the web interface?

The description of the apps also displays a horizontal scrollbar (presumably because the non-wrappable mail-adress is too long). I'd suggest reducing the font size a little and forcing text-wrap for words longer than a line.

Also, I find it uncommon that the install/uninstall menu appears over the sandwich menu (i.e. under the finger) - from Android UI rules (and also the TXT category dropdown) I'm used to the menu appearing below the finger and below the sandwich menu button.

Edit: The fontsize used in the gallery-app for the Text-Widged seems to be just fine for discriptive texts. For the list of Apps the chosen (bigger) font size seems just perfect. /Edit.

The launcher can redirect an apps stdout and stderr output to a web page. This feature doesn't seem to be used. I'd like to remove it.

Commit 2a1713e introduced UTF-8 umlauts ("Ü", to be specific) in the manifest of the "about" app. This causes mainfest.read() in launcher.py to fail with

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/opt/ftc/launcher.py", line 968, in <module>
    FtcGuiApplication(sys.argv)
  File "/opt/ftc/launcher.py", line 705, in __init__
    self.addWidgets()
  File "/opt/ftc/launcher.py", line 950, in addWidgets
    self.apps = self.scan_app_dirs()
  File "/opt/ftc/launcher.py", line 891, in scan_app_dirs
    manifest.read(manifestfile)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.5/configparser.py", line 696, in read
  File "/usr/lib/python3.5/configparser.py", line 1012, in _read
  File "/usr/lib/python3.5/encodings/ascii.py", line 26, in decode
UnicodeDecodeError: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0xc3 in position 283: ordinal not in range(128)

(after deleting the try...except around file loading in launcher.py)

Right now all apps are equally accessible / deletable by the user ftc.

I would suggest the following:

• introducing an additional "end user" account (eg. ftc-user) which after logon via sFTP/SSH only "sees" the (user)apps directory (seebelow)
• storing apps in two separate locations: (1) for system apps (currently WiFi, NetInfo, FT-GUI, About) which are invisible to and undeletable by ftc-user and (2) for the app samples and apps generated by the end user.
  Then a "cleanup" of the app directory doesn't remove basic functionality.

The idea is to allow beginners to gain experience slowly and not to confuse them with a full view of the linux fs, while still allowing the pros full access.

When the Version/Licenses sub-window is opened in the "About"-app, it shows an X in the top right corner. Tapping on the X only closes the sub-window and returns to the "About"-app.
Pressing the "Home"-Button in the same situation shows the launcher.

Is this intended?

I'm uncertain myself right now - it irritated me because I expected the "home"-button to be a "tap-the-x"-replacement. On the other hand I think it's a good idea from a usability perspective to have the button always take one back to a known starting point - the Launcher.

When booting up, the start screen shows a small black box in the top left corner. No big deal, but it hurts my eye ;)

When shutting down via long button press while the FT-GUI is running, the Shutdown-Screen leaves a bigger black field in the top right corner - showing the time the FT-GUI displays in this corner. Also no big deal but ... ;)

The USB keyboard works fine if the launcher and subsequent apps are run with root permissions. When being run under permissions of the ftc user only some keys do anything at all and even those generate wrong key events. This can best be seen in the "TXT" tab of the gallery app.

First opened ft-GUI then send confirm dialog:

Raphael

When I open the About App and klick on License the License Info opens but when I click the button it wont close. But when I have pressed the button and then I press the X in the right upper corner I am Directly on Desktop.