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OpenBoard-org / OpenBoard

OpenBoard is a cross-platform interactive whiteboard application intended for use in a classroom setting.
https://openboard.ch/
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Openboard is not launching #1042

Open SarjyantShrestha opened 3 months ago

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

Openboard doesn't show up but it's running in background. I'm using the latest version. And it shows no error while launching from terminal.

edit: it launched after terminating the process from htop. It's not consistent though.

letsfindaway commented 3 months ago

OpenBoard is using SingleApplication and will terminate if it detects that it is already running. This might be what you experience. But the question remains why an OpenBoard process is running and not visible on the screen. Have you any indication under which circumstances this happens?

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

Have you any indication under which circumstances this happens?

It happens every time. I'm not sure why.

letsfindaway commented 3 months ago

it launched after terminating the process from htop. It's not consistent though.

From that I assume that you're on Linux, right? Ubuntu or other? What version? And you used the .deb package from the Github release page?

And you said that it launches after terminating the process from htop. This means that you did some sequence of starting it first (successfully or not?), trying to start it again (probably not successful), checking and terminating it via htop (or probably any other process monitor) and then starting it again - this time successfully?

You are experiencing this problem. I cannot reproduce that here, so I would need as much information as possible from your side. Try to not only describe the problem, but provide as much information about your environment as possible. And most important: describe step by step what you are doing and which sequence leads to a successful launch and which do not.

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

I'm using Arch Linux (6.10.3-arch1-1) with the Hyprland window manager. I installed OpenBoard using paru -Syu openboard. Even after a reboot, OpenBoard doesn’t launch on the first try. When I checked htop, I noticed that it’s running in the background, but it doesn’t appear on any of my workspaces. If I terminate OpenBoard from htop and launch it again, it starts successfully. However, if I close it and try to launch it again, it doesn’t always start on the first attempt. I often need to terminate it from htop and then launch it again to get it to start. I’ve also observed that Spotify takes a while to load, around 2 minutes. But in case of openboard it never launches it's just in the background. I have to manually terminate it.

I hope I’ve provided some useful information. If you need more details, I appreciate your guidance.

letsfindaway commented 3 months ago

I'm using Arch Linux (6.10.3-arch1-1) with the Hyprland window manager. I installed OpenBoard using paru -Syu openboard.

That's important information. So you're not using one of the official builds, but the AUR build for Arch. Probably @Vekhir can help, who packaged the latest version for AUR (https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/openboard).

Even after a reboot, OpenBoard doesn’t launch on the first try. When I checked htop, I noticed that it’s running in the background, but it doesn’t appear on any of my workspaces. If I terminate OpenBoard from htop and launch it again, it starts successfully.

So the question is what is different in the situation between the very first attempt and the second one after terminating the dangling instance.

However, if I close it and try to launch it again, it doesn’t always start on the first attempt. I often need to terminate it from htop and then launch it again to get it to start.

Again: if there remains a dangling instance, then the SingleApplication mechanism in OpenBoard will not allow to start a second process.

I’ve also observed that Spotify takes a while to load, around 2 minutes.

This also sounds weird. Could you find out what it tries to do in that time? Most probably it is waiting for something (Network?) and then times out.

But in case of openboard it never launches it's just in the background. I have to manually terminate it.

It probably launches, but never comes to the stage where it sets up the screens.

I hope I’ve provided some useful information. If you need more details, I appreciate your guidance.

Yes, thanks, this was useful information.

What you could probably do to find out where OpenBoard hangs on the first launch is to start is from a console using strace:

strace openboard

Or if you want to redircet the output to a file:

strace openboard 2>&1 >strace.log

You might get a huge amount of output, as every system call is traced. But this could contain indications of where the process actually hangs.

Vekhir commented 3 months ago

Can't really say much except that it works on my (X11) system. At this point, probably an issue with Hyprland. @SarjyantShrestha Which version of hyprland are you running? Has OpenBoard ever worked (if installed previously), i.e. is this launch problem a recent issue? Hyprland 0.42 is currently in testing, so might be worth checking it out when it gets released on Arch.

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

@SarjyantShrestha Which version of hyprland are you running? Has OpenBoard ever worked (if installed previously), i.e. is this launch problem a recent issue? Hyprland 0.42 is currently in testing, so might be worth checking it out when it gets released on Arch.

I'm currently using Hyprland 0.41.2-3. Yes, it used to work flawlessly before.

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

So the question is what is different in the situation between the very first attempt and the second one after terminating the dangling instance.

openboard shows up on screen after terminating instance from the first try.

This also sounds weird. Could you find out what it tries to do in that time? Most probably it is waiting for something (Network?) and then times out.

I don't know how to check for these things. Maybe strace ?. My laptop fan gets loud on the process of launching spotify. This is also a recent issue.

I'm trying to get the output for strace openboard 2>&1 >strace.log when it gets stuck but surprisingly openboard is showing up every time I run this command. lol.

Vekhir commented 3 months ago

Yes, it used to work flawlessly before

Great! What does "before" mean exactly? When was the last time (that you can recollect) that it still worked? If you like, you can check out /var/log/pacman.log to see which packages were updated inbetween.

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

Great! What does "before" mean? Yesterday? Last week? If you like, you can check out /var/log/pacman.log to see which packages were updated inbetween.

Since a month ago maybe, I've lost track. I didn't care thinking it'd be fixed after a few updates

Vekhir commented 3 months ago

Since a month ago maybe, I've lost track. I didn't care thinking it'd be fixed after a few updates

I once was in the same situation, and what I did was to set up a minimal VM which reproduced the issue and then used the Arch Linux Archive to find a working snapshot. From there you can try to find the day inbetween where it doesn't work anymore. It's a bit of work, but it was a crucial step to find the root cause back then, because like you now, I didn't know when the issue started appearing.

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

Thank you for the guide, I might consider doing that in my free time. For now I'll just do the workaround (ie. terminating from htop).

Vekhir commented 3 months ago

Alright, feel free to report here if you find something.

letsfindaway commented 3 months ago

Please note also that OpenBoard has known issues on Wayland. At least I know:

Maybe these restrictions do not apply for you. But it could be worth trying to start OpenBoard on some X11 environment.

SarjyantShrestha commented 3 months ago

openboard: error while loading shared libraries: libpoppler.so.138: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

I just got this issue today. I noticed I have /usr/lib/libpoppler.so.140 on my system.

Vekhir commented 3 months ago

That's a common occurence with AUR packages. You need to recompile OpenBoard against the new Poppler version: https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/openboard#comment-897913

luma-vpk commented 1 month ago

um, i encountered the same problem. since i installed openboard a week ago, i haven’t seen any such problems before. using the aur version and hyprland, i did sigkill then tried to run and openboard worked as it should Linux 6.11.3-arch1-1 Hyprland, built from branch at commit 4520b30d498daca8079365bdb909a8dea38e8d55 (version: bump to 0.44.1).