Alexa.service still overloading CPU

[rvsphinx]

I edited Alexa.service just as @cnoorman suggested. But my CPU is stilling being overloaded. I have an RPI 3 B and just enable Alexa not both services for now. If I run startsample.sh run with minimal load on CPU. when i start service runs from 80% and up till completely freezes most likely because of temp.

[shivasiddharth]

Oopsie.. apologies thought that, I was commenting on one of the other git "headless-avs-sample-app"..

[shivasiddharth]

This was solved in #77. Check William's comment. If your service files are outdated, please pull the latest service files from master.

[rvsphinx]

Sorry but I did grab the latest file. I also backed it up created a new file with the syntax in the alexa.service file and once I sudo systemctl start alexa.service cpu from 7% jumps to 75 and 85% usage. once I stop service everything drops.
Is there any thing else you think I can do.

[vijayrraut]

I also did the changes as per William's comment, but still the cpu goes to 85%, Please help

[shivasiddharth]

try the updated alexa.py file

[vijayrraut]

Sorry Shivasiddharth, I pulled the updated alexa.py, and alexa.service files but still cpu goes to 70% and pi gets hanged.

[shivasiddharth]

For time being in the alexa service file change

ExecStart=/usr/bin/python -u /home/__USER__/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/alexa.py

to

ExecStart=/bin/bash /home/__USER__/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/startsample.sh

Then run:

sudo systemctl stop alexa.service
sudo systemctl disable alexa.service

Then go through the service installer process again. This will start the startsample as service, but you will not have any indicators or audio tones.

[rvsphinx]

Hello, I tried go back to something simple that @HardTYZ commented. Adding screen -dmS -D and add RemainAfterExit=yes to the alexa.service file and that worked! From 85% down to 8 a 9% . I recommend this for anyone else. Just install screen sudo apt-get install screen then put service file like this:

[Unit] Description=Companion Service After=network.target

[Service] Environment=PATH=/home/pi/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin ExecStart=/usr/bin/screen -dmS -D bash -c '/usr/bin/python -u /PATH/TO/YOUR/SCRIPT.py' WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/ StandardOutput=tty, StandardError=tty Restart=always User=pi RemainAfterExit=yes

[Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

[shivasiddharth]

Fair enough.

[grvweb]

Hello, I tried go back to something simple that @HardTYZ commented. Adding screen -dmS -D and add RemainAfterExit=yes to the alexa.service file and that worked! From 85% down to 8 a 9% . I recommend this for anyone else. Just install screen sudo apt-get install screen then put service file like this:

[Unit] Description=Companion Service After=network.target

[Service] Environment=PATH=/home/pi/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin ExecStart=/usr/bin/screen -dmS -D bash -c '/usr/bin/python -u /PATH/TO/YOUR/SCRIPT.py' WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/ StandardOutput=tty, StandardError=tty Restart=always User=pi RemainAfterExit=yes

[Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

I tried this no effect on ram and cpu but, service keeps restarting every 2 mins.

For time being in the alexa service file change

ExecStart=/usr/bin/python -u /home/__USER__/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/alexa.py

to

ExecStart=/bin/bash /home/__USER__/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/startsample.sh

Then run:

sudo systemctl stop alexa.service
sudo systemctl disable alexa.service

Then go through the service installer process again. This will start the startsample as service, but you will not have any indicators or audio tones.

Didn't found useful, I have attached a screenshot.

RAM Size increasing from 100 mb to 900 mb and processor jumps from 10% to 80%, After sometime pi stops responding.

[shivasiddharth]

I tried this no effect on ram and cpu but, service keeps restarting every 2 mins.

If you have not installed screen, then obviously it will restart.

[williamhemmingsen]

shivasiddharth, see my new pull request. There was an error in alexa.service. It now does not cause any high cpu.

Regards,

[williamhemmingsen]

[Unit] Description=Companion Service After=network.target

[Service] Environment=PATH=/home/pi/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin ExecStart=/usr/bin/python -u /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/alexa.py WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/ TTYPath=/dev/tty12 StandardInput=tty StandardOutput=tty StandardError=null Restart=always User=pi

[Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

Screen works, but it mask systemd from restarting on failure. Try the above, it works perfectly for me.

William

[shivasiddharth]

@williamhemmingsen , can you raise a PR?

[grvweb]

[Unit] Description=Companion Service After=network.target

[Service] Environment=PATH=/home/pi/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin ExecStart=/usr/bin/python -u /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/alexa.py WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/ TTYPath=/dev/tty12 StandardInput=tty StandardOutput=tty StandardError=null Restart=always User=pi

[Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

Screen works, but it mask systemd from restarting on failure. Try the above, it works perfectly for me.

William

I ran it by changing line no: 7 from /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/alexa.py to /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/alexa.py Still Same issue..! Should i change alexa.py from Assistants-Pi/Alexa/ to Assistants-Pi/ directory ?

[williamhemmingsen]

[Unit] Description=Companion Service After=network.target [Service] Environment=PATH=/home/pi/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin ExecStart=/usr/bin/python -u /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/alexa.py WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/ TTYPath=/dev/tty12 StandardInput=tty StandardOutput=tty StandardError=null Restart=always User=pi [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target Screen works, but it mask systemd from restarting on failure. Try the above, it works perfectly for me. William

I ran it by changing line no: 7 from /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/alexa.py to /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/alexa.py Still Same issue..! Should i change alexa.py from Assistants-Pi/Alexa/ to Assistants-Pi/ directory ?

/home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/alexa.py is correct. Above is a typo. The code is correct in github.

But changing the script is not enough. you MUST update systemd.

steps--

pull down new copy of alexa.service from git and overwrite your current alexa.service. then run the following commands to update systemd.

sudo systemctl stop alexa.service sudo systemctl disable alexa.service sudo /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/scripts/installer.sh
sudo systemctl enable alexa.service sudo systemctl start alexa.service

[williamhemmingsen]

Also just so you know the high CPU is caused by stdin/stdout/sterr.

[grvweb]

Also just so you know the high CPU is caused by stdin/stdout/sterr.

True, it is caused by stdin/stdout. Issue is not related to service file. I tried by running it in background via crontab, init.d and rc.local. I also tried running this command in crontab @reboot /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/build/SampleApp/src/SampleApp '/home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/build/Integration/AlexaClientSDKConfig.json' '/home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/third-party/alexa-rpi/models' > /dev/null 2>&1 & I got same response, nothing really worked. I think maybe this issue is not related to this repo because there is no issue with alexa.py file.

[shivasiddharth]

Is the sampleapp also driving the CPU crazy ?

[grvweb]

Yes, issue is with sampleapp. It is expecting input as alphabets from keyboard. May be some kind of invalid input is feed so, it is generating output as "invalid option" you can find this in systemctl status.

[shivasiddharth]

Check issue #539 in the official avs-device-sdk we are not alone on this. Amazon themselves don't recommend running Sampleapp as a service. They have designed Alexa to work with stdin causing this issue.

[grvweb]

I fixed it. Open develop branch on your amazon voice services repo, I will make a pr. 😁🎉🎊

[shivasiddharth]

Develop branch holds good only for the google assistant, where constantly changes are happening. raise a PR to the master for Alexa.

[grvweb]

Ok.. I Will.

[grvweb]

Issue fixed on Raspberry Pi, Tested with both fresh and old installations.

For old installation delete all folders in /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa (Only folders, not files).

Move to Installation directory

cd /home/pi/Assistants-Pi

Pull Changes

git pull origin master

Run Installer

sudo /home/pi/Assistants-Pi/scripts/installer.sh

Some tests may fail ignore them.

Then, you need to update systemd.service file manually:

sudo systemctl disable /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service
sudo systemctl stop /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service
sudo nano /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service

Enter the following inside alexa.service file:

[Unit]
Description=Amazon Alexa
After=network.target network-online.target

[Service]
Type=forking
ExecStart=/home/pi/Assistants-Pi/Alexa/start.sh

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service
sudo systemctl start alexa.service

Should work fine. Only 5% to 10% CPU should be use by Alexa.

[vijayrraut]

Hello Gowthamraj, I tried git pull, but while enabling the service its failing with below error, please help.

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo systemctl daemon-reload pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo systemctl enable /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/alexa.service -> /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service. pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo systemctl start /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service Failed to start lib-systemd-system-alexa.service.mount: Unit lib-systemd-system-alexa.service.mount not found.

[grvweb]

Hello Gowthamraj, I tried git pull, but while enabling the service its failing with below error, please help.

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo systemctl daemon-reload pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo systemctl enable /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/alexa.service -> /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service. pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo systemctl start /lib/systemd/system/alexa.service Failed to start lib-systemd-system-alexa.service.mount: Unit lib-systemd-system-alexa.service.mount not found. Try sudo systemctl start alexa.service