What is this thing? It crashes my game ...

[JensAyton]

[script.debug.syntax.action.badSelector]: ***** PlayerEntity DOES NOT RESPOND TO scriptAction: "sendTargeCommsMessage: [wing-plea]"

This is the newest crash variant I got. ... :?:

Please be careful with terminology. This message is not in any way related to a crash.

[Lestradae]

Please be careful with terminology. This message is not in any way related to a crash.

My game did crash. The "targe(t)" typo was the only error message apart from the memory exhausted per se in the stderr. Little Bear & others have told me that there might be a problem with the high Benulobiweed ships typo density and that ...

You still have Charlies ships installed and 1.70 will not run properly with them. Getting an occasional crash due to virtual memoray exhusted is "normal" as Oolite does leak a bit, but you'll get it all the time with Charlies ships installed.

... so both things can`t be true at the same time. Either one or more of Charlie`s ships caused the crash with their typo`ed help for the virtual memory exhaustion or this message is not in any way related to a crash - true or false?

And, by the way, I can`t find out where the tesoura.oxp is from. It`s not also from Benulobiweed ... is it?

Greetings,

L

[LittleBear]

Strictly speaking, the game stopping and suddenly exiting to desktop (due to an OXP typo) is a "clean exit" rather than a crash! Most typos are harmless, in the sense that they won't cause the game to exit or crash, but the ship / object either won't appear or won't do what it was meant it. Oolite 1.70 really dislikes AI typos though and will bail to desktop as soon as a ship with a faulty AI is spawned. (Found this out writing random hits, spawning a ship by the station to test my AI. If I'd made a mistake the game would lock or drop me to desktop). In 1.65 the command did not work, but the game woudn't exit. Eg for Charlies ships on 1.65 the ship would be there and behave itself, it just woudn't send a threatening message when you blew off its wing (due to the target typo). On 1.70 however, the typo caused the game to exit as soon as the ship appears.

However, although OXP typos make the situation worse, the Vitual Memoray exhusted is due to leaks in Oolite itself. You'll get more of these with every OXP in, but the real cause is the bugs in the game itself (hopefully to be squoshed for the MNSR). Charlie's ships have typos, but they are also really lovely eye-candy. As a result of their complexity they do chew up a lot of memory (and lots of them can appear), so you will get more exits due to exhaused virtual memoray with them in. Fixing typos will help, but the real problem is you have so many OXPs installed that you're going to have a lot of virtual memoray exhusted problems due to the leaks in Oolite.

[Kaks]

Couldn't agree more. I've had some success removing most problems with a couple of Charlie's creations, but due to their complexity, they mostly seem to use between 3 & 8 times more memory & resources than the more modest standard oolite ships.

When you do a hyperspace jump, oolite removes the old star system from memory, and adds a new one. As it does that, the virtual memory it needs gets more and more due to memory leaks. The more ships and oxps you have, the more virutual memory will be 'lost' at each jump.

With 160 OXPs I wouldn't bet on being able to make 3 jumps without running out of memory. With about 40, I regularly have 8 jumps without virtual memory problems.

[Lestradae]

... and I`m asking myself: Would all this that you told me not be a good addition to any FAQ that tells newcomers to Oolite or people without any knowledge of scripting like myself how the game works, and what to do and what to avoid

The virtual memory leak is, from my position of (as yet) 95% player, 3% bug-hunter, 1 percent ideaproducer and 1% oxp-attempter, an extremely serious flaw within Oolite, one which should by all means be repaired before any future version is termed the MNSR.

I think if the memory leak problem stays in, it will scare many potential players away. I was often sitting in front of my computer going from to to to to ... If I wasn`t that enthusiastic about this particular Elite-reenactment, I would have stopped bothering long ago.

Another thing is the planet textures being disabled. It reduces the game experience, say, by 40% for me. Sung`s textures (when I still had them, seem to have lost them while I was re-installing so often) were awesome in that regard. Its terrifying to have muddy Amiga-golfballs again. Methinks, the planet textures should also be contained at least as an option in a NMSR.

Oolite will grow and stay successful if it continues attracting new players, who will after some time think about getting involved in helping to develop something, even if only by contributing ideas about future expansions or tweaks (as it is the case with me). As a 95%-player, perhaps I can tribute to understanding the pure player`s perspective.

Keep up the good work!

L

[LittleBear]

The memory leak is a big problem. I play with about 30 OXPs in though and only get a bail in every 2 or 3 hours (which is OK). The thing to do is avoid high demand OXPs that make detailed ships very common. The space bar in random hits for example is complex, but you only get 1 added and then only in Anarchy Systems, so it doesn't put much of strain on the game. The Condor though is not only complex its common as it has the role "police". You can therefore easily get a lot of Condors (particulary in a Corperate State) chewing up loads of memory.

[Ark]

I think if the memory leak problem stays in, it will scare many potential players away. I was often sitting in front of my computer going from to to to to ... If I wasn`t that enthusiastic about this particular Elite-reenactment, I would have stopped bothering long ago.

1.70 is a test version !!!!!!!!!
do not forget that

You can therefore easily get a lot of Condors (particulary in a Corperate State) chewing up loads of memory.

Especially in hi-tech ones where a Black monk monastery is present

[Kaks]

1.65 had its share of memory leaks too.

The main difference here is that 1.65 kept awfully quiet about it, and sometimes it would crash 'for no apparent reason'...

edit: the vast majority of programs in the real world have a lot of memory leaks. (windows itself is as leaky as anything. Check the memory usage with the task manager 10 minutes after a fresh restart, use your computer normally, and about 3 hours later, the same system will use 100-150 Megabytes more.)

While we're trying to remove memory leaks, Oolite's resources are slightly more limited than, say, microsoft's...

[Ark]

1.65 had its share of memory leaks too.

The main difference here is that 1.65 kept awfully quiet about it, and sometimes it would crash 'for no apparent reason'...

I have always suspected that most of the leaks were there in 1.65 but they were dormant. Now that we have a reliable cache mechanism (in contrast with 1.65) all those nasty leaks come into the surface.

[JensAyton]

1.65 definitely leaks - it keeps all textures it loads in memory forever.

I wouldn’t even consider releasing a “final” release with known major leaks.

[Lestradae]

Ahruman,

I wouldn’t even consider releasing a “final” release with known major leaks.

That`s very pacifying to my bug-hating heart

And even if I tend to repeat myself: I think it is an enormous amount of absolutely, fantastic and brilliant work you are doing here - without getting anything for it! And, exactly therefore, this can`t be mentioned enough!

Thank you for your work! * spends round of applause *

Cheers

L