Topic: StartWatch 0.7.0 Release

[tinplate]

StartWatch v. 0.7.0 is now available
http://www.softwx.com/windows/startwatch.html

With this version, the feature set is now fixed for the v.1.0.0 release. I'll just be making bug fixes, minor tweaks, and updating the manual for the first non-beta release.

What's new:

Added Programs menu to the main window. Moved "Start Programs" from the File menu to the Programs menu, and renamed it "Begin Startup    Sequence".

Added two types of menu options to the Programs menu - the first type is group commands that affect all programs, and a second type which only affect the program that's currently selected in the program list of the Status page.

Added pop up menu when you right click the mouse on a program on the Status page. The popup menu contains the program specific options also found in the Programs menu.

Added dynamic Program Statistics window. One of the items displayed is the peak PageFile usage. This value is useful in determining a reasonable value for the Memory Leak Protection's Max Memory setting. After your program has run for awhile (24 hours for example), you can see what the peak memory usage was during that time.

Made some changes to program minimizing and closing.

Fixed bug where programs that were closed because the port they depend upon went down did not always restart when the port came back.

Steve

[Mark / Ohio]

Running about 2 hrs now.

Observations...

(1)  Port monitoring..

This is a problem I did not have with previous releases.  When I manually disconnect Virtual VP the extra port I monitor of course shuts down closing the programs that are programmed to start / shut down depending on port availability.  Problem is when I reconnect Virtual VP, StartWatch never shows the port as active again thus the programs remain shut down.  Initial startup works fine.  It is only after the port shuts down during operation that monitoring of the port appears to cease.

(2)  Program startup minimization...

I now only have two programs requiring StartWatch to minimize.  VP Live is working fine as before.  WeatherLink is still refusing to minimize when set to bulletin mode by StartWatch.  Most of the time it will minimize when not in bulletin mode by StartWatch.  (This is really a non-issue at this time for me as I don't need WL in bulletin mode anyway.  I'm not using any of the running wind average tags or the APRS feature.)

(3)  VWS and ShutDown all programs command...

When the closing StartWatch and the close all opened programs command is used VWS will fully shutdown about 50% of the time.  When it dies not fully shutdown the icon become unresponsive and it must be closed by Task Manager.  It does seem to be working more often than in the previous release.

I like the new additional program stats information.  Saves me from bothering with Task Manager or Process Explorer to get that info.

Thanks Steve for working so hard on these programs and giving us the frequent updates.  It is appreciated.    

 

[tinplate]

1) I just did a test where all programs run on the same PC. I have VVP, plus two weather programs whose start is dependant on one of VVP's ports. After all is started up, I click disconnect on VVP. Not long after that, the StartWatch port monitor shows the port going down, then the two weather programs are shutdown. When I click Connect in VVP, the port monitor shows it's up agains, and then the two weather programs are started again. If this is not what you're seeing, then I need to find out what's different in your configuration and setup. Also, make sure you have the boxes checked in the program options that say you want to restart the program when the targget comes back up.

2) Another odd one. I have the same configuration for WeatherLink, and it minimizes everytime. Which version of WL are you running?

3) VWS is a bit of a problem child. It handles its windows (there's about 19 of 'em, you just can't see them) in a way that makes identifying the one that will act on a close message difficult. Pick the wrong window and sometimes nothing happens and sometimes it crashes VWS.  I'll probably have to put some more code in specifically for VWS. Also, if StartWatch tries to close VWS before VWS is totally and completely finished initializing (which can take a while), that can also cause the close to fail. Although not an ideal solution, you can use the Close/Kill All Programs option in the Programs menu rather than the dialog that pops up when you close StartWatch. That will try to close the programs nicely, and then terminate them if they don't listen. I don't do that when StartWatch closes, because it requires waiting a little while to see if the programs close without needing the less polite termination technique.

Steve

[Mark / Ohio]

1) I just did a test where all programs run on the same PC. I have VVP, plus two weather programs whose start is dependant on one of VVP's ports. After all is started up, I click disconnect on VVP. Not long after that, the StartWatch port monitor shows the port going down, then the two weather programs are shutdown. When I click Connect in VVP, the port monitor shows it's up agains, and then the two weather programs are started again. If this is not what you're seeing, then I need to find out what's different in your configuration and setup. Also, make sure you have the boxes checked in the program options that say you want to restart the program when the targget comes back up.

Well I just tried it again and it is an intermittent.  I tried it twice now and it worked OK but the third time it remained red for several minutes.  Closing all programs and restarting did not fix it.  The port stays dark green even after Virtual VP is restarted.  It takes a full shutdown and restart of StartWatch to get light green to show for the port again.  What it does is show red for the port 5511 127.0.0.1 of Virtual VP.  Once Virtual VP was manually reconnected it would continue to show red.  I waited for a minute or so with no change.  I also tried changing the port monitor interval with no change.  I normally do not have this port connected to anything else so to verify the port was turning back on I configured VP Live to monitor it.  After restarting everything and verifying I was receiving data from the port by VP Live (and at this time the port was showing green) I manually disconnected Virtual VP again.  After the port showed red and my programs shutdown I reconnected Virtual VP.  The port continued to show red so I manually started VP Live and was able to recieve data through the port, waited for a bit longer, but the port monitor indicator never turned back to green again.

2) Another odd one. I have the same configuration for WeatherLink, and it minimizes everytime. Which version of WL are you running?

Version 5.7a Release 5/12/2006 (No expansion modules installed)

3) ..... Although not an ideal solution, you can use the Close/Kill All Programs option in the Programs menu rather than the dialog that pops up when you close StartWatch. That will try to close the programs nicely, and then terminate them if they don't listen. ....Steve

I can do that easily enough.

[tinplate]

regarding item#1, make sure that StartWatch is monitoring a free VVP port, i.e. don't use the same port that any program uses to connect to VVP.

Also, could you email me your StartWatch.ini file?

Steve

[W3DRM]

Installed StartWatch v0.7.0 about 20 minutes ago. Have it set to monitor VPLive, VirtualVP, & VWS.

Observations:

Have gone through three shutdowns and it all three tries, all routines have shutdown completely without any intervention required by me. Previously, I could not get VWS to shutdown at all.

Killed each of the three routines to see how StartWatch handled the process being stopped and in each case it detected it almost immediately and restarted the process successfully.

Will continue to watch the results over the next few hours and will post any problems found.

Thanks again Steve for creating these routines!

NOTE: Sorry for not getting these latest versions installed earlier for testing but I had a flu shot on Thursday and by Saturday morning I was suffering from what appeared to be a full-blown flu attack. Feeling much better today but still a little sluggish.

[Ravenstar]

Have 0.7.0.18 installed and running fine. Starts WeatherLink and minimizes and puts into Bulliten mode, all other programs starting and minimizing fine.

Question and I hope it don't make me look too dumb, but what port do I put in StartWatch for the console COM4 port to be monitored? 4 don't work and COM4 don't work.

[tinplate]

StartWatch monitors TCP/IP (i.e. network) ports, not serial ports. If you're using VirtualVP, you can monitor one of VirtualVP's unused TCP/IP ports such as 5514. This port will become responsive when VirtualVP is ready to accept connections on any of its ports.

It's difficult to monitor serial ports because windows allows only one connection on a serial port. There are ways that programs can do it, but it involves hooking into the gory internals of windows, and is outside the scope of StartWatch.

The reason I added TCP/IP port monitoring to StartWatch is for VirtualVP monitoring, and also because some programs get confused and behave badly when there is a network failure after they've made a successful connection. I thought it might be handy to be able to have those programs get closed automatically, and then restarted after the network comes back up.

Steve

[Ravenstar]

Thanks Steve for that indepth explanation!

I take it I have to [Enable] Virtual Console 8 (5514) in VirtualVP for this to work properly so StartWatch gets a valid reading?

[tinplate]

Yep!

[Mark / Ohio]

regarding item#1, make sure that StartWatch is monitoring a free VVP port, i.e. don't use the same port that any program uses to connect to VVP.

Also, could you email me your StartWatch.ini file?

Steve

I only hooked VP Live to the same port that one time to verify the port was coming backup.  Normally the port is unused except for StartWatch.

I tried the same routine tonight 6 times (exact same configuration as last night) waiting for the port to show red for each of the following intervals (20sec.,30sec.,40sec.,50sec.,50sec., 1min.28seconds) and then reconnected Virtual VP and it worked every time restarting the programs like it is supposed to.  I guess at this point if no one else is having a problem with it, must be something on my end.    

I do have ZoneAlarm firewall.  The new version of StartWatch asked permission to communicate and I allowed it just like the previous version.  Maybe something was going on with ZA.  But the intermittent symptom is puzzling plus I did not show any blocked actions though in my ZA alert logs.  

I will go ahead and send you a copy of my .ini file.

As a side note after running 19 hrs 30 minutes I show no alerts other than what I created manually.  All seems to be running well at this time.  

[Anole]

The lastest version is working very nicely for me at the moment. Still watching for that pesky little WD/WU upload problem I was seeing but so far so good on 0.7.0!

On a side note, it's pretty cool to be able to watch the interface detecting problems and "taking care of it" for me. It's one of the things I really like about VirtualVP too. It was quite an eyeopener to see how much seemingly superfluous activity VWS generates between it and the VP. It's almost as much fun as watching the old Windows defragger moving blocks around on the screen.  

[tinplate]

It's almost as much fun as watching the old Windows defragger moving blocks around on the screen.  

It's good to hear I'm not the only person.  

[FishDude]

It's almost as much fun as watching the old Windows defragger moving blocks around on the screen.  

It's good to hear I'm not the only person.  

Gentlemen, I agree and we are GEEKS!

I think it is more like watching the lights/bytes on my 9600bps modem downloding Word Star!

[Anole]

The lastest version is working very nicely for me at the moment. Still watching for that pesky little WD/WU upload problem I was seeing but so far so good on 0.7.0!

10 hours now without this issue popping back up. Things look very good from here!

Thanks for the effort on StartWatch Steve! Like your other programs, it's a gem.  

[Anole]

It's almost as much fun as watching the old Windows defragger moving blocks around on the screen.  

It's good to hear I'm not the only person.  

Gentlemen, I agree and we are GEEKS!

I think it is more like watching the lights/bytes on my 9600bps modem downloding Word Star!

Heh!  I _knew_ I wasn't the only one!

[Mark / Ohio]

It's almost as much fun as watching the old Windows defragger moving blocks around on the screen.  

It's good to hear I'm not the only person.  

Gentlemen, I agree and we are GEEKS!

I think it is more like watching the lights/bytes on my 9600bps modem downloading Word Star!

Heh!  I _knew_ I wasn't the only one!

Ok, I'll come out of the closet as well.  Another blinking lights and automation enthusiast here too.  


SW running the second day now with no problems.  I did have to bump up the memory headroom on VWS.  I found that changing some settings and manually uploading files past my previous limit of 70Mb.  It shutdown and restarted while I was tweaking when it past the set point just like it is supposed to.    

[Ravenstar]

Here's one for ya Steve for what it's worth. I rebooted today and all programs ran and did as they were supposed to. ABout 15 minutes later I clicked [Alerts] in SW and got this and it doesn't change. All other menu options works, it minimizes and comes back up but the alerts screen stays blank:

[W3DRM]

Steve - here's a suggestion for StartWatch:

Include the Leak protection setting in the Alerts log file so we can tell what the setting was that caused the alert. I am still trying to find a good Leak protection setting for VWS (see log file below) and it would be nice to have the setting value included in the log file. I'm at 75MB and still geting alerts...

[tinplate]

I can do that. I'm also planning on adding memory use graphs that cover a long enough time span to really see if leaks are occurring, and to get a good feel for what a good memory limit setting would be.

Steve

[W3DRM]

Steve - that sounds great! I'm looking forward to an even better product in the future!!!

[Mark / Ohio]

..... I am still trying to find a good Leak protection setting for VWS (see log file below) and it would be nice to have the setting value included in the log file. I'm at 75MB and still geting alerts...

I bumped mine up to 80Mb a few days ago for VWS.  It has been close when I'm in there fiddling with the VWS settings but so far no more alerts

[Ravenstar]

Only way I could get the alerts window back was to delete alerts.txt and restart SW.

[tinplate]

Could you pull it out of your Recycle bin and email it to me?

[Ravenstar]

Sent!