Keryx Never Starts

[AndyDap]

I have downloaded and re-installed the current version of Keryx twice now and the problem has been exactly the same on each occasion.

I have installed Keryx on a 1Gb USB flash drive and in the Windows environment have executed the keryx.exe file in the win32 directory.

A blank command prompt terminal screen appears, my CPU activity goes to 100% and sits there. My PC effectively freezes, though I can get to task manager and shutdown keryx eventually (key strokes take a while to register with the system).

There are no error messages or other activity that I can observe. System information is:

Systemreport

Processor
      Number of CPUs:1
      Name:Athlon 64 Processor 3700+ (San Diego)
      Clock frequency:2244 Mhz
      Socket:Unknown (Socket 939)
      Voltage:1.40 Volt
      Technology:90 nm
      Manufacturer:Advanced Micro Devices
      Model:Familie 15 Modell 7 Stufe 1
      Cache(s):128 KB Level1 ; 1024 KB Level2 ; 0 KB Level3 ; 0 KB Trace
      Serial number:0002-0F71-078B-FBFF-0000-0001

      Mainboard
      Model:AV8 (VIA K8T800P-8237)
      Manufacturer:http://www.abit.com.tw/
      Serial number:
      On-board devices:

      Display
      Name:NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GS
      Chipset:GeForce 7600 GS
      RAM:512 MB
      DAC:Integrated RAMDAC
      BIOS date:12/11/06

      Drive

      k: 1.00 GB (1073577984 Bytes) (Total capacity:)
      0.03 GB (28803072 Bytes) (Bytes used:)
      0.97 GB (1044774912 Bytes) (Bytes free:)

      Windows®
      Name:Windows XP Home Service Pack 3
      Version:Uniprocessor Free 5.1.2600
      Service Pack:Service Pack 3.0

      Memory (RAM)
      Maximum modules:4
      Installed modules:3
      RAM type:Unknown
      Access speed:No Information available
      Total:2.047 MB
      Used:931 MB (46 %)
      Free:1.115 MB (54 %)

      Swap File
      Total:4.894 MB
      Used:979 MB (21 %)
      Free:3.914 MB (79 %)

[mac9416 (mac9416)]

Hi, Andy,

Have you checked the logs in the logs directory for output?

[AndyDap (gate2a)]

Seems strange, but I don't have a logs directory (I'm sure I'm doing something dumb!). Maybe the log file is produced outside of the keryx install directory?

Full tree is:

K:\keryx\win32
K:\keryx\source
K:\keryx\projects
K:\keryx\plugins
K:\keryx\pixmaps
K:\keryx\locale
K:\keryx\linux
K:\keryx\doc
K:\keryx\dir_file_list.txt
K:\keryx\win32\keryx.conf
K:\keryx\win32\keryx.exe
K:\keryx\source\app.fil
K:\keryx\source\keryx.conf
K:\keryx\source\keryx.py
K:\keryx\source\messages.pot
K:\keryx\source\mki18n.py
K:\keryx\source\setup.py
K:\keryx\source\lib
K:\keryx\source\lib\config.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\consts.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\log.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\plugins.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\project.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\__init__.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\delayedresult.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\download.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\editor.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\main.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\misc.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\options.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\startDialog.py
K:\keryx\source\lib\wxkeryx\__init__.py
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32-bit-default
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default\debian.conf
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default\karmic-64-bit.keryx
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default\sources
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default\lists
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default\sources\sources.list
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-64-bit-default\lists\status
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default\debian.conf
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default\karmic-32-bit.keryx
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default\sources
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default\lists
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default\sources\sources.list
K:\keryx\projects\karmic-32-bit-default\lists\status
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default\debian.conf
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default\jaunty-64-bit.keryx
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default\sources
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default\lists
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default\sources\sources.list
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-64-bit-default\lists\status
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default\debian.conf
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default\jaunty-32-bit.keryx
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default\sources
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default\lists
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default\sources\sources.list
K:\keryx\projects\jaunty-32-bit-default\lists\status
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default\debian.conf
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default\hardy-64-bit.keryx
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default\sources
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default\lists
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default\sources\sources.list
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-64-bit-default\lists\status
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32-bit-default\debian.conf
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32-bit-default\hardy-32-bit.keryx
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32-bit-default\sources
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32-bit-default\lists
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32-bit-default\sources\sources.list
K:\keryx\projects\hardy-32...

[AndyDap (gate2a)]

Sorry, that was a bit big. Probably should have used an attached .txt file.

[mac9416 (mac9416)]

Not a problem.

It looks like Keryx isn't even getting far enough to create a logs directory.

Try running Keryx from source. You'll have to download and install Python and WxPython:
http://www.python.org/download/
http://www.wxpython.org/download.php
Then should be able to simply double-click keryx.py in the keryx\source directory.

If running from source works correctly, we'll know that it's not a problem with Keryx itself, but with the executable.

[AndyDap (gate2a)]

I read about the problems with Python 2.6, which is what I currently have loaded on my system. Will I have to uninstall this and install an older version of Python first?

[Chris Oliver (excid3)]

That is pretty weird. The version of python you have installed should not affect the executable as it is using the version of Python we compiled it with. Like mac suggested, try installing and running from source and if Python 2.6 doesn't work for you, I would try 2.5 as well. There are issues with certain libraries and 2.6 so I always tend to use 2.5 if possible.

[AndyDap (gate2a)]

Yeah!

Keryx compiled and ran following the instructions by Chris (just ran it with 2.6). I wasn't sure whether this would build/replace the dowloaded executable, so I ran the keryx.exe in win32 again just to check. Obviously it didn't, as it still behaves the way it did before.

[Chris Oliver (excid3)]

Definitely an intriguing issue...I don't have any idea what would cause it to lock up like it did. We have been noticing some issues with the binaries we have been building so maybe we need to go another route there. Unless you happen to come across something else that might give us an idea on what is causing it I don't really have any other recommendations for you.

In any case, we really appreciate the bug report and will keep that in mind when we build executables again. Mac, did we build this with py2exe or pyinstaller this time around? We might have to stick with one if we are getting unexplainable issues like this...

[AndyDap (gate2a)]

Thanks Chris and Mac. I'll keep an eye out for any updates as Keryx is exactly what I'm looking for to maintain a Linux box in my shed that is just a little too far away for my wifi.

Cheers, Andy.

[mac9416 (mac9416)]

Chris, 0.92.4 beta was compiled with Pyinstaller, though we've done it
with Py2exe in the past. The advantage to using Pyinstaller was that
we can get a single-file executable. As you say, if we keep having
problems like this, we may want to go back to Py2exe.

[Chris Oliver (excid3)]

Glad we could help Andy! We will do what we can.

As for py2exe, you can build close to a single file executable but you might have to have a couple dll's in the same directory. I think that if we do run into any more issues, we should consider sticking with py2exe quite strongly.

[AndyDap (gate2a)]

... just a quick follow up.

I got the advice on where previous versions of Keryx are from a post on your blog. I then downloaded 0.92.3, which was compiled by py2exe and ran that.

It appears to be working perfectly. So far I have run it on my XP PC and Karmic PC. I have opened a project and downloaded packages, but haven't actually done an install yet (haven't needed to). By the looks of it though, for my situation, it seems that it was something with the pyinstaller created exe that was causing the problems.

Thanks for your help,

Andy.

[Chris Oliver (excid3)]

Andy,

Alright, looks like we might have to stick with py2exe until we figure the issue out. Thanks for the follow up!

[mac9416 (mac9416)]

I transitioned us back to Pyinstaller and did a lot of refactoring. Andy, if the project is still useful to you, please download 0.92.5 and give it another try!