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Return to Misty Moorings (FSX/P3D/MSFS2020) => Misty Flying Club and Multi Player => Topic started by: bawheeler on September 18, 2019, 10:36:22 PM

Title: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: bawheeler on September 18, 2019, 10:36:22 PM
For the first time (after 120+ flights) I am having a problem with Cigar Box locking up mid flight.  I have re-installed it and there is no improvement. Basically I get airborne and then it dies along the way. If I switch to the application Windows says the app is "Not Responding". My only option is to kill the task, but then of course I can't file the PIREP.  Any suggestions?  Brian
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: tomse on September 19, 2019, 07:23:45 AM
I have the same issue since yesterday on the MFC0029 leg from AK75 to PASH. Some seconds after take off CigarBox freezes completely and must be killed by the task manager.
I filed a Charter Flight from AK75 to PASH with the same result.
I started the leg before at PAOT which was no problem a few days ago (with the BID of MFC29) and Cigarbox crashed again.
I think it must be a server problem rather than an individual issue.
I actually ran MFC 29 twice  >:(
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: jeff3163 on September 19, 2019, 08:28:47 AM
... me too!   :(  For me, every time it locks up is at the exact same time.  Upon the wheels leaving the ground.  You can see in Tomse's screenshot.  The flight log stops on the same exact line in the text every time. 

fs(timestamp) Visibility: (x#) miles

The cigarbox window is rendered untouchable, and must be killed by the Task Manager.  It does not seem to recover on it's own, even though activity is evident in the task manager.  Memory usage numbers continue to change for the Kacars program during the frozen condition.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 19, 2019, 08:43:52 AM
Cigar box connectivity issue with the server? Has to be the server provider or connection to the database.  Henry could you please check server status asap?

N
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: John on September 19, 2019, 02:35:03 PM
I'm having same problem  :(

John
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 19, 2019, 06:32:03 PM
Well the mfc site itselt appears to be up. (site functions are working as well as submitting manual pireps) however there appears to be no connection between the site and the cigar box module or vice versa. Working on it.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: Patrick 94 on September 22, 2019, 04:39:55 AM
Hello
.. moi aussi!   :(  Pour moi, chaque verrouillage est exactement au même moment. Sur les roues quittant le sol. Vous pouvez voir dans la capture d'écran de Tomse. Le journal de vol s'arrête à chaque fois sur la même ligne exacte dans le texte.

fs (timestamp) Visibilité: (x #) miles

Bests regards
Patrick
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: jeff3163 on September 22, 2019, 07:07:52 AM
Hello
.. moi aussi!   :(  Pour moi, chaque verrouillage est exactement au même moment. Sur les roues quittant le sol. Vous pouvez voir dans la capture d'écran de Tomse. Le journal de vol s'arrête à chaque fois sur la même ligne exacte dans le texte.

fs (timestamp) Visibilité: (x #) miles

Bests regards
Patrick

That's exactly what I was saying.   ;D ;)
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: bawheeler on September 22, 2019, 07:30:55 AM
Just tried a charter flight manually entering the same locations I want to fly in an MFC flight plan, same results.

Guess I'll go back to searching for Henrik's new AI ships until we have a fix...
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 22, 2019, 09:22:08 AM
Have done more testing to identify the issue. Our systems seem to be working as intended but the ACARS connection to the MFC web site is being blocked and is locking up the app some reason- appears to be a server provider host issue- like a firewall blocking the portals.. Henry is working on it with the host provider. Very frustrating.

In the meantime, MFC apps are all working fine and manual pireps can be used without issue for those who wish to record their flights/times which can continue to contribute to their the stats until this issue is resolved-one way or another. 

Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: williamb on September 23, 2019, 08:12:53 PM
I am having the same problem.  Flew the Telegraph Creek to Gilbert Bay 3 times since yesterday.  I did not notice the problem on the first flight until after landing and trying to file the Pirep.  On the other two flights CigarBox locked up shortly after T/O. and the program behaved as others have described.

WilliamB 
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: tomse on September 24, 2019, 06:35:04 AM
Is there atleast someone whose Cigarbox works ok???
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 24, 2019, 07:49:19 AM
From our understanding - all the clients with Cigar Box are not working - Appears to be a comms issue which is freezing/locking up the Cigar Box acars client portion- like a virus might quareteen or comms stopped by incorrect port or a dot.net coding change. Henry is into it at the server level but appears not our stuff so it get much more complex. (Appears to be a wide spread outage for all kaCARSII users/clients (by FSProducts) and still trying to find the source of the issue).
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: RCFlyer on September 24, 2019, 09:09:21 AM
I wonder if this issue is related to the latest Windows 10 update?  The start of this issue, at least for me, started about the time my Windows system did its last upgrade.

Danny
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: av8erjm on September 24, 2019, 10:17:55 AM
Norm you say it seems to be for the whole KaCARSII has anyone contacted another virtual airline like Buffalo to see if they are having a problem also, just curious
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 24, 2019, 12:00:36 PM
It has been reported that AKA which also uses a similar custom acars (by FSProducts) is also down. (same issue- lockup!).

There is many VA that use kaCarsII by FSProducts as we do. If we can't fix, will have to switch to an alternate acars. Henry is investigating. Sure is a pain in the ole butt!!
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: lionwing on September 24, 2019, 12:25:13 PM
If I can chip in on this.

The VA I run uses a customised version of KACARS we branded as HERMES.  It has been running fine today with a number of flight reported filed by our crew.

Jeff (FS Products) contacted the VA a few months ago to say he was stopping development and support of KACARS software due to commitments elsewhere.

If I understand correctly from our VA "techie" the fight reporting software runs independently of any service provided by FS Products and connects only to server / VA for which it is intended with relevant files placed on that server to link to the software.

I might be telling you guys what you know already but thought it worth mentioning.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 24, 2019, 12:47:38 PM
Hmm interesting.. Yes I knew Jeff was out of it.. but you guys are running with the same architecture type of Kacars?  Which VA Lionwing?  Now it doesn't appear to be the actual software itself but perhaps the server platform itself, dot.net software or the server provider firewall protocols?. Dunno for sure, Henry is on that part.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 24, 2019, 05:52:26 PM
Cigar Box is up and running again. (Testing it now= but so far so good and no comms issues or locking up issues as was experienced since Sept 18th until this afternoon (Sept 24).

Welcome back into the RTMM-MFC Air!. 

Norm
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: lionwing on September 25, 2019, 06:30:58 AM
Hmm interesting.. Yes I knew Jeff was out of it.. but you guys are running with the same architecture type of Kacars?  Which VA Lionwing?  Now it doesn't appear to be the actual software itself but perhaps the server platform itself, dot.net software or the server provider firewall protocols?. Dunno for sure, Henry is on that part.

To the best of my knowledge we are running KACARS with a few customer tweaks of our own but none of them radical .  Just options to divert a flight and no "charter" facility.  All core features aside from that.  Below is an image of HERMESl

(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48792690392_5a93614206_o.png) (https://flic.kr/p/2hkDhWC)

The VA is airwego.org.uk (http://airwego.org.uk).
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 25, 2019, 06:57:33 AM
Thanks for the info Lionwing. Yes, the exact kaCars II. Don't think the kaCars or the VA was the problem here. The host server provider used here was Go Daddy and suspecting that whatever they did in a host upgrade (last Wednesday) prevented the kaCARS (FSProducts) from connecting to the VA system. (ports/firewall on their system etc). In any event, sure glad it is fixed now and all is working again.   
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: lionwing on September 25, 2019, 07:01:00 AM
That's good news.

We have been looking into other options beyond KACARS as from a VA point of view while it is quite robust we are wary of running into a situation while it will not function for whatever reason which would bring "ops" to a halt pretty quickly.

Fingers crossed that never happens.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: simondix on September 29, 2019, 02:56:39 PM
Thanks for this post.  I thought it was me.  Manual PIREP on its way.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: jeff3163 on September 29, 2019, 03:16:54 PM
Thanks for this post.  I thought it was me.  Manual PIREP on its way.

Is it still happening to you?  It works for me.  I assumed it was fixed.  You can file manually, of course.  But I think it's working now.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: John on September 29, 2019, 03:20:01 PM
It's working for me :D

John
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: simondix on September 29, 2019, 05:51:46 PM
I did the flight but it refused to Stop Flight so I could file the PIREP.  Bit miffed as I did  a 0ft VS landing and lost the bragging rights.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 29, 2019, 06:29:21 PM
Oh you can brag about it Simon cause on the flip side no-one will ever prove you didn't do a 0fpm landing. (even though it might never be possible again! lol.)!

Norm
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: tomse on September 30, 2019, 03:46:50 AM
CigarBox doesn't seems so stable to me as before the server problem appeared.
After filing the Pireps error message come up, sometimes freezing before 'Start Flight', needs a kill with the taskmanager and a restart.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 30, 2019, 07:44:53 AM
Hmmm ok Thomas. It shouldn't be freezing after you have received pirep sent confirmation. Maybe it's not clearing when you try to load/start the next flight and it freezes. Try closing after a completed flight then start it up again for the next flight and see if that clears it.

Norm
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: jeff3163 on September 30, 2019, 08:43:45 PM
     I have experienced this occasionally also.  Pressing the "Start Flight" button causes a cigarbox lockup.  I have to kill it in Task Manager, then restart cigarbox.  I got the impression that I had not clicked the button good enough the first time.  So I try to give that button a firm (yet single) click.

     I also sometimes, although not recently, have gotten that "404 remote server not found" error after filing a flight.  I ignore it though, because the pirep files anyway.
     Now I have been getting (sometimes) "Operation timed out, and Try again." messages after filing.  But those go through and get filed also without resending.  I just have to refresh the cigarbox.  It is strange, that my internet connection seems to close every time I file a PIREP.  I wait for it to reestablish, then refresh the cigarbox.  I go to the logbook page and my latest flight is there, waiting for approval.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: nbrich1 on September 30, 2019, 09:13:37 PM
There is thousands of pireps now in the system and every new one added adds more calculations for top pilot stats as well as all the pilots records. All takes time to process which I think is slowing responses but even with comms errors or slow ping backs the pirep usually goes through and is received on the site. So even if comm errors or time out errors just check the site and if your pirep is there just ignore cigar box error messages. The site has received your pirep.
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: MFC0001 on October 02, 2019, 12:42:19 AM
There are several issues in play....as Norm has said, the number of Pireps now in the system slows down calculation for Top Pilot.....that Program in itself is problematic and has been since the day it wass released.  Now we have the choice not to use it or live with the problems.  Because it is not supported, what you see is what we have.....until someone takes on the challenge of a rewrite.  This isn't likely because the core program is undergoing a make over  In process now for several years there is no release date which just means we are in limbo until something is changed.

As for the lock up in Cigar Box, first of all this is a kaCARS II program, not kaCARS.  Unfortunately Jeff is no longer supporting the program, but the problems seems to have been a Microsoft issue that has been quietly resolved.  I wish I could tell you more, but the fact is that I was about to roll back kaCARS to the free version when all of a sudden we were back on line. 

There very well may be some lingering issues, but it seems like most functions are now active and we are back to as close to normal as possible.

Please let us know your issues.....we will do our best to resolve them.

Henry
Title: Re: Cigar Box locking up mid flight
Post by: Rangerick on November 20, 2019, 08:33:17 PM
FYI... Cigar Box Shut down (Froze) for me this evening sometime prior to completion of the flight.??

Is there an option to file a manual PIREP for a Charter Flight ?  I tried unsuccessfully to do that.

"The flight code and number you entered is not a valid route!"