The Ur-Quan Masters Discussion Forum

The Ur-Quan Masters Re-Release => Technical Issues => Topic started by: Mike D on September 17, 2005, 04:11:49 pm



Title: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Mike D on September 17, 2005, 04:11:49 pm
Hello!

I'm having a problem with the game and I was wondering if anyone else has had it and managed to fix it. The problem is that quasi-space portals don't appear at all, neither on the main visual display or on the map. While in hyperspace, the console in that runs alongside the main game app churns out the following text repeatedly:

Code:
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'game clock' blocking on semaphore 'Clock'
Thread 'game clock' awakens, released from semaphore 'Clock'
Thread 'game clock' blocking on semaphore 'Clock'
Thread 'game clock' awakens, released from semaphore 'Clock'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on semaphore 'Clock'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' awakens, released from semaphore 'Clock'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'
Thread 'quasispace portal manager' blocking on mutex 'Graphics'

This seems to correspond to bug report #750 (http://uqm.stack.nl/cgi-bin/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=750) but no solution has been found there yet. Can anyone help?

Thanks,

Mike


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Novus on September 17, 2005, 05:49:27 pm
I took a quick look at the relevant parts of the source code. This problem may have something to do with losing two weeks while the starbase is being rebuilt. Try to avoid starting the two-week jump between the 3rd and 17th of a month and see if that helps. I'll look into this further when I have the time.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Mike D on September 17, 2005, 06:00:40 pm
Thanks very much for the reply, I'll try that.  ;D


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Mike D on September 17, 2005, 07:25:55 pm
That didn't seem to work. I tried a fresh install and went looking for a quasi-space portal before rebuilding the starbase but the same problem occurs each time.

Thanks anyway.  :)


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: meep-eep on September 22, 2005, 02:24:39 am
Could you add a saved game of this happening to this bug report (http://uqm.stack.nl/cgi-bin/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=750)?


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: MikeD on September 22, 2005, 04:18:18 am
Done.

But since it doesn't seem to be happening to anyone else apart from the reporter of the bug, that suggests that the problem is probably on my end so a saved game of mine could work for everyone else.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: meep-eep on September 22, 2005, 04:34:05 am
A problem on your side may corrupt the saved game. It's happened before. It would give us something to work with, as it's hard to track down a bug we can't reproduce.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Zeep-Eeep on September 23, 2005, 04:52:20 am
I used to have this problem with the
original DOS game. For some reason
every 1 of 3 games I'd start, the portal
would not appear. Never figured out
why though.

If re-starting your game doesn't work, then
maybe someone here would send you a
save game file to see if that helps.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: meep-eep on September 23, 2005, 05:15:15 am
Hmm... I've seen this on the DOS version too. The problem there appeared to be a broken event queue, but if this is the case here, then I can't explain the debug messages the OP pasted.
If it is the same problem (described jhere (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~starcontrol/forum/index.php?topic=857.0) on the SCDB), there should be other symptoms. The most noticable one would be that no ships would ever show up in HyperSpace, even the Melnorme if you call for it.
Perhaps the OP could test this, though I may be able to reproduce it myself with the savegame, but so far I haven't had the time to look at the bug closely.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Novus on September 23, 2005, 02:58:39 pm
Hmm... I've seen this on the DOS version too. The problem there appeared to be a broken event queue, but if this is the case here, then I can't explain the debug messages the OP pasted.
AFAIK, Meep-eep, the Quasispace portal manager thread is responsible for adjusting the appearance of the portal while it is appearing or disappearing. As far as I can tell, this thread wakes up all the time and checks whether the portal should expand or contract based on a flag set by the portal event handlers.

The Quasispace portal event is very sensitive to problems in the event queue, as each ARILOU_ENTRANCE_EVENT sets a flag telling the Quasispace portal manager to expand the portal and sets an ARILOU_EXIT_EVENT to occur a few days later. The ARILOU_EXIT_EVENT then queues the next ARILOU_ENTRANCE_EVENT. If one of these gets skipped, the portal will never open/close any more.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: MikeD on September 23, 2005, 03:52:16 pm
If it is the same problem (described jhere (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~starcontrol/forum/index.php?topic=857.0) on the SCDB), there should be other symptoms. The most noticable one would be that no ships would ever show up in HyperSpace, even the Melnorme if you call for it.

This aspect of the game still functions as it should for me. I'm able to see all the graphics associated with another race in Hyperspace (blip on the radar, black hole following ship in Hyperspace) and I get pulled out of Hyperspace on contact just as I should.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: Novus on September 25, 2005, 06:55:50 pm
Have you tried the current CVS version of UQM, Mike? The Quasispace portal shows up for me when I load your save from the bug database, so using the CVS version might fix your problem.


Title: Re: Quasi-Space Portals Not Appearing
Post by: MikeD on September 26, 2005, 01:06:42 am
Have you tried the current CVS version of UQM, Mike? The Quasispace portal shows up for me when I load your save from the bug database, so using the CVS version might fix your problem.
Thanks for the suggestion, but it still didn't work. I did notice something though. It was a bit quiet in hyperspace while I was camping at the point where the portal would normally spawn. On the 17th, no portal appeared but a Slylandro suddenly appeared in hyperspace at that moment coming in from the edge of the little Hyperspace map. I waited another month but the same thing didn't happen. Maybe it's just a coincidence but it might be significant.  :)