MP crashing intermittently with error relating to AresLog.txt (1 Viewer)

[Anthony Vaughan]

Has anyone seen this error in MP1 1.30:

[2022-11-03 07:38:54,863] [Log ] [10 ] [ERROR] - Exception: System.IO.IOException: The process cannot access the file 'C:\ProgramData\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\log\AresLog.txt' because it is being used by another process.

I haven't seen this error before 1.30. It happens only occasionally and on all client machines. MediaPortal closes and will usually start when next called.

This happens when MP is started. It seems to crash on initialization.

As it happens, I am using the DefaultWideHD skin with the Skin Default.

Tony

 

[CyberSimian]

Has anyone seen this error in MP1 1.30

I am still using MP 1.29, so my experience is not directly comparable to yours. However, my MP log file at DEBUG level does contain several references to "Ares", and the Ares log file was updated as recently as this morning (which is strange as I do not use the Ares skin).

If you don't want to use the Ares skin, I would suggest that you disable it/uninstall it. There does not seem to be an approved way of doing this, so I would suggest that you rename all files and folders that have "Ares" in the name. These are the files and folders that are present on my 1.29 system:

\Program Files (x86)\...\AresBackupRestore.exe
\Program Files (x86)\...\AresPlugin.dll
\ProgramData\...\cache\Ares
\ProgramData\...\Skin\Ares
\ProgramData\...\Log\AresLog.txt

If you rename these files and folders instead of deleting them, you can re-instate them if there is some adverse effect on MP (e.g. MP won't start).

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[doskabouter]

That is indeed strange, only thing I could guess it's some threading issue.
And somehow this plugin should be disabled if ares skin is not active... it's doing all kinds of stuff (and failing at it according to the log)
Unfortunately I can't find any sources for it, only the dll that is here: MediaPortal-1/AresPlugin.dll at master · MediaPortal/MediaPortal-1
@Developers : any idea where the sources of this dll are, and if it's possible to only enable usage of this dll when ares is active?

 

[Anthony Vaughan]

If you rename these files and folders instead of deleting them, you can re-instate them if there is some adverse effect on MP (e.g. MP won't start).

I tried what you suggested but the thing is that MP still tries to start AresPlugin.ImagePlugin. Can't see how to stop Ares being used even though it isn't used.

Unfortunately I can't find any sources for it

I can't find the source either.

The thing is that I never saw this error before 1.30 but can't for the life of me see why changes in the 1.30 release would lead to this error.

 

[doskabouter]

searching a bit more I found Support for Ares Skin
but I can't find either the sourcecode nor a way to disable it...

 

[Anthony Vaughan]

Okay. I think I've figured this out.

The bit that processes (loads and starts) plugins searches for DLLs in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\plugins\process" folder.

That's why renaming any existing DLLs doesn't work, because MP goes looking for matching processing for the given DLL names.

The fix is to simply delete the DLL you don't need to process - or move it somewhere else. So CyberSimian was had the right idea. You don't need to delete anything else because, so far as I can tell, removing AresPlugin.dll prevents any other processing of AresPlugin.

This fix has worked on my development machine so I'll test it now on my production system.

I notice from some other forum entries that there must have been a time when you could disable AresPlugin that no longer seems to exist.

Hope this helps.

Tony

 

[CyberSimian]

The bit that processes (loads and starts) plugins searches for DLLs in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\plugins\process" folder.

Thank you for investigating this and identifying the cause.

That's why renaming any existing DLLs doesn't work, because MP goes looking for matching processing for the given DLL names.

I was a bit imprecise in my previous post -- I should have said change the file extension of the files that you want to exclude. I have just tried this with the Ares DLL on my MP 1.29 system and it has eliminated all references to Ares in the log file.

When I test new files provided by the developers, my custom is to suffix the extension of the unwanted versions with a numeric digit. So suffix 0 is the version shipped with the product, suffix 1 is the first modified version, and so on. In this way it is easy to keep track of the different versions, and re-instate specific versions as necessary.

The only place that I have found where changing the file extension does not work is the Windows "Startup" folder, where Windows will try to start everything in that folder, regardless of its extension (so changing ".BAT" to ".BAT0" does not stop Windows trying to start that file).

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[Anthony Vaughan]

I was a bit imprecise in my previous post -- I should have said change the file extension of the files that you want to exclude. I have just tried this with the Ares DLL on my MP 1.29 system and it has eliminated all references to Ares in the log file.

Yes. You're right. I've found that removing access to AresPlugin.dll stops AresLog.txt being updated.

Although you could delete everything relating to Ares, I think you don't have to once you've removed AresPlugin.dll.

Thanks for the help.

Tony