Short, Silence Limited MP3 Files Corrupt, Crashing ProScan

[ca_tallguy]

Hello, apologies if this is a known issue. New around here but couldn't seem to find anything with search.

I have proscan set up with: "new row for each transmission" AND "skip silence" turned on. It seems that transmissions that are limited to almost zero by the threshold create MP3 files that are corrupt. Trying to play them causes ProScan to crash. The files appear in windows explorer but meta info about them do not appear, and media players are unable to play them.

I just tried to add one of the files to this message but the message board says "the uploaded file is empty" when I do.

[ca_tallguy]

Also, it seems that after a crash, the files that WERE recorded during the session are not showing up in ProScan. For example, the last crash was an hour ago, and ProScan ran for awhile and made a few dozen recordings (plus some bad ones), and none are showing since I reopened ProScan after the last crash.

[ca_tallguy]

I've switched to WAV files and ProScan isn't crashing any longer.

I pretty much love the software but that was a glitch that might have made it unworkable for me. Glad I figured out a workaround. Unfortunately, I don't think the WAV files are working as well as the mp3 files might have worked. The corrupt mp3 files were mostly short transmissions that were going to be skipped due to the silence limiting... which would have been REALLY REALLY nice to cut down on clutter/noise. I'll try to tinker to see if I can get it to do the same.

One of the nicest things was that my settings using mp3 files seemed to ignore the last cutout crackle, resulting in maybe 75% fewer files to sort through since that effectively ignored keyed mic bursts. It would be awesome if ProScan could have an explicit options to enable this:

(1) trim the last XX seconds/milliseconds of transmissions, discarding the row/sound file if it is otherwise under silence threshold.
(2) have a "minimum recording length" option so I could ignore transmissions that are too short to contain interesting info.
(3) have option to honor the "delay" set on a channel for continuation of recordings, mimicking what the scanner does when listening
(4) have a folder grouping option, as an extension to "per day" folders, that would "group transmissions separated by more than XXX minutes of silence" into distinct folders, named based on the start time of the earliest transmission within. This would be very helpful in isolating different incidents that generate flurries of transmissions close together.

Thanks for the great software! Now that it's not crashing since switching to WAV files, I may be ready to buy!

[Bob]

I will look at the suggestions when I'm in this area next. They look good.

I will also look at the corrupt mp3 files. Not sure when as I'm working on getting the next release out but it will be a high priority.

[Bob]

I will look at the suggestions when I'm in this area next. They look good.
[EDIT] Suggestions should be email to me so I can organize them and find them.

I will also look at the corrupt mp3 files. Not sure when as I'm working on getting the next release out but it will be a high priority.[/quote]

[EDIT]
There are two issues here. The files created during the recording process may be too short in length, not containing the frame header info and the second issue is during play back, the corrupted files caused ProScan to crash. I will look at this.

[ca_tallguy]

Thanks Bob! I will email suggestions to you.

BTW, I just noticed that Apple uses some logic in their iPhoto software, similar to what I outline in #4. They use a concept of "events" to help you group. You can set it to group things by day, or to break with XX amount of time between photo timestamps.

[Bob]

So far I don't see any mp3 file corruption. Basically the mp3 encoder spits out the data and the data is written to a file. I thought maybe it was missing mp3 frames but I don't think so now. I will keep looking but I have to get the next release out this week.

What OS are you running?
What is the mp3 bitrate set at?

[ca_tallguy]

I'm running vista home premium 64bit.

I can try diff bitrates and will post results. I think the problem may be the file is opened for writing, then nothing is written because of the silence limiting. And either the mp3 file being empty causes it to crash proscan or maybe the file isn't closed if nothing is ever written to it? I can try to replicate some files and will zip them up to post here if I can get that to work.

[ca_tallguy]

Trying to replicate again now but seems to be working now with a few diff settings I'm trying. ProScan isn't crashing when attempting to play those files any longer (windows media player still doesn't like them). I've attached two zip files -- one with new mp3 files that don't seem to be crashing the program, and another that MAY have files that previously were crashing.

I guess what I'd expect the behavior to be is that if a transmission ends up being empty, that the file is deleted and not kept at all -- same for the row in the audio recordings log. It appears the file is opened for writing when the transmission starts -- do you have logic to cleanup/remove if it's empty? That seems like one possible fix + feature enhancement. Though I can't seem to replicate the problem again now.

[ca_tallguy]

I seem to have reversed the file descriptions on the attachments above. "corrupt" archive has files that are possibly suspect.

[Bob]

Trying to replicate again now but seems to be working now with a few diff settings I'm trying. ProScan isn't crashing when attempting to play those files any longer (windows media player still doesn't like them). I've attached two zip files -- one with new mp3 files that don't seem to be crashing the program, and another that MAY have files that previously were crashing.

I guess what I'd expect the behavior to be is that if a transmission ends up being empty, that the file is deleted and not kept at all -- same for the row in the audio recordings log. It appears the file is opened for writing when the transmission starts -- do you have logic to cleanup/remove if it's empty? That seems like one possible fix + feature enhancement. Though I can't seem to replicate the problem again now.

I will be looking at this. I don't have logic that checks for 0 length files. There shouldn't be any 0 length files but there are so I will be doing work in this area so no 0 length files are created in the first place.

What recording mp3 settings and sample rate do you have so I can try to replicate the problem first.

[ca_tallguy]

Unfortunately, I can't really replicate any longer -- at least to point of crashing the program. I tried a variety of mp3 settings and none are crashing (though they still create the files).

However, I just tried to upgrade to 4.4 as I see that just came out and I'm throwing an exception when I open the program -- says something about encoder. I hit the "email" button so hopefully you have it. Let me know if you want me to send manually. Gonna check for other threads about the new version now, but wanted to mention because the encoder and ref's to mp3 in exception may be related.

[Bob]

Unfortunately, I can't really replicate any longer -- at least to point of crashing the program. I tried a variety of mp3 settings and none are crashing (though they still create the files).

However, I just tried to upgrade to 4.4 as I see that just came out and I'm throwing an exception when I open the program -- says something about encoder. I hit the "email" button so hopefully you have it. Let me know if you want me to send manually. Gonna check for other threads about the new version now, but wanted to mention because the encoder and ref's to mp3 in exception may be related.

I tried to send you the fx but your email server rejected it.

[ca_tallguy]

Hi Bob -- could you try again, and to the additional addresses I just tried to email to support address?

Also, if you are sending any kind of exe or installer, maybe rename the extension to TXT and tell me what I should change it back to. And/or zip the file?

Thanks so much.

-- Darin

[Bob]

Hi Bob -- could you try again, and to the additional addresses I just tried to email to support address?

Also, if you are sending any kind of exe or installer, maybe rename the extension to TXT and tell me what I should change it back to. And/or zip the file?

Thanks so much.

-- Darin

Try the latest version. I did work in this area.