svn:E160013 error while installing psychtoolbox

Programming Help
1

Hi All,
I am trying to install the psychtoolbox by calling the function DownloadPsychtoolbox.m which I have downloaded from the psychtoolbox.org website. I am using Matlab 2013b version on linux-ubuntu 13 system.

Until May , I was using Matlab 13b with psychtoolbox 3.0.9 but in the process of renewing the matlab license and reinstalling matlab, I think, the psychtoolbox got detached from matlab.

I am following the steps in the website.

However I get two errors:
svn: E160013: Unable to connect to a repository at URL
‘http://psychtoolbox-3.googlecode.com/svn/beta/Psychtoolbox’

PLEASE HELP!! Thanks a lot in advance

Best,
Sujata

2

What is linux-ubuntu 13? If you need the very old and unsupported 3.0.9 version, see bottom of Psychtoolbox-3 - Flavors and Versions . Older versions than that no longer exist.

3

Hi @mariokleiner
Thanks for your reply.
I see that the older version that I have been using so far is 3.0.9. I have downloaded from the link you shared.

However, when i open the matlab → go to the psychtoolbox folder → run the script DownloadPsychtoolbox.m , it throws an error that psychtoolbox folder is already there.

Yes, i can see the folder…but how do I now connect it with the matlab so that matlab recognizes the psychtoolbox functions that I am including in the script?

Your quick response will be very very helpful. Thank you so much!

Best,
Sujata

4

It literally explains that under the link. You cd() into the Psychtoolbox subfolder and run SetupPsychtoolbox and hope for the best.

5

Hi @mariokleiner
Thanks, again. I have run the setupPsychtoolbox() as mentioned in the link.
However, I get a big red and yellow warning screen when I run my expeirment-script.
The screen disappears and following are the errors I get:

WARNING: Querying rasterbeam-position doesn’t work on your setup!
(Returns a constant value 4352)
WARNING: This can happen if Psychtoolbox gets the mapping of connected
displays to graphics card
WARNING: outputs wrong. See ‘help DisplayOutputMappings’ for tips on
how to resolve this problem.

WARNING: Couldn’t determine end-line of vertical blanking interval for
your display! Trouble with beamposition queries?!?

WARNING: Detected end-line is -1, which is either lower or more than
25% higher than vbl startline 768 → Out of sane range!

PTB-INFO: OpenGL-Renderer is NVIDIA Corporation :: GeForce GT
610/PCIe/SSE2 :: 4.3.0 NVIDIA 319.60
PTB-INFO: VBL startline = 768 , VBL Endline = -1
PTB-INFO: Beamposition queries unsupported or defective on this
system. Using basic timestamping as fallback: Timestamps returned by
Screen(‘Flip’) will be less robust and accurate.
PTB-INFO: Measured monitor refresh interval from VBLsync = 16.673980
ms [59.973684 Hz]. (50 valid samples taken, stddev=0.031237 ms.)
PTB-INFO: Reported monitor refresh interval from operating system =
16.678063 ms [59.959000 Hz].
PTB-INFO: Small deviations between reported values are normal and no
reason to worry.

----- ! PTB - WARNING: SYNCHRONIZATION TROUBLE ! ----

One or more internal checks (see Warnings above) indicate that
queries of rasterbeam position are not properly working for your setup.

Psychtoolbox will work around this by using a different timing algorithm,
but it will cause Screen(‘Flip’) to report less accurate/robust timestamps
for stimulus timing.
Read ‘help BeampositionQueries’ for more info and troubleshooting tips.

PTB-INFO: Support for fast OffscreenWindows enabled.
1 lhs

data:
0, 0 1
1, 0 0
2, 0 0
3, 0 0
4, 0 0
5, 0 0
6, 0 0
7, 0 1
mask:11111111 val:10000001
mask:00000000 val:00000000
mask:00000000 val:00000000
mask:00000000 val:00000000
addr 0: 49168, 0
setting up access to pport
iopl: -1 (Operation not permitted)
Error using ppMex
couldn’t claim address space

Error in pp (line 316)
input = inv(ppMex([uint64(ports(:))
uint64(addr(:))],[bitSpecs(:,1:2) uint8(output(:))]));

Error in Send_TTL_Now (line 7)
pp(uint8([2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9]), TTL, slowChecks, port, address); %send trigger

Error in IM_LA (line 56)
Send_TTL_Now(Resp_1) %Send test TTL and clear port

6

The red and yellow warning screen is related to the first bit of the output you posted, see the help BeampositionQueries it points to for what to do.

The errors you show for the rest are about the parallel port:
iopl: -1 (Operation not permitted)
Error using ppMex
couldn’t claim address space

I assume you have gotten this code from someone, its best you contact them about how to get that to work.

7

The warning output tells you how to deal with the timestamping error → Read what’s written, follow the instructions. ppMex is not even a Psychtoolbox function, so i can only guess

If you’d need further advice from myself, help PsychPaidSupportAndServices tells you how to buy up to 30 minutes of paid support.

-mario

8

Hi @dcnieho and @mariokleiner

The code used to work well until last month. Matlab license expired and i had to reinstall matlab. Psychtoolbox got removed from the path. And then the problems started after this.

I did yesterday’s process again. In addition to the errors and warnings I posted yesterday, these following errors also pop out in the matlab-command window (sorry, I missed this portion):

Error using ppMex
couldn’t claim address space

Error in pp (line 316)
input = inv(ppMex([uint64(ports(:)) uint64(addr(:))],[bitSpecs(:,1:2)
uint8(output(:))]));

Error in Send_TTL_Now (line 7)
pp(uint8([2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9]), TTL, slowChecks, port, address); %send trigger

Error in IM_LA (line 56)
Send_TTL_Now(Resp_1) %Send test TTL and clear port

is send_TTL_Now function not a psychtoolbox function? I am using it to send triggers from stimulus-presentation PC to the other PC which is used for recording realtime EEG signals. We use Iwave software in the other PC.

Best,
Sujata

9

Hi Sujata,

That sucks! Sadly indeed ppMex and Send_TTL_Now are not part of Psychtoolbox. I don’t recognize ppMex from somewhere, so don’t know anything about it. You’d have to check with whoever developed those how to get them to work.

Google does find some things:
https://github.com/benoitberanger/parport_cenir

https://jianchen.info/send-triggers-via-parallel-port-in-linux-using-pp-ppmex-c/

https://sccn.ucsd.edu/pipermail/eeglablist/2016/011194.html

Maybe that or further googling gets you somewhere.

Best,
Dee

10

Hi Dee,

Thanks for your quick response…yes, I am looking at those files.
However, I want to know why the psychtoolbox path does not get added permanently in matlab after i run the script setPsychtoolbox()?

Thanks,
Sujata

11

I tried to install the psychtoolbox again , this time from Neurodevian: Psychtoolbox-3 - Using PTB on Linux

it throws error: E:unable to locate package matlab-psychtoolbox

so, i first tried to install the neurodebian: sudo apt-get install neurodebian…

again error: E:unable to locate package neurodebian

why?

12

because you didn’t read the instructions carefully and misspelled the
commands, look again

13

Because NeuroDebian does not support such ancient old versions of Psychtoolbox, or older Linux distributions than Debian 9 or Ubuntu 16.04-LTS (i don’t know your distro, as you only made non-sensical statements wrt. that), and also matlab-psychtoolbox-3 would be the name, not matlab-psychtoolbox.

But also this action made no sense in the first place, given that we told you already how to proceed (-> Read help DisplayOutputMappings carefully, as the software literally told you to, as well as help BeampositionQueries as Dee told you), and “reinstall everything” was not the advice, and will certainly not help with ppmex, a file that doesn’t even relate to Psychtoolbox. It is pretty clear that whatever you did was not just reinstall Matlab, as that could not have caused any of the remaining problems you reported. A script setPsychtoolbox() does not exist btw., but SetupPsychtoolbox() would save the path properly, unless your Matlab’s pathdef.m file does not have the correct file permissions, in which case the function will have given you troubleshooting instructions.

That ppMex error message sounds like the iopl() syscall is failing due to lack of permissions. One either needs to be started sudo as root (bad idea!) or the Matlab executable must have CAP_SYS_RAWIO capability assigned, cfe. “man setcap” a la
sudo setcap cap_sys_rawio+eip /path/to/realmatlabexecutable

Anyway, any further advice needs paid support.
-mario

14

Thank you, Dee and Mario…I will look at your comments carefully.
Thank you!

Sujata

15

Hi @mariokleiner
while I am trying to work on your comments, i would also like to know how much is the paid service per session.And each session is for how long?

Thanks ,
Sujata

16

See here for details: Psychtoolbox | Open source solution

In short, current rate is 150 Euros + tax for up to 30 minutes of my work time. You pay for my time, not for a guaranteed successful result. Every started additional hour costs 300 Euros + tax unless you have a long term membership discount (which you won’t have if your lab doesn’t have a support membership since many months already).

-mario

17

Hi @mariokleiner thank you for your response…I will get back to you shortly.

Best,
Sujata