[shiihs]

My habit is to simply close the cover and put everything to sleep.  It rarely, if ever goes for more than a day in sleep mode, but 20+ hours is common as many of my rehearsals start at about the same time and run for about 2 hours.

Same for me. I do close down MobileSheets application between rehearsals and performances, but do not typically restart the tablet, and after a few weeks MobileSheets will just close down in the middle of using it, and refuse to start up again until the tablet is restarted. I wonder if there's some cache building up or something along those lines that could cause a problem over time (and which is cleaned up during reboot). Anyway, I'm now trying to make it a habit to restart my tablet just before a concert keeping my fingers crossed that's the magic workaround  .

[mikerice123]

Mike, is there an ETA for the new release, or is there something I could test for you? I'm getting into a busy rehearsal schedule preceding a concert, and need to be confident that my music isn't going to disappear.

I've continued to do some testing. I have a lot of Android apps on my Chromebook, so I temporarily removed all of them except MobileSheets, and I had a crash anyway, so I don't think it's interference from another Android app.

I also think it's possible that there may be a connection between network connectivity and the crashes. This thread started with a hypothesis that 3G might be the culprit, but I'm wondering if it's broader than that. There is one venue where I use MobileSheets where I always have a Wifi connection, and one venue where I almost never do (unless I use my phone hotspot). Over the months, the crashes have been more common at the venue where I have a connection. I'm going to try keeping Wifi off when I'm there. It will take a while, probably weeks, to form any conclusions, but I am working on it.

Now that you have published the update that includes the option "Resume Viewing Song or Setlist at Startup" ("Settings" -> "Library Settings" -> very last option), it has made all the difference in the world to address this issue.  Now for me when this issue occurs, and MobleSheets gets restarted, there is less than a half second delay until MobileSheets returns to the song and exact page I was on.  So I am very grateful for your adding this setting.

By the way, because this was essentially a dealbreaker for me during performances, I installed a different sheet music viewing and editing app.  Surprisingly, this other app would also get restarted automatically at the exact same moment as MobileSheets.  I tested this on another Chromebook as well and got the same result.  So this clearly means that the Chromebook has been the source of the problem, and not MobileSheets.  So, to that end, I thank you for adding this setting, which essentially overcomes this problem that certain Chromebooks have created.

[Zubersoft]

I'm glad to hear that Mike. I've certainly done all I can to alleviate the problem.

Mike

[tbclark3]

By the way, because this was essentially a dealbreaker for me during performances, I installed a different sheet music viewing and editing app.  Surprisingly, this other app would also get restarted automatically at the exact same moment as MobileSheets.  I tested this on another Chromebook as well and got the same result.  So this clearly means that the Chromebook has been the source of the problem, and not MobileSheets.  So, to that end, I thank you for adding this setting, which essentially overcomes this problem that certain Chromebooks have created.

I am happy to hear that Mike's fix works and only takes half a second. I haven't experienced the crash since I started turning off Wifi to play. However, I also haven't been playing much due to a broken hand, so perhaps it's lack of opportunity. 

I am really curious about "restarted at the exact same moment as Mobile Sheets".  Can you go into some more detail? Were both of the apps running on the same Chromebook?  Was it in tablet mode? Which app was foreground? What other app(s) were running at the time? Was Wifi active? Anything else you can add?

[mikerice123]

Sure, I'll elaborate on all that.  Both my wife and I have the same Chromebook and experience the same issue.  We thought it was random until one day we both had our Chromebooks open at the same time but  in different rooms of the house.  When the MobileSheets re-start occurred on my Chromebook, my wife yelled out that MobileSheets restarted on her Chromebook as well.  Because these both occurred at the exact same time, that led me to think that maybe there was a time-of-day component to this.  So on a spreadsheet I started tracking when the restart occurred, both for her Chromebook and mine, and I soon found a pattern.
The pattern was that at four different time periods each day--early morning, morning, early evening, and night.  Typically, the restart would occur exactly one minute later than the previous day, at least for three of the four time periods, and for the fourth, the restart occurred exactly one minute earlier than the previous day.  This pattern was so consistent that I could call out to my wife a couple minutes before one of those time periods as to which minute the re-start would occur, and it would always happen as predicted.  This prediction became important for group rehearsals and especially for live performances, so that we could have a hard copy of the song on our stand available to us during the re-start.

Now, to your specific questions.  I installed both sheet reader apps on both our Chromebooks and would have one of the apps active on one Chromebook and the other active on the other Chromebook right beside each other during one of those time periods mentioned above.  Sure enough, the re-start occurred on both Chromebooks at the exact same moment.

Regarding tablet mode, I found that the re-start occurred equally in either tablet mode or laptop mode--no difference at all.  Also it didn't matter whether MobileSheets was the active program or whether it was in the background.  If it was in the background, then immediately after the re-start, the Chromebook switched the active program to be MobileSheets.

I tested having zero other apps running, and that made no difference.  It also made no difference as to whether Wi-fi was on or off.  The re-start occurred on schedule, regardless.

I can add one other thing I learned.  If the Chromebook was asleep at the time of the "scheduled" re-start, and prior to going asleep it was in the background, that when I woke the Chromebook up,  MobileSheets automatically re-started and moved from being in the background to becoming the active application.  So, my conclusion is that the Chromebook is doing something four times a day that either causes MobileSheets to re-start, or creates some kind of setting or state that upon wake-up, also causes MobileSheets to re-start.

I would suggest you keep your own log and see if indeed on your Chromebook there is a pattern of times in which this occurs.  In my case, while I'm still keeping a log, it's need has diminished significantly since Mike made the last update.

I hope this addresses all your questions.  If not, I can elaborate further.

[tbclark3]

@mikerice123, it's a GREAT response, and it answers all of my questions. Thank you for taking the time to do this testing, summarize it, and share it.  I think your tests prove that the bug is in MobileSheets and not ChromeOS.  However, I provided an AI with background information, and your latest post, and posed that question.  Here is what I got:

Analysis: MobileSheets Pro Crash Pattern on Chromebook

The detailed logs reveal a conflict between the MobileSheets Pro Android application and a regularly scheduled internal process within the ChromeOS operating system. The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the MobileSheets Pro application is the component at fault.

1. The Timing Points to Normal System Jitter

The pattern of the crash—occurring four times a day, simultaneously across multiple Chromebooks, with a small, consistent daily drift of ±1 minute—is highly significant.

• Synchronization: The simultaneous nature confirms the trigger is an absolute, time-synchronized system event, not a random local hardware failure.
  
• Time-Skew (Jitter): This precise, drifting schedule is common and is likely a deliberate feature of a standard ChromeOS or Google service. It’s known as time jitter or skewing, and it prevents every device worldwide from hitting a central server (e.g., for logging, maintenance, or synchronization) at the exact same second, which would cause an overload.
  

Therefore, the Chromebook is not doing anything abnormal; it is running a predictable, routine, system-level task designed to occur at these specific, time-skewed intervals.

2. Why MobileSheets Pro is the Failure Point

The fault lies with MobileSheets because it is the only application failing to handle this routine system event:

• Exclusivity of the Crash: If the system event were a fatal flaw (like a VM reboot or kernel crash), all running Android apps or the entire OS would be affected. The fact that the crash is exclusive to MobileSheets proves the app has a vulnerability to the specific, low-level process that runs at those times.
  
• Application-Specific Reaction: The restart is not a generic error. The app receives a system interrupt (likely related to process or clock management) and crashes fatally, then uses its internal logic to relaunch itself and force it to the foreground. The aggressive way the app handles the interruption—a sudden restart—is coded into MobileSheets.
  
• The Problem is the App's Stability: The fact that the issue persists and affects a variety of Chromebook brands confirms it is a bug in how the MobileSheets Android code interacts with the ChromeOS Android Virtual Machine (ARCVM). MobileSheets is not robust enough to save its state and gracefully survive the momentary disruption caused by the scheduled system maintenance.
  

In conclusion, a routine ChromeOS event is acting as a predictable "stress test" four times a day. Only MobileSheets Pro is failing this test, which makes the app's coding the root cause of the performance interruption.

[Zubersoft]

I don't trust AI with anything. It's regularly wrong about things in a significant way, hallucinates things and makes up facts, and generally is not very useful in my opinion.

mikerice posted this: 

By the way, because this was essentially a dealbreaker for me during performances, I installed a different sheet music viewing and editing app.  Surprisingly, this other app would also get restarted automatically at the exact same moment as MobileSheets.  I tested this on another Chromebook as well and got the same result.  So this clearly means that the Chromebook has been the source of the problem, and not MobileSheets.  So, to that end, I thank you for adding this setting, which essentially overcomes this problem that certain Chromebooks have created.

So the AI just completely disregarded that incredibly important piece of information showing that it happens to apps other than MobileSheets.

Mike

[pnich]

Some users have reported an issue where they will load a song or setlist, and after 2-30 seconds, MobileSheetsPro will randomly return to the library screen without any user interaction. A solution has finally been identified - if the device has a SIM card in it, you must remove the SIM card to eliminate this problem. I'm not sure why a SIM card would cause these severe problems, but it seems like it's causing the OS to restart MobileSheetsPro automatically. 

Mike

I don't have a SIM card, but mine went back to the library screen soon after I performed an "Import" of 1 song and added it to a "Set List"

[Zubersoft]

Does that happen every time you load the setlist even after closing the app and restarting it?

Mike

[cgreiner]

Does that happen every time you load the setlist even after closing the app and restarting it?

Mike

I am using Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+. After the most recent update, in my setlists, moving to the next song crashes the software and returns me to the tablet's menu. I have turned off wifi, bluetooth and rebooted but still same issue. I've been using this software since 2017 with very few issues. Any help soon will be appreciated as I have a gig on the 26th.

[Zubersoft]

Please see this post: https://www.zubersoft.com/mobilesheets/f...l#pid59873

Mike