We Keep Coding

The new Input System doesn't trigger anything anymore

This post is shamelessly a copy/paste from my post on the Unity Forums : https://forum.unity.com/threads/input-system-doesnt-trigger-anything-anymore.717386/, but Stack Overflow seems more active
TL;DR : InputSystem worked some days ago, don't trigger anything anymore, halp.
I tried the new Input System some days ago, and that's really neat ! I did a lot of stuff, trying to understand the best way to use it, and, in the end, I had a character jumping and moving everywhere, that was cool ! Then, I merged my code in our develop branch and went to bed.
Today, I want to continue my code, but my character doesn't move anymore, Actions are not triggered (even if inputs are detected in debugger) and I really don't know why. Either the code merge overwrote some important settings (I know what you're thinking and yes, the "Active Input Handling" is set on "Both" and I tried only running the preview) or I did something important during my little tests and I didn't realize.
So I decided to try to reproduce my steps on a fresh new project, maybe you guys can help me figure what do I do wrong ?
1/ Create a new 2D project (via the Hub)
2/ Install the latest Package (version 0.9.0)
3/ Click Yes on that message prompt to activate the new Input management in the settings
4/ Restart Unity Editor since it didn't restart even if the message said it would and check the project settings (yes, it's on "Both", and yes, my Scripting Runtime Version is 4.0)
5/ Create a new GameObject and add a PlayerInput on it
6/ Click on "Open Input Settings" and create an "InputSettings" asset
7/ Click on "Create Actions..." to create my ActionMap asset
8/ Create a "TestAction" on my "Player" ActionMap and set it to the key "t"
9/ Create a new Script "TestScript" that contains a OnTestAction() method (that only logs "test") and enables the test map/action (just to be sure) :
using UnityEngine;
using UnityEngine.InputSystem;
using UnityEngine.InputSystem.PlayerInput;
public class TestScript : MonoBehaviour
{
void Start()
{
InputActionMap playerActionMap = GetComponent<PlayerInput>().actions.GetActionMap("Player");
playerActionMap.Enable();
playerActionMap.GetAction("TestAction").Enable(); //Just to be sure
}
public void OnTestAction()
{
Debug.Log("test");
}
}
10/ Pressing "Play" and spamming "T" like a madman to try to display a debug (note that, in the debugger, a User is created, my "t" presses are detected, my TestAction exists and is mapped on the "t" key but no debug is displayed
It's probably a silly problem, but it's driving me crazy, what do I do wrong ? It's even more infuriating that it worked some days ago !
Additional information :
- Switching the Input Management from "Both" to "New Input System (preview) does nothing
- Checking in Update() is my action is enabled returns "True" every frame
- Checking in Update() is my action is triggered returns "False" every frame
- Using action.started/triggered/performed does nothing (I tried also switching to UnityEvent or C# events for this) :
public class TestScript : MonoBehaviour
{
InputAction a;
void Start()
{
InputActionMap playerActionMap = GetComponent<PlayerInput>().actions.GetActionMap("Player");
playerActionMap.Enable();
a = playerActionMap.GetAction("TestAction");
a.Enable(); //Just to be sure
a.started += OnTriggeredTestAction;
a.performed += OnTriggeredTestAction;
a.canceled += OnTriggeredTestAction;
}
public void OnTestAction()
{
Debug.Log("test");
}
public void OnTriggeredTestAction(InputAction.CallbackContext ctx)
{
Debug.Log("test triggered");
}
}
Injecting directly the InputActionReference of my TestAction and using it does nothing
Forcing "Default Control Scheme" and "Default Action Map" does nothing
Using BroadcastMessage or UnityEvents doesn't work

You probably tried to import a new input system package for multiple input devices compatibility. These types of errors are due to conflict between old and new input system packages and are probably resolved in the latest updates.
To resolve this issue, Go to Edit -> Project Settings->Player->Under Other Settings under Configuration is the option Active Input Handling. Select Both. Unity will restart. Now your problem should be solved. You will be able to use old input system packages and the new ones also simultaneously.

Check for rogue users in the input debugger
I was having very similar symptoms (Input System would randomly just stop sending callbacks). When I opened up the input debugger, it was registering the key presses, but the callbacks were never being called in my script.
Restarting Unity didn't help.
Rebooting didn't help.
I also discovered in the input debugger that there were 2 "users" in the input system and (by process of disabling Game Objects in the scene one at a time) discovered that I had accidentally attached another copy of my Input Action Asset to a different Game Object in the scene and that Unity was registering this other object as a 2nd player or "user", which was assigned all the input action bindings I was trying to capture.
The rogue Action Asset was essentially intercepting the actions, preventing the callbacks from being called on the intended script. I don't know if that's your particular issue, but maybe it will help someone else who (like me) has spent hours pouring through forums, looking for a solution to this elusive problem.
An easy way to tell if you have the same problem is to open the input debugger and see if the desired actions are actually mapped to the user of interest.
Screen clip of input debugger:
For me, there was an unexpected User #1 and only one of the users (not the intended one) actually had keys bound to the desired actions

Posting just incase others run into this issue, as this solved my problem. Make sure to call Enable() for it to start routing events.
//Create a and set the reference
private InputControls _inputMapping;
private void Awake() => _inputMapping = new InputControls();
//Route and Un-route events
private void OnEnable() => _inputMapping.Enable();
private void OnDisable() => _inputMapping.Disable();

I don't know if this will work for you but it worked for me and I was having the same issue.
I had created 2 control schemes. Mobile and Pc. Mobile required touch screen and PC required keyboard and Mouse. Doing this made my Mobile input event stop firing. So adding the Gamepad to my Mobile Control scheme allowed the events to fire again.
TLDR. Check your control scheme make sure it allows for the inputs your binding to.

I had a similar problem, reproduced with exactly the steps described in the question.
In my case, I forgot to set control schemes.
The problem was fixed after adding them.
To do so:
Open your Input Action Asset.
Select a control scheme, in the upper left corner. (say, Keyboard) (if you haven't added a control scheme to begin with, your problem may be different than mine)
Go Right Click > Edit Control Scheme.
EditControlScehme Screen Img
Click on the plus sign to add a control scheme to the list.
Add control scheme to the list Screen Img
Select the control scheme you want to add. (in this case, Keyboard)
Select control scheme Screen Img
Should look like this:
Added control scheme Screen Img
You're all set. Save everything and the problem should be fixed.
Play your game and it should work.

As of at least Unity 2020.1.2 and Input System 1.0.0 the input system will randomly stop working correctly. The only fix I'm aware of is restarting Unity.

In coded ui how do you correctly retrieve a browser window that contains an embedded Adobe PDF reader in browser

I'am running across this issue when I'm debugging or running my coded UI automation project, where i get the exception labeled "{"COM object that has been separated from its underlying RCW cannot be used." System.Exception {System.Runtime.InteropServices.InvalidComObjectException}" everytime i come from a browser window that contains a pdf reader embedded in it. This happens every time I retrieve the window and try to click back. It barfs when i perform the back method on it. I've tried different things but none has worked including the playback wait.
var hereIsmypdf = ReturnPDFDoc();
public BrowserWindow ReturnPDFDoc()
{
Playback.Wait(1000);
var myPdFdoc = GlobalVariables.Browser;
return myPdFdoc;
}
hereIsmypdf.Back();

The only way i was able to get around this issue was not to use the BrowserWindow class. I ended up using the WinWindow class and just getting the tab of the window from it. The BrowserWindow class seemed to trigger the exception "COM object that has been separated from its underlying RCW cannot be used." System.Exception {System.Runtime.InteropServices.InvalidComObjectException}" everytime i tried to retrieve it. I hope this helps someone one or maybe someone has a better way to handle this issue.
For the people that voted my question down, i really did try to figure it out. Sorry i wasnt clear about what i was asking the community or couldn't properly articulate what this pain was. I'm sure someone probably is going through the same pain i did and having a hard time articulating whats going on.
Here is my code on what i ended up doing
public WinTabPage ReturnPDFDoc()
{
WinWindow Wnd = new WinWindow();
Wnd.SearchProperties[BrowserWindow.PropertyNames.ClassName] = "IEFrame";
WinTabList tabRoWlist = new WinTabList(Wnd);
tabRoWlist.SearchProperties[WinTabPage.PropertyNames.Name] = "Tab Row";
WinTabPage myTab = new WinTabPage(tabRoWlist);
myTab.SearchConfigurations.Add(SearchConfiguration.AlwaysSearch);
myTab.SearchProperties[WinTabPage.PropertyNames.Name] = "something";
//UITestControlCollection windows = newWin.FindMatchingControls();
return myTab;
}

Why is PictureBox.Load locking image on some systems?

(Please see the edit on the bottom of the question, if you do not want to read the whole story.)
Hi,
I am new to stackoverflow. Don’t get me wrong, I use it quite often. But up until now I never actually posted something. This is because I did not have something new/useful to say and my English is not that good. The first thing (might have) changed, the latter did not.
I ran into a problem at a customer's Windows 7 system quite recently. I was shipping a C# .Net 4.0 Windows Forms application via ClickOnce. Basically, it is an application that creates a bitmap file and shows it to the user. If the bitmap exists prior to the creation, the existing file gets deleted first. After that the new file is created and loaded by a PictureBox.
The following thing occurred at the customer’s system: After starting the application the first creation succeeds – the second and all following ones do not. The file cannot be deleted, because some process is blocking it. This process is the application itself.
System.IO.IOException: The process cannot access the file “filename” because it is being used by another process.
Well, of course that is nothing unusual. The thing is I tested the application on several systems. None showed this exception. And until now I am unable to see an code error.
So I looked a little bit closer on the customer’s system: The only difference I could find is, that they changed the users folder so that they are not located on the windows partition, but on a different one (C:\Users --> D:\Users). I searched for an instruction on the internet and did the same thing on one of my test systems. To my surprise I got the same exception when I ran my application on it.
With that I could change my code so that the exception does not occur anymore. But I do not understand why that is. So maybe there is something wrong with my code and the error just reveals itself under that special circumstances. Or maybe the code is okay and the reason lies somewhere else. I just hoped that you might be able to help me.
So here is some code I put together, that shows the same behavior. I used 3 buttons, an OpenFileDialog and a PictureBox on a Form. First thing to do is to choose an image file. By pressing one of the two remaining buttons it gets copied into the main folder of the application. After being copied it is shown by the PictureBox. By the way, it does not seem to matter if it is a ClickOnce-application or a “normal” one.
String m_FileName;
private void btnChooseFile_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) {
if(openFileDialog1.ShowDialog() == System.Windows.Forms.DialogResult.OK) { // If file was chosen, set file name for later use and activate buttons.
m_FileName = "Test" + Path.GetExtension(openFileDialog1.FileName);
}
}
private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) {
// This is not working.
if(this.pictureBox1.Image != null) {
//Image img = this.pictureBox1.Image; // I was not sure, if maybe the pictureBox somehow prevents the disposing of the image, as long as it's assigned to it.
//this.pictureBox1.ImageLocation = null; // So I set them null, both the image and the image location.
//this.pictureBox1.Image = null;
//img.Dispose(); // Then I disposed the image.
this.pictureBox1.Image.Dispose(); // The short version. It is not working either way.
this.pictureBox1.Image = null;
}
(new FileInfo(openFileDialog1.FileName)).CopyTo(m_FileName, true); // But still this is where the Exception occurs.
this.pictureBox1.Load(m_FileName);
}
private void button2_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) {
//This is working.
if(this.pictureBox1.Image != null) {
//Image img = this.pictureBox1.Image;
//this.pictureBox1.Image = null;
//img.Dispose();
this.pictureBox1.Image.Dispose();
this.pictureBox1.Image = null;
}
(new FileInfo(openFileDialog1.FileName)).CopyTo(m_FileName, true);
pictureBox1.Image = Image.FromFile(m_FileName);
}
What happens now is the following: If I start the application and click button1 twice, I will get the exception (on the second click). If I start it and click button2 twice, I will not. If I start the application and click buttons1 first and after that button2, I will get the exception. So, the Picture.Load-Function somehow blocks the file, even if I dispose it.
When I searched on the internet, I found an article from microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/309482/en-us. But it does not hit the bull's eye.
Take into account, that both versions are working on all my test machines. I just get the exception when I change the users folder to a non-windows-partition.
Why is that? And where is the difference in the presented versions?
Edit
Okay, because of the first and only reaction so far, it seems to me, that it is still not clear, what really happens: If I take the above code, put it in a Windows Forms application, compile it and run it on different computers (at work, at home, does not matter) it works - both button1 and button2 (with the Click-functions linked to them) can be used as often as I like - no exception thrown. If I run the application on a computer, where I changed the users folder, and click button1 the second time - bam - IOException, file locked by process. Button2 works as long as I do not press button1.
The first answer implies, that I should get the locking on every system. But I DO NOT (as long as I do not change the users folder)! I tested it on every single computer I could get my hands on - no IOException. I set up a new system, just to rule out some special changes to the systems in my company - both buttonx_Click functions worked - no exception either. I even compiled the program on another computer - same behavior. The only three systems to throw that exception were the ones with the changed users folder.
So far I have no clue, why this difference in behavior occurs. Can somebody help me?
Anybody?

Yes, this is normal. Happens on any operating system, doesn't have anything to do with the Users folder location. The PictureBox.Load() method was intented to be used to load images from locations other than the file system. Like a web site. Which is slow, it avoids freezing the UI while the download is taking place.
It internally uses a FileStream when it discovers that the url you pass is actually a file and not a website name. This FileStream does not get disposed until the PictureBox itself is disposed or you call the Load() method again. A requirement because Image.FromStream() requires the stream to remain readable until the image is no longer used. It is this FileStream that keeps a lock on the file. Disposing the PictureBox.Image is not enough to also dispose the FileStream, the Image object doesn't know that it is being displayed inside a picture box.
There are several ways to solve this problem:
Use the Image property instead of Load(), assign it from Image.FromFile(). Disposing the Image now also releases the lock on the file. As you found out
Keep a dummy image around, one that perhaps displays a "Loading..." bitmap. Load() it first to release the lock on the file
Dispose the PictureBox and recreate it.

This works and unlocks the file
Image img= Image.FromFile(mypath);
Graphics g = pictureBox1.CreateGraphics();
g.DrawImage(img,0,0);
img.Dispose();

Webcams, C#, and a reliable wrapper

I'm in dire need of a replacement for a wrapper being used in a C# application. Basically, what we need to do is attach a webcam feed to one of two picture boxes. This will be used to take still images at the push of a button, which may detach the camera feed and attach the still image to that picture box, then reattach the camera feed later. We had previously found some free code to utilize with a CaptureDevice.cs file and Pinvoke.dll to tie it into avicap32.dll. Unfortunately, this seems to have random, intermittent errors that cannot be reliably reproduced. It's just too flaky. At some random point, one of those picture boxes may go black and won't show the feed until the picture is taken, at which point the proper picture is attached to the picture box. Then, even if there's only one webcam attached, it'll keep prompting for the webcam to be selected, something it wouldn't do otherwise.
Quite frankly, I'm surprised and dismayed that Microsoft hasn't included anything in .NET to cover webcam video feeds. I'm looking for something reliable and relatively simple to implement to replace this buggy webcam system.

It is time to use MediaCapture object. Use this sample for MS Windows 10 https://github.com/Microsoft/Windows-universal-samples/tree/master/Samples/CameraStarterKit/
And read this article as well http://www.codepool.biz/csharp-camera-api-video-frame.html

May I suggest
http://www.emgu.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
I have used OpenCV in many C++ libraries and it seems to work very well for webcams from other things I've tried. Emgu is just a C# wrapper for OpenCV.
Here is a sample project to try it out on. It's very basic and simple, but should work right away.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18919663/vs%20samples/OpenCVCSharpTest.zip (just uploaded)
Sample:
using Emgu.CV;
using Emgu.CV.Structure;
...
public partial class Form1 : Form
{
public Capture cvWebCam;
public Form1()
{
InitializeComponent();
try
{
cvWebCam = new Capture();
timer1.Start();
}
catch
{
Console.WriteLine("Default camera not found or could not start");
}
}
private void timer1_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
if (cvWebCam != null)
using (Emgu.CV.Image<Bgr, byte> frame = cvWebCam.QueryFrame())
{
pictureBox1.BackgroundImage = frame.ToBitmap();
}
}
}

Try DirectShow.net- it's a free wrapper library to access DirectShow functionality from .NET:
http://directshownet.sourceforge.net
Its code samples contain a sample app for capturing video from webcams, too:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/directshownet/files/DirectShowSamples/

How to get selected text from an active application, without using a clipboard

What am I doing:
My main intent is to enable user friendly text to speech for personal use on Win 7. Approach should work in Google Chrome, VS and Eclipse.
Code example:
Following code creates global keyboard hook for ctrl + alt + space, called hookEvent. If event fires, it starts/stops speaking clipboard contents ( that can be updated with ctrl + c ).
/// <summary>
/// KeyboardHook from: http://www.liensberger.it/web/blog/?p=207
/// </summary>
private readonly KeyboardHook hook = new KeyboardHook();
private readonly SpeechSynthesizer speaker = //
new SpeechSynthesizer { Rate = 3, Volume = 100 };
private void doSpeaking(string text)
{
// starts / stops speaking, while not blocking UI
if (speaker.State != SynthesizerState.Speaking)
speaker.SpeakAsync(text);
else
speaker.SpeakAsyncCancelAll();
}
private void hookEvent(object sender, KeyPressedEventArgs e)
{
this.doSpeaking(Convert.ToString(Clipboard.GetText()));
}
public Form1()
{
InitializeComponent();
hook.KeyPressed += new EventHandler<KeyPressedEventArgs>(hookEvent);
hook.RegisterHotKey(ModifierKeysx.Control|ModifierKeysx.Alt, Keys.Space);
}
Question:
I would prefer not using the clipboard. Or at least, restoring the value after, something like:
[MethodImpl(MethodImplOptions.Synchronized)]
private string getSelectedTextHACK()
{
object restorePoint = Clipboard.GetData(DataFormats.UnicodeText);
SendKeys.SendWait("^c");
string result = Convert.ToString(Clipboard.GetText());
Clipboard.SetData(DataFormats.UnicodeText, restorePoint);
return result;
}
What are my options?
Edit:
To my surprise, I found that my clipboard reader is the best way to go. I created a notification area app, that responds to left click (speaking clipboard) and right click (menu opens up). In menu the user can chance speed, speak or create a audio file.

MS provide accessibility tools that do cover what you're trying to do. If you take a look at documents about screen scraping. In short, every component is accessible in some manner, if you use some of the windows debugging tools you can get to see the component names/structures within. You can then use that, however, its complicated as most times you would need to be very specific for each application you intend to scrape from.
If you manage to scrape you dont need to use the clipboard, as you can access the text property of the apps direct. Its not something I've had to do, hence, Ive no code to offer off the top of my head, but the term "screen scraping" should point you in the right direction.

If to expand a little on what Bugfinder said, Microsoft provider a UI Automation Framework to solve problems like the one you mentioned:
In particular you can use the TextSelectionChangedEvent of TextPattern:
The problem with this solution is that it only works on supported operating systems and applications - and not all support this.
Your clipboard solution is acceptable for applications that do not provide a good automation interface.
But for many applications the UI Automation Framework will work well and will provide you with a far better solution.