App not responding when I try to add photo for observation (Android 11)

Bug Reports
1

I am using an LG android. Two days ago it started having problems when I try to add a photo for observation. When I hit add image, it either

  1. just hangs on the white screen for a very long time and either crashes, or
  2. finally shows images from my photo gallery after a long pause.
    In addition, I have also been having the problem when I add an observation, it enters two identical ones.
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2

Which version of the app do you have? Can you please share screenshots of what youā€™re seeing?

We ask these questions up front for new bug reports because theyā€™re often necessary for us to investigate the bug.

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3

I believe I have the same problem. I recently upgraded to Android 11 and then saw the problem. When I take a photo to start an observation, I get the Camera app and can take a picture. However, when I accept the photo, the iNaturalist app appears to crash and then restart. This causes an empty observation to be put in my upload queue.

4

I hesitate to say ā€˜me tooā€™, but I just upgraded to Android 11 on a Pixel 3a, and the iNaturalist app crashed just after clicking on the check-mark after having taken a photo. I did click the ā€˜send bug reportā€™ ā€“ but I donā€™t know if the dev team gets access to those.

This is version 1.20.11 (442)

5

I can replicate this after updating to Android 11 on my Pixel 3a as well. Weā€™ll take a look.

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6

OK, there are fixes in the latest beta version (1.20.16 (447) ), and weā€™ve started rolling it out very slowly to the Google Play Store to look for crashes. If you want to try out the beta version now, go to https://play.google.com/apps/testing/org.inaturalist.android

7

I downloaded a new version of Android yesterday and it seems to have affected iNaturalistā€™s ability to use the camera to take a photo within the app. I have a Google Pixel 2, Android 11.

if I take a photo within the ap, iNaturalist doesnā€™t recognize it, no photo, no location. Sometime it also crashes the app. These photos show up as blank grey boxes if I use google photos. If I take a picture with my camera, I am able to add it to a new observation.

Anyone else having this issue?

8

Platform: Android (Google Pixel 3a)

App version number: 1.11.20 - 442

Screenshots of what you are seeing:

Screenshot_20200924-151039
Screenshot_20200924-1510391080Ɨ2220 20 KB

Screenshot_20200924-151005
Screenshot_20200924-1510051080Ɨ2220 75.6 KB

Screenshot_20200924-151044
Screenshot_20200924-1510441080Ɨ2220 775 KB

Description of problem:

Step 1: press the green plus button for a new observation

Step 2: press the camera button at the top left to add a photo

Step 3: choose the take a photo option

Step 4: take the photo

Step 5: press the blue check to accept the photo

So after I updated my phone to Android 11 yesterday I can no longer take photos in the app. After I press the button to accept the photo the screen goes white, then the app makes an empty observation (which donā€™t appear on the web version in my observations). The photo file that is saved is also empty.

I can upload photos to the app taken with a separate camera app (I did several that way today).

I did try to send a log file but in the outlook app and the gmail app both I get a message that the files were unable to be attached.

Thanks!

9

Iā€™m not having any issues with the camera yet on Pixel 3, Android 11, iNat 1.20.19 (450). The photos appear, the location is taken, and they show up as normal in the Photos app. Which version of the iNaturalist app are you using? You can view that information in the menu under About.

After you take the photo, can you go to that About page and tap 3 times on the version number? That will give you the option to ā€œSend Debug Logsā€ and email the file to help@inaturalist.org, which can help with troubleshooting.

10

I just posted another thread about this! I also updated yesterday and canā€™t take photos in app today. Pixel 3a

1 Like
11

Thanks for that! Iā€™m going to merge your posts here.

12

version 1.20.11 (442)

13

I have the same version as Matthias55

14

I tried to send the debug logs but when I opened up Gmail (after tapping send debug logs), I got an error message ā€œcouldnā€™t attachā€. So I think I sent an empty message to help@inaturalist.org

15

excellent description of the problem! I have exactly the same issue.

16

This is a known bug in the app: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/app-not-responding-when-i-try-to-add-photo-for-observation/16006 Weā€™ve partially released an update that should fix it (version 1.20.19) so you might see an update to that version in the Google Play Store, but you probably wonā€™t at this time. Iā€™ll see if we can expand the rollout, but weā€™re looking to see if the update is introducing any major issues.

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17

Thanks for the info tiwane. I can manage with the workaround for now :)

18

I am having the same issue with my Pixel 3 XL on Android 11 RP1A.200720.009. Will keep an eye out for updates.

Reinstalling the iNaturalist app from the play store today didnā€™t help.

19

We just rolled out version 1.20.19 to 100%, so you should now be able to update it in the Google Play Store. Let us know if the update fixes this issue for you.

1 Like
20

Now that Iā€™ve updated the app to 1.20.19 the problem seems to be resolved. Thanks.