Running Emulator on HighSierra

Bugs and Other Issues
1

I'm trying to run the 3.0 emulator for macOS on a HighSierra mac. I had previously installed the 2.3 emulator, so:

  • I did a hard reset
  • I installed the new 3.0 emulator
  • I restarted the mac

Now, when I select Emulator in the Connect menu, I see a dialog saying "Starting the Android emulator. Please wait: this might take a minute or two" forever. Apparently there is no activity at all, except for an (empty) Terminal window appearing in the dock.

I successfully installed the 3.0 Emulator on Catalina and BigSur.

2

There is a bug in 3.0 that affects earlier versions of macOS. Try this version instead, which should work back to Mac OS X 10.10:

http://ai2-buildserver-nightly-ewp.csail.mit.edu/setuptools-beta/MIT_App_Inventor_Setup_3.0.1rc1.dmg

3

Thanks a lot for your prompt answer Ewan. Unfortunately the problem is still present. I:

  • did an hard reset
  • restarted the mac
  • installed the new emulator
  • restarted the mac
  • selected emulator in the connect menu

As before, I keep seeing the "Starting the Android emulator. Please wait: this might take a minute or two" forever.

4

In Terminal.app, try the following to get more information about what's going on:

launchctl remove edu.mit.appinventor.aiStarter
/Applications/AppInventor/commands-for-Appinventor/aiStarter

This will run aiStarter in the terminal. From App Inventor, try starting the emulator, and you will see some information logged into the terminal. Please copy and paste that here.

Once you've done that, press Ctrl+C to kill aiStarter. You can restore normal behavior by running:

launchctl load /Library/LaunchAgents/edu.mit.appinventor.aiStarter.plist
5

Hi Evan, I'm pasting here the content of the Terminal following your instructions:

Last login: Thu Dec 17 22:18:35 on ttys001
/Applications/AppInventor/commands-for-Appinventor/aiStarter ; exit;
iMac-di-Emanuele:- emanueleilariaS / Application/AppInventor/commands-for-Appinventor/aiStarter ; exit;
Running ai Starter version 3.0
Bottle server starting up (using WSGIRefServer())…
Listening on http://127.0.0.1:8004/
Hit Ctrl-C to quit.
 
Launchctl remove edu.mit.appinventor.aiStarter /Applications/AppInventor/commands-for-Appinventor/aiStarter 127.0.0.1 - - [17/dec/2020 22:22:38] “GET /ping/ http/1.1.” 200 38
 
* daemon not running; starting now at tcp:5037
* daemon started successfully
 
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:42] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:42] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:42] “GET /start/ http/1.1” 200 0
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:42] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:42] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
emulator: WARNING: encryption is off
emulator: ERROR: x86 emulator currently requires hardware acceleration!
Please ensure Intel HAXM is properly installed and usable.
CPU acceleration status: HAXM is not installed on this machine
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:43] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:44] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:45] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:46] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:47] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:48] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:49] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:50] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:51] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:52] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:53] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:54] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:55] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:56] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:57] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:58] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:22:59] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:00] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:01] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:02] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:03] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:04] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:05] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:06] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:07] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:08] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:09] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
127.0.0.1 - - [17/Dec/2020 22:23:10] “GET /echeck/ http/1.1” 200 38
6

Thanks @s_federici. Can you also send me the system information report on the device? To do this, open the  menu, press down the Option key, and select "System Information..." when it appears. From the System Information window, select File then Save. I believe you already have my email address so just send it to me as an attachment.

The key error is:

emulator: ERROR: x86 emulator currently requires hardware acceleration!
Please ensure Intel HAXM is properly installed and usable.
CPU acceleration status: HAXM is not installed on this machine

so either the system doesn't support the virtualization technology required by the newer emulator, or something went wrong in the installation process. Once I have the information about the hardware I can advise on next steps.

7

I just sent you the file to your MIT email address

8

Hi Evan, any news?

9

@s_federici I had replied privately by email. Please let me know if you want me to resend my message.

10

No, thanks, it is fine. I have found your reply in my junk mail folder (yahoo magics)

11

Sorry for the late feedback. I managed to finally test the installation of the tool you suggested (I'm assisting a student of mine, that still uses HighSierra). The installation went fine, the student updated the security settings and restarted the mac. The emulator is not starting yet, still showing the message "Starting the Android emulator. Please wait: this might take a minute or two".

12

I also have the same problem.
The emulator is not running.
I use apple m1 mac. I'd appreciate it if you could check.

13

Any further suggestion?

14

@s_federici A next step would be to install Android Studio and set up an emulator image with that following the instructions provided by Google.

Then they should download the companion app from this link (http://ai2.appinventor.mit.edu/companions/Emulator.apk) and install it into the emulator by dragging and dropping the file onto the emulator window.

After that, they should be able to connect by using the Connect > Emulator option. The aistarter tool will use the existing emulator process from Android Studio rather than starting its own copy.

I use this method to test App Inventor on many versions of Android, so it should work for your student (assuming there isn't a hardware issue preventing the Android Studio emulator from working).

15

I will try this. Where can I find the Google instructions on how to set up an emulator image in Android Studio?

16

Google provides instructions here.

17

While waiting for the student to try the Android studio emulator strategy, I had another student that tried to run the InteHAXM installation and got the following error message

VT/NX not present
Your computer does not meet the minimal requirements for this software. Intel(R) HAXM cannot be installed on this computer. Please refer to the Intel(R) HAXM documentation for more information

18

This worked very well on my Catalina mac. The emulator is already setup, right after installing Android studio. I had just to drag the companion to the emulator and connect the emulator. I hope the same smooth process can be applied to MacOS HighSierra. I will let you know how it goes.

19

Unfortunately it didn't work on the HighSierra mac of the student. When we press the green arrow to start the emulator nothing happens.

20

I forgot to say that he was using a HighSierra VM (using VirtualBox)