Google Mobile Ads Crash

[Marco Batista]

Hello :)

Recently we started noticing a crash on our apps on Android 5+, it started happening more frequently in the middle of April.

Stack trace:

java.util.concurrent.TimeoutException: android.view.ThreadedRenderer.finalize() timed out after 10 seconds

       at android.view.ThreadedRenderer.nDeleteProxy(ThreadedRenderer.java)

       at android.view.ThreadedRenderer.finalize(ThreadedRenderer.java:407)

       at java.lang.Daemons$FinalizerDaemon.doFinalize(Daemons.java:190)

       at java.lang.Daemons$FinalizerDaemon.run(Daemons.java:173)

       at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:818)

We search for possible causes but didn't found anything that applied to our problem. The activity responsible for this crash is com.google.android.gms.ads.AdActivity.

If it helps, the apps are being developed on Android Studio 1.1, using a reduced version of Play Services:

compile 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-ads:+'
compile 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-analytics:+'

Has anyone experienced this problem before? Is it something I can fix?

[Andrew Brogdon (Mobile Ads SDK Team)]

Thanks for posting your stacktrace.  I'd like to get some more information from you, if you don't mind:

1) On what device(s) are you seeing this crash? Is it something you've seen personally, or was it reported to you?

2) What version of Google Play services is installed on the affected devices?

3) What version of the SDK are you using when building your application?

4) You mention that the AdActivity is responsible for the crash -- how did you determine this? Do you have a more complete stacktrace than the one you've posted?

Thanks!

-Andrew

[Marco Batista]

Thank you for your reply,

1) We haven't been able to reproduce the crash on our end.
The crash has been reported through a crash reporting service (Crashlytics/Fabric), during the last week there were ~1000 crashes reported.
The affect devices range from a multitude of brands and models (e.g.: Samsung, Sony, HTC, ...). One device that has seen most of the crashes is Samsung SM-G900F (S5).

2) As far as I know, currently I have no way of knowing this

3) Android SDK: 5.1 (API 22), we support API 16+,
Google Mobile Ads SDK: I actually don't know the exact version, it is setup to always use the newer version available.
The apps were built and compiled on the 22nd of April, so I guess it used the version that was available at that time.

4) That is the only stacktrace that I have. I was able to "pinpoint" the problem using the breadcrumbs report and the Google Analytics error reports.
On Google Analytics the crash only appears associated with the AdActivity and on the breadcrumbs it happens after the call to "showFullScreenAd" which shows an Interstitial Ad.


Another thing is that the crashes seem to happen more frequently with our german users than with the others, which makes me wonder if it is a problem related with a specific group of ads.
Searching for the problem, the more info I could get was on stackoverflow (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/27232275/java-util-concurrent-timeoutexception-android-view-threadedrenderer-finalize), but that is related to WebViews which we don't use on our app.

[Andrew Brogdon (Mobile Ads SDK Team)]

The German language aspect is interesting.  As you surmised, it's possible that there's a particular ad that's causing an otherwise obscure bug to manifest. I've passed your stacktrace and all the other details on to the engineering team, though, so they'll take a look at it as soon as they get the chance.

Thanks!

-Andrew

[Marco Batista]

Hello Andrew, do you have any news on this issue?

[Andrew Brogdon (Mobile Ads SDK Team)]

I don't have anything new right now, unfortunately. The SDK team has been quite busy with our latest release, so it's not completely surprising.

I'll make a point of checking in with them about this, though, and see if I can bump up the priority.

-Andrew

[Marco Batista]

ok, thank you :)