Stata 15 FRED API Mac Apple Technical Issue: Stata Freezes and Requires a Force Exit

[Ali Sheikhpour]

Hi first off thank you for all help and time.

I'm facing a problem, that at this point I'm fairly confident is a general bug. My update of STATA 15 on updated Mac OS is unable to authenticate FRED with an API for streamlined data import. I get the console non-responsive and have to force quit. I re-installed the software after deleting it. Then just now tried it on my desktop iMac (Stata 15 I/C) with same non-responsive status. I re-created an API and it gives the same issue. So I opened up the Console errors/faults and hoped it would maybe help in troubleshoot; it seems to be a Sandboxed permissions issue. I'm not too familiar with Apple's sandboxing so if anybody has some words of advise I'd be eternally grateful! Much thanks.

Error Stata 15.rtf

-A.S.

[William Lisowski]

It is not clear to me from your description what the source is of your API. This sounds like a question that should be directed to the developer of the API. It would be helpful if you were able to find a Windows or Linux system to test on to see if this is indeed Mac specific, or perhaps the result of a more general change in Stata, or - a more distant possibility - a change at FRED.

With that said, in the output of search fred I see that Stata 15 includes an import fred command. Does it fail in a similar fashion? If so, then the question would seem to be one to be directed to Stata Technical Services.

[Zhao Xu (StataCorp)]

Hello Ali Sheikhpour,

I am not able to reproduce the problem with the information you provide. If you could please send your do-file to [email protected] I will be happy to help.

[Ali Sheikhpour]

It is not clear to me from your description what the source is of your API. This sounds like a question that should be directed to the developer of the API. It would be helpful if you were able to find a Windows or Linux system to test on to see if this is indeed Mac specific, or perhaps the result of a more general change in Stata, or - a more distant possibility - a change at FRED.

With that said, in the output of search fred I see that Stata 15 includes an import fred command. Does it fail in a similar fashion? If so, then the question would seem to be one to be directed to Stata Technical Services.

The source API comes from: https://fred.stlouisfed.org

I'm running bootcamp right now with Windows 10. I'll be installing a fresh Stata 15 and responding shortly with errors or not.

Thanks for the correspondence and help.

[Ali Sheikhpour]

Hello Ali Sheikhpour,

I am not able to reproduce the problem with the information you provide. If you could please send your do-file to [email protected] I will be happy to help.

Hi there -- I'll send a corresponding email but am not sure what you mean by needing a do-file? This is on a clean install of Stata 15, after fully updating, I import "FRED" and when asked for API I enter the API and get a hung Stata I have to force quit.

After testing it on Windows 10 with the same API it worked. So this seems to be at the very least, an Apple related issue. I've replicated it on an iMac and new MacBook Pro. I'll send the error/faults under the console again. I'll also send associated screenshots that might help illuminate the issue better than I'm explaining.

I appreciate the time and help.
Stata 15.rtf
A.S.

[Chinh Nguyen (StataCorp)]

I'm facing a problem, that at this point I'm fairly confident is a general bug. My update of STATA 15 on updated Mac OS is unable to authenticate FRED with an API for streamlined data import. I get the console non-responsive and have to force quit. I re-installed the software after deleting it. Then just now tried it on my desktop iMac (Stata 15 I/C) with same non-responsive status. I re-created an API and it gives the same issue. So I opened up the Console errors/faults and hoped it would maybe help in troubleshoot; it seems to be a Sandboxed permissions issue. I'm not too familiar with Apple's sandboxing so if anybody has some words of advise I'd be eternally grateful! Much thanks.

I tried import fred using Stata/15 IC on 3 different Macs and had no problem.

The log you sent is unrelated to Stata. You're just looking at output from other processes. Are you referring to the 'loginwindow' process? If so, that's the process that displays the login screen and many other things. What you're looking for are is a spin report which may be generated when an application is "hung". Look in ~//Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports.

I'm not sure what sandboxing you're referring to but sandboxing on macOS only happens to apps downloaded from the App Store. There is no sandboxing of Stata since we're independent of the App Store.

[Chinh Nguyen (StataCorp)]

import fred is written in Java. We've had reports where some virus scanners on Macs will scan JAR files and cause Java to load extremely slowly and appear to hang in Stata. Do you have a virus scanner installed on your Mac?

[William Lisowski]

Another comment from someone having no direct experience with the FRED API: Does using it open a dialog window? In that case, if you are using a third-party window manager for macOS (e.g. Witch, Contexts), a conflict between a Java-based window and your window manager may be the source of your problem. See the thread at

https://www.statalist.org/forums/for...ting-csv-files

most especially the final post from Chinh Nguyen.

[Ali Sheikhpour]

This problem was fixed using the console to permanently save my API key. Once I set key using the command instead of GUI interface, everything started working as normal. Hope this helps anybody else that might've have the same issue!