Potential pitfalls when using Lab Streaming Layer (LSL) and how to avoid them

More and more researchers all over the world are using Lab Streaming Layer (LSL) and we at Brain Products continue to put focus on this protocol in our established, new, and upcoming products. Despite this, LSL has some idiosyncrasies that are sometimes a bit difficult to deal with. For this reason, we collected our experience in troubleshooting some of the problems in a new support article.

If your setup of LSL works, it makes synchronizing multiple data and marker streams very easy and streamlined. That said, since LSL usually requires a well-functioning network, problems with the network automatically translate to problems with LSL. It is generally a good idea to stick to a stable, dedicated wired network, but if this is not a possibility, there are some guidelines to observe that decrease the chance of potential issues.

Next to the network, problems in the configuration, ranging from the hardware-specific LSL connectors, up to the configuration file(s) responsible for controlling signal viewing and/or recording can become a burden to the users. Potential side effects of such problems are that it can become difficult to connect to streams or even find them in the network.

In addition, dealing with recordings that save data from LSL streams in a dedicated XDF file can be much different than what you are used to, for example when you are typically saving data to our BrainVision Core Data Format that is supported in BrainVision Recorder and BrainVision Analyzer 2.

In a new article in the Support & Resources section of our website, we have a lot of potential fixes to the pitfalls mentioned above and more.

Please check the article and send us your feedback if you have questions, in case you think an important point is missing, or if you even have better solutions than what we are suggesting. We are always happy to add items to the list if it means working with LSL and Brain Products gets even easier in the process.