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Subject: |
GDM crashes when it cannot find any .desktop files |
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Date: |
Mon, 01 Apr 2019 10:05:16 +0200 |
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User-agent: |
Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/26.1 (gnu/linux) |
Hello,
I used to have a config (when using SLiM) where my system profile did
not contain any window manager, so no .desktop files. Instead, the WM
would be installed in my profile and ~/.xsession would start it and a
couple of other things.
Unfortunately GDM crashes in that context. More precisely, after
choosing the user name on the log-in screen, it enters an infinite loop
with an assertion failure:
gdm_session_set_environment_variable: assertion 'value != NULL' failed
At that point you pretty much have to reboot since it becomes very hard
to type at the console. (You can try it in a VM.)
The workaround is to add at least one window manager to the system’s
‘packages’ field.
It would be nice to fix it now that GDM is our default log-in manager.
Ludo’.
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Subject: |
Re: bug#35068: GDM crashes when it cannot find any .desktop files |
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Date: |
Fri, 26 Apr 2019 14:32:40 -0400 |
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User-agent: |
Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/26.2 (gnu/linux) |
Hi Ludo and Danny,
Ludovic Courtès <address@hidden> writes:
> Hello,
>
> Timothy Sample <address@hidden> skribis:
>
>> There are two workarounds. The first is to keep Danny’s patch as-is,
>> but add logic to “xinitrc” so that it only uses “~/.xsession” when
>> passed “custom” as an argument (it’s kinda magic, but it seems to be a
>> common convention). I have a slight preference for this option, because
>> it makes the whole “~/.xsession” thing more explicit. However, it would
>> break other DMs that don’t install a “custom.desktop”. Maybe we could
>> integrate it into all DMs at the service level.
>>
>> The quicker workaround is to keep the current logic, and install the
>> following with GDM:
>>
>> [Desktop Entry]
>> Encoding=UTF-8
>> Type=Application
>> Name=Fail
>> Comment=This session always fails.
>> NoDisplay=true
>> Exec=false
>>
>> This way, GDM fails cleanly when there are no “.desktop” files. It
>> doesn’t show up in the list, either (“NoDisplay=true”), so everything
>> just kinda works as expected without any visible changes.
>
> I have a slight preference for the hack you propose Timothy, at least in
> the short term, because it seems less likely to break anything than
> fiddling with “Exec=custom” and all that.
>
> Anyway, it’d be great if one of you could push a fix by 1.0. :-)
Pushed as 8caa458953eeac783c73a0e5aaa72842fe3914c9.
I’m closing the bug and the patch. If we want to change the “xinitrc”
script to understand “custom”, we can start a new discussion to figure
out the best way to do it after 1.0.
-- Tim
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