Yakkety desktop fails to start

[Kev Bowring]

Following a set of updates (attached) Saturday 20th I lost a working desktop.

Further to that dailies for Xubuntu and Mate both fail to start a working desktop either by:

1 - booting Try option from the first menu
2 - booting Try option from the Try/Install dialogue
3 - logging into installed system

For Xubuntu (both locally and in installed daily)

Changing the Exec line in /usr/share/xsessions/xubuntu.desktop from

Exec=/usr/share/xfce4/scripts/run-systemd-session xubuntu-session.target

to

Exec=startxfce4 and my normal desktop runs again.

(Found all this out after I reported bug 1615338, which I've now marked invalid)

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.10
Package: systemd 231-4
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.6.0-10.12-generic 4.6.5
Uname: Linux 4.6.0-10-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.3-0ubuntu7
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: XFCE
Date: Sun Aug 21 08:59:13 2016
InstallationDate: Installed on 2016-06-11 (70 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Xubuntu 16.10 "Yakkety Yak" - Alpha amd64 (20160611)
MachineType: NOVATECH LTD MBB-44608
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.6.0-10-generic root=UUID=246fbeaf-5feb-4078-9c56-10a03b4fafa1 ro quiet splash
SourcePackage: systemd
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 06/19/2014
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: F5
dmi.board.asset.tag: To be filled by O.E.M.
dmi.board.name: H81M-DS2V
dmi.board.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.board.version: To be filled by O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: 7383241-001
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: NOVATECH LTD
dmi.chassis.version: V1.0
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvrF5:bd06/19/2014:svnNOVATECHLTD:pnMBB-44608:pvrV1.0:rvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:rnH81M-DS2V:rvrTobefilledbyO.E.M.:cvnNOVATECHLTD:ct3:cvrV1.0:
dmi.product.name: MBB-44608
dmi.product.version: V1.0
dmi.sys.vendor: NOVATECH LTD
modified.conffile..etc.systemd.journald.conf: [modified]
mtime.conffile..etc.systemd.journald.conf: 2016-07-21T07:46:55.198735

[Ubuntu QA Website (ubuntuqa)]

This bug has been reported on the Ubuntu ISO testing tracker.

A list of all reports related to this bug can be found here:
http://iso.qa.ubuntu.com/qatracker/reports/bugs/1615341

[Kev Bowring (flocculant)]

attached systemd graphical session log just in case

[Iain Lane (laney)]

It's because RefuseManualStart=yes is in graphical-session-pre.target. The run-* scripts start graphical-session-pre.target explicitly, because https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/3750 means that it doesn't work properly wrt. ordering if you just start the end .target.

I'm guessing this should be =no until that bug is fixed.

[Iain Lane (laney)]

I'm going to upload a patch which removes RefuseManualStart=yes, because this breaks session startup. If there's a better fix, it can be done as a followup.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package systemd - 231-4ubuntu1

---------------
systemd (231-4ubuntu1) yakkety; urgency=medium

  * debian/patches/units-graphical-session-pre-dont-refusemanualstart.patch:
    Add a new patch to let graphical-session-pre.target be manually started
    for now (LP: #1615341)

 -- Iain Lane <email address hidden> Sun, 21 Aug 2016 13:46:28 +0100