window-list freezes gnome-panel

[Hrimhari]

Binary package hint: gnome-panel

Greetings,

Apart from the already reported bugs related to vertical window-list just not using the space it can for the window buttons, it seems that it freezes the gnome-panel process when it can't squeeze more window buttons into it's crazy hardcoded X pixels height.

Thank you,
Felipe

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: amd64
Date: Sun Nov 11 23:12:45 2007
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 7.10
ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/gnome-panel
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: gnome-panel 1:2.20.0.1-0ubuntu6
PackageArchitecture: amd64
ProcCmdline: gnome-panel --sm-client-id 117f000101000119483966700000060910000 --screen 0
ProcCwd: /home/hrimhari
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=/home/hrimhari/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games
 LANG=en_CA.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: gnome-panel
Uname: Linux valhalla 2.6.22-14-generic #1 SMP Sun Oct 14 21:45:15 GMT 2007 x86_64 GNU/Linux

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

To reproduce the problem (at least on my environment), I just open new terminals until I notice that the panel froze. In my case, it happens around the seventh.

By the way, I'm on a hp pavillion dv2404ca (amd 64 athlon X2).

[PatrickFisher (pjfisher)]

I can confirm this issue.

I'm running Gutsy on a ThinkPad z61t (x86)

I can reduce the occurrence by setting gnome-panel to always group the windows. Now it only freezes when I open the eighth application in one workspace. Closing some windows and running "killall gnome-panel" fixes the problem. If I do not close any windows, however, gnome-panel will restart in a frozen state.

I can easily reproduce this bug, so if there is any output I can provide I'd be happy to do so.

[Marko Ulvila (mulvila)]

Confirming the bug. Running 7.10 on MSI S250 laptop.

In my system the gnome-panel starts using 100 % of the CPU, apparently when there are 7 or more windows open. My workaround is to freeze (not kill) the process from the system monitor. This way the system stays stable and usable, but the panel is obviously is no longer available.

[PatrickFisher (pjfisher)]

Marko:

I'm not 100% sure we are dealing with the same bug.

1) My gnome-panel only uses 20% of my CPU during the freeze (compared to 0-1% normally)
2) My system is still completely usable during the freeze. I can start applications from the terminal and I can use windows that are already open

Could you confirm that this is what is happening for you?

Also, if it is, running "killall gnome-panel" restarts gnome-panel and your system (including the panel) should be completely usable afterwards.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

Greetings,

I can't confirm that gnome-panel always takes 100% of CPU when it freezes.

I did once notice that my system decided to be disc-intensive and I figured it was the frozen gnome-panel doing it for an unknown reason. I figured that a disc intensive process would probably also be CPU intensive, so I ran "top" and found the gnome-panel eating CPU. I then found out that it was frozen again, so I killall'ed it and the problem went away.

In any case, my system remains usable when gnome-panel freezes. It's just that I can't start anything that depends on the panel, so if I don't have an open terminal, I need to go to the console to do anything related to launching an application.

IMHO, there are two related problems to be fixed:

1. Fix the freeze when window-list can't acomodate more windows in its limited space (add scroll buttons?), and

2. Make the window-list properly use its available space instead of always taking the hard coded minimum size also as maximum size.

It looks like someone decided to remove the size settings on window-list because they were a bad workaround to this problem but forgot to fix the problem itself.

Best regards,
Felipe

[Marko Ulvila (mulvila)]

Yes, the killall gnome-panel command released the process and the gnome-panel came up smoothly and functioned well for a while, then again freezing and stealing all the CPU. I think the bug is the same, my system just deals with the increasing CPU use in an extreme way.

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Thanks for your bug report. Please try to obtain a backtrace http://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingProgramCrash and attach the file to the bug report. This will greatly help us in tracking down your problem.

[PatrickFisher (pjfisher)]

I hope this helps.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

Here goes my backtrace.

[tim (tautges)]

Here's another batch of output from gdb. This is from a Dell Latitude D420 running standalone, but I've also observed it when docked and also on my Dell Precision 690 running a 64-bit OS, FWIW.

Also, anybody have any suggestions for an alternative while this gets fixed, besides just not allowing many windows/apps?

[tim (tautges)]

Oh, one more thing, this only started happening after I upgraded to Gutsy (that'll teach me to upgrade so fast...)

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

As workaround, I suggest:

1. Grouping windows (should help a little),

2. Not using the window-list in a vertical manner (seems to have a special problem to use the available space when vertical).

The crash started on Gutsy, but the use of available space problem was already there on Feisty. The difference is that on Feisty we could set our own size limits, so setting a higher "minimum" size would allow it to use more of the available space on gnome-applet.

[Russell Healy (russell-healy)]

Sorry, I jumped the gun - didn't see the history of status changes until after I changed it myself :)

I am having the same problem on three different computers.

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

We are closing this bug report because it lacks the information we need to investigate the problem, as described in the previous comments. Please reopen it if you can give us the missing information, and don't hesitate to submit bug reports in the future. To reopen the bug report you can click on the current status, under the Status column, and change the Status back to "New". Thanks again!.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

Excuse me, I followed the link and attached the requested files. What kind of information is missing?

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

I thought I attached the requested information. Could you be more specific on what is missing?

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Sure, the stacktrace isn't good enough to determine where the problem is. You may need to install the following packages and get a new trace: libglib2.0-0-dbg, libgtk2.0-0-dbg, gnome-panel-dbg and libwnck22-dbgsym.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

I shall try it tonight. In the mean time, the problem should be easily reproducible by making the "Window List" a vertical, right-placed bar, configuring it not to group windows and opening enough Terminals to fill it up.

This may be more useful than trying to make sense out of my stack trace, since you'd be even able to debug it.

Best regards,
hri

|Sure, the stacktrace isn't good enough to determine where the problem
|is. You may need to install the following packages and get a new trace:
|libglib2.0-0-dbg, libgtk2.0-0-dbg, gnome-panel-dbg and libwnck22-dbgsym.
|
|** Changed in: gnome-panel (Ubuntu)
| Status: New => Invalid
|
|--
|window-list freezes gnome-panel
|https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/162134
|You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
|of the bug.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

Another backtrace. Note that it may not be useful since gnome-panel doesn't CRASH. It FREEZES.

[Oscar (doscar)]

I can confirm the problem too, in several computers with different graphics cards. To reproduce the problem, just open any windows until the panel freezes around the seventh.

[Oscar (doscar)]

I forgot to say that the panel is put on the left, not on the bottom.

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

Thanks for the bug report. This particular bug has already been reported, but feel free to report any other bugs you find.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

_This_ bug is a duplicate? Have you compared the opening dates and the amount of comments this one has? And from the comment in the other bug:

--
Thanks for your report, note that is only reproducible with Ubuntu not with gnome-panel trunk, so maybe it's caused by an Ubuntu patch to it. thanks.
--

I'm happy to know that the "trunk" version is fixed, but how about the "release" version used by Ubuntu? Has that been checked before accusing them of mispatching the software? Had a patch been prepared for that release?

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

Whatever has been opened before the other one is not revelant, bug #187540 has a clear description and an upstream task already, it's easier to duplicate this way now

[Q'tee (harma-everts)]

I experience this bug in Hardy as well. If I open QT4 Designer (which has about seven panels) and some other programs, the gnome-panel freezes. However, since I have a Core 2 Duo CPU, I can still work, because it only eats the resources of one of the CPU's. Killing the Gnome-panel will restart it and the problems will be gone until I open too many windows again. Please let me know if I can provide more info.

[Hrimhari (felipe-carassonet)]

I'm quite surprised that a bug known for such a long time would still be present in Hardy. Everyone must be really busy with bugs considered to be more important..?

|*** This bug is a duplicate of bug 187540 ***
| https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/187540
|
|I experience this bug in Hardy as well. If I open QT4 Designer (which
|has about seven panels) and some other programs, the gnome-panel
|freezes. However, since I have a Core 2 Duo CPU, I can still work,
|because it only eats the resources of one of the CPU's. Killing the
|Gnome-panel will restart it and the problems will be gone until I open
|too many windows again. Please let me know if I can provide more info.
|
|--
|window-list freezes gnome-panel
|https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/162134
|You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
|of the bug.

[Chris B (viperborg)]

Also getting this in Intrepid.

[Angel Mass (angelmass)]

The bug is still present in Ubuntu 10.10