Discover app bug, cant find some apps

[Tarık Buğra]

be sure Appstream is set up properly on your system, i get this error at first when i open discover, i dont see recommended apps, i can see some apps when i search but not all, i dont see some apps, example: google earth, steam... im using lubuntu 19.10 and asus x550l

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 19.10
Package: plasma-discover 5.16.5-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.3.0-24.26-generic 5.3.10
Uname: Linux 5.3.0-24-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_modeset nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu8.2
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: LXQt
Date: Wed Jan 1 00:52:56 2020
InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-12-31 (0 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Lubuntu 19.10 "Eoan Ermine" - Release amd64 (20191017.1)
SourcePackage: plasma-discover
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[8p-k26-gj (8p-k26-gj)]

SUMMARY
When I start discover I get a pointless "Make sure that AppStream is properly set up on your system". What is it trying to tell me? What am I supposed to do about this as a user?

STEPS TO REPRODUCE
1. Start Discover

OBSERVED RESULT
Passive popup "Make sure that AppStream is properly set up on your system".

EXPECTED RESULT
No passive popup, or at least a helpful error, even better with a "Let me fix that for you" button.

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS
KDE Plasma Version: 5.15.80
KDE Frameworks Version: 5.58
Qt Version: 5.12.0

[Nate-b (nate-b)]

I've never gotten this myself, but I've heard of other who have gotten it too.

We should either suppress this error message or somehow make it actionable.

[Aleix Pol (aleixpol-kde)]

Which distribution?
Do you reckon your appstream is properly set? This is something your distribution should be doing and maintaining.

[Nate-b (nate-b)]

(In reply to Aleix Pol from comment #2)
> Do you reckon your appstream is properly set? This is something your
> distribution should be doing and maintaining.
All the more reason not to bug the user about it. :)

If we need to tell the user that something is broken but it's not Discover's fault, a PassiveNotification probably isn't the right way to do it.

[Aleix Pol (aleixpol-kde)]

What's the right way to do it?

In this case the only right answer is have the problem not exist. if a distro information gets broken, we need to nudge its users to get the issue solved.

[Nate-b (nate-b)]

(In reply to Aleix Pol from comment #4)
> What's the right way to do it?
>
> In this case the only right answer is have the problem not exist. if a
> distro information gets broken, we need to nudge its users to get the issue
> solved.
I agree, but a quickly disappearing message saying "Make sure that AppStream is properly set up on your system" doesn't do that. :)

The message needs to indicate:
- What is wrong in words that users can understand
- That it is the fault of their distro and not Discover
- How they can fix it themselves, or who they can contact to get it fixed

The current message doesn't do any of that. My recommendation would be to show the message in a Kirigami InlineMessage, and for it to be worded more like this:

"Your <distro name> operating system is not providing accurate and up-to-date information. Applications may show less detailed information, and search results may be less accurate.

To fix this issue, please do <thing that will fix it locally for the user> and file a bug for the <distro name> maintainers at <distro bugtracker URL>."

[Aleix Pol (aleixpol-kde)]

The problem though is that we don't know what's wrong. The AppStream premise is that the distribution should be taking care of it, if they're not then we're just broken.

We can give complex hints like to a blindfolded kid trying to hit the piñata but in the end it's a matter of the distro delivering the data.

[Nate-b (nate-b)]

Where does the message come from? AppStream itself? Are we literally just passing on the string it gives us and it isn't telling us what might be wrong?

[Jwr91886-i (jwr91886-i)]

I get the message and there is no functionality to the app, I was looking for a video player app and nothing was available, when I widened the search function to only Multimedia nothing is available, so I further widened it to the "home page" and still nothing is available. Someone must have taken all the apps down (Sad face)

[Petersearby0 (petersearby0)]

I have also received this AppStream message.

I found in the console log: 'Could not open the AppStream metadata pool "Some components have been ignored: Metadata files have errors: /var/cache/app-info/xmls/mkyral-plasma-unstable.xml.gz"'

This references a repo that I previously had added which was having issues and I was no longer using. I removed the repo completely and also deleted the file it complained about above and the AppStream message disappeared. This is probably not the only possible cause of the message but hopefully this is helpful in figuring out what's going wrong.

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS
KDE Plasma Version 5.15.5
KDE Frameworks Version 5.59.0
Qt Version: 5.12.4

[Briggs (jba1978)]

Created attachment 124687
Discover "Appstream" error

[Briggs (jba1978)]

(In reply to Briggs from comment #10)
> Created attachment 124687 [details]
> Discover "Appstream" error

I get this on a fresh install of Fedora31 KDE

[Tarık Buğra (gezgin61)]

I found out that if i install my system at english language, i dont have that bug, Discover works well. But after i configure system to my language which is Turkish and restart system, Discover shows me same bug again. I hope this will help you guys to help me.

[ԜаӀtеr Ⅼарсһуnѕkі (wxl)]

I can confirm this by changing to Turkish language, logging out and back in, and then opening Discover.

This is somehow related to AppStream but I'm a bit unclear how.

Running in terminal produces:
adding empty sources model QStandardItemModel(0x555778d00810)
Could not open the AppStream metadata pool "Unable to add data: MDB_BAD_VALSIZE: Unsupported size of key/DB name/data, or wrong DUPFIXED size"
no packages for "libgphoto2"
kdeinit5: preparing to launch '/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libexec/kf5/klauncher'
kdeinit5: Launched KLauncher, pid = 2619, result = 0
Connecting to deprecated signal QDBusConnectionInterface::serviceOwnerChanged(QString,QString,QString)
kdeinit5: opened connection to :0
kdeinit5: Got EXEC_NEW '/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/kf5/kio/http.so' from launcher.
kdeinit5: preparing to launch '/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/kf5/kio/http.so'
qml: message: Please make sure that Appstream is properly set up on your system
kf5.kio.kio_http: Can't communicate with kded_kcookiejar!
took really long to fetch KNSBackend(0x555778d05950, name = "/usr/share/knsrcfiles/discover_ktexteditor_codesnippets_core.knsrc")

That AppStream error (MDB_BAD_VALSIZE) turns out to be an issue, again specifically for Turkish, for elementaryOS' app store:
https://github.com/elementary/triage/issues/6

Also perhaps related, I also get an error "Please check your connectivity" instead of the "Featured" content that seems related to AppStream:
https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=409220

FWIW the "Featured" content comes from here:
https://autoconfig.kde.org/discover/featured-5.9.json
And for grins I checked on appstream.ubuntu.com for all the ones that normally show up (Inkscape and KDE SDK do not), all of them have a "Name" in "tr," so it shouldn't be a translation issue.

[ԜаӀtеr Ⅼарсһуnѕkі (wxl)]

I'll also add that there's no similar problem with Greek, so it's not that it's non-English languages that are the problem. So far, it seems that it is specifically Turkish.

Discover is not non-functional when using Turkish, but some apps don't show up. Steam Installer can't be found, but Blender can.

[ԜаӀtеr Ⅼарсһуnѕkі (wxl)]

Oh running `appstreamcli status` produces that same error:

AppStream Status:
Version: 0.12.9

Distribution metadata:
 /usr/share/app-info
  - Empty.

 /var/lib/app-info
  - YAML: 8
  - Iconsets:
     ubuntu-eoan-updates-main
     ubuntu-eoan-updates-universe
     ubuntu-eoan-security-main
     ubuntu-eoan-security-universe
     ubuntu-eoan-backports-universe
     ubuntu-eoan-main
     ubuntu-eoan-universe
     ubuntu-eoan-multiverse

 /var/cache/app-info
  - Empty.

Metainfo files:
  - Found 37 components.

Summary:
Unable to add data: MDB_BAD_VALSIZE: Unsupported size of key/DB name/data, or wrong DUPFIXED size

[Aleix Pol (aleixpol-kde)]

@Briggs, can you confirm it's properly set up? i.e. can you run "appstreamcli refresh" on your system and tell us if it succeeds and removes the error?

[Briggs (jba1978)]

(In reply to Aleix Pol from comment #12)
> @Briggs, can you confirm it's properly set up? i.e. can you run
> "appstreamcli refresh" on your system and tell us if it succeeds and removes
> the error?

I'm very sorry. I no longer have it installed.

[Aleix Pol (aleixpol-kde)]

Assuming it's fixed, haven't seen it in any major distro for a while, meaning they just fixed their AppStream.

[Tarık Buğra (gezgin61)]

I can see now discover works well with turkish language at Lubuntu 20.04. I don't have enough knowlage to understand why but thanks^^.