No desktop after login, after fresh install of 9.04

[rhill]

Summary: No desktop after login, after fresh install, just a blank screen with mouse pointer. However, it appears all works fine if I boot from the same CD used for install (using the 'try Ubuntu' option.)

After reading an article about how easy it was to install Ubuntu 0.04 at Tom's Hardware, I decided to give it a try on my somewhat old laptop. I am new to Linux so sorry in advance if I don't provide all the information I should. My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 6000 with an ATI X300 inside, and Windows XP Pro as the initially installed OS.

I installed the package ubuntu-9.04-desktop-i386.iso, and it seems all went well, up to when I have to login. Login screen displays with no problem as far as I can tell. However, as soon as I login, I am faced with only a blank desktop and the mouse pointer, nothing else. I reinstalled further three times, and always the same thing. Then I tried booting Ubuntu from the CD I burned using the above-mentioned image, and it actually work fine, I could configure my network connection and surf using Firefox.

So I find a bit baffling that it works fine from the CD, but when installing on the HD from that CD, it doesn't work fine. Note that when I am at the point where there is no desktop, I can access any of the six terminals. But since I am new to all of this, I have no idea what to do while in a command-line terminal in order to diagnose, or fix the problem of not having any desktop.

update 1: forgot to mention, I tried the "xfix" option at boot time, and it didn't work.

[Ben Crisford (bencrisford)]

Hey! Thanks for taking the time to report this bug :).

When you boot ubuntu using the method that normally gives you a "blank desktop" at some stage you should have a menu with an option saying "recovery mode", select that and hit enter. If you can't find recovery mode, boot into the "blank desktop" and hit Ctrl+Alt+F6.

Now you should have a command line (black background, white writing). Log in (if it prompts you to), and then type:
init 2

That might sort your problem?

[rhill (rhill-fr-ca)]

Hi Ben.

I did the following
1) Rebooted
2) Selected "Ubuntu 9.04, kernel 2.6.28-11-generic (recovery mode)"
3) Selected "Drop to root shell prompt"
4) Entered "init 2"

Result: back to blank (black) desktop, where only the mouse pointer is visible.

There doesn't seem to be any "hidden" objects under mouse pointer wherever I put the mouse pointer, so it seems to be a case where the GUI itself doesn't load at all.

Performing the above steps, there is a lot of information displayed, and I suspect this is dumped into some log file which might contain useful information as to what failed, but I wouldn't know where to find that log file, or how to read its content.

[Ben Crisford (bencrisford)]

Hmm, thats interesting.

You could do the same again and try the command "startx" (sans quotes), but i doubt it will help, and I don't expect you to try it.

Could you boot normally with a USB memory stick inserted, when the black screen shows, press Ctrl+Alt+F6. It should give you a command line (if it doesn't then don't worry and post back here saying so).

At the command line, log in, and then run this command:
sudo cp ~/.xsession-errors /media/<name-of-usb>

Note the "sudo" at the beginning, as well at the space between "cp" and "~", and the space between "s" and "/".
Replace "<name-of-usb>" with the name of your usb, i.e. the name that appears in My Computer when you are in windows, if it has spaces then I THINK you should type "name%20of%20usb" instead of "name of usb" but im not entirely sure.

After you run that command it should ask you for your sudo password (likely to be the same password as your user account if you dont know it). After you hit enter it will copper the error log onto your USB. :)

[rhill (rhill-fr-ca)]

Ok, I tried "startx" after selecting the "root shell prompt" in recovery mode, and the desktop showed up (with all the icons etc.) Looks like a step in the right direction. However, immediately there is an error message on the desktop, and the mouse pointer freeze, and so does the keyboard, such that I can't get into any of the tty consoles (ctrl-alt-f1-6). I force-rebooted many time using recovery and "startx" and always ended up with an error message and a frozen interface/keyboard, although the error message came in various flavor as detailed below:

*** 1st flavor ***
/-----
Error
The panel encountered a problem while loading
"OAFIID.GNOME_FastUserSwitchApplet".
Do you want to delete the applet from your configuration?
[Don't delete] [Delete]
\-----

*** 2nd flavor ***
First message box:
/-----
Error
?
\-----

Second message box (appears right on top of the first one, so I couldn't read the first message):
/-----
Error
"User Switcher" has quit unexpectedly.
If you reload a panel object, it will
automatically added back to the panel.
[Don't reload] [Reload]
\-----

*** 3rd flavor ***
/-----
Error
The panel encountered a problem while loading
"OAFIID.GNOME_IndicatorApplet".
Do you want to delete the applet from your configuration?
[Don't delete] [Delete]
\-----

*** 4th flavor ***
/-----
Error
"Indicator Applet" has quit unexpectedly.
If you reload a panel object, it will
automatically added back to the panel.
[Don't reload] [Reload]
\-----

Etc. Of course, I didn't make any choice given that the interface was frozen (keyboard and screen), only a cold reboot would get me out.

Regarding copying .xsession-errors to a USB stick, I couldn't as it seems my USB stick doesn't show up in /media. But I opened .xsession-errors to see its content (using the "nano" command), and it is definitely empty ("Read 0 lines"). I really want to make this thing work, I liked what I saw when I booted from the Live CD.

[Ben Crisford (bencrisford)]

I don't understand why it isn't working for you. But in some cases ubuntu just isn't compatible.

The last thing I would suggest is the ubuntu alternate CD, which is available from:
http://releases.ubuntu.com/jaunty/ubuntu-9.04-alternate-i386.iso

[rhill (rhill-fr-ca)]

Well, regarding the alternate release, it says I need an "Intel Atom processor," while my laptop contains a centrino. As mentioned originally, Ubuntu works fine if I boot from the CD rather than the installed version (which came from the same CD) -- I could log in fine to the desktop, and surf using Firefox, so this means it can work on my laptop. Something specific to the installed version is preventing it to work.

[Ben Crisford (bencrisford)]

Well this is pretty odd :/.

The bug is either a gnome bug or an X. bug, and as it worked (temporarily) when you ran "startx" I am assuming that the bug is in X.

I'll add that to also effects. But I am not sure whether to confirm this bug or not. You are certainly having difficulties, I don't doubt that, but I don't know if this is actually a bug or something unique to your system.

Would you mind posting some of your system specs to the description please?

Thanks :),
Ben

[rhill (rhill-fr-ca)]

Problem solved.

Sorry to have lost your time. Problem was that the partition to which /home is mounted was full (100%). I reinstalled without importing data files/settings from the resident Windows XP installation, and it now works fine. What put me on the right path was that I tried to log in using a "GNOME failsafe" session at the login screen. Rather than a blank desktop, I had an error message that "Nautilus" couldn't find my Desktop folder. I tried to create one using mkdir, but this failed with a "no space left."

What I understand less, is that I previously tried to install without importing any data, and it still didn't work. This time I forced a format of the partition. From the message given to me by the partitioner was that all files/folders on the partition would be wiped out, so my understanding was that the partition was emptied. Somehow, this is not what happens, it needs reformatting to clear space on the partition.

Maybe an error message informing of an out of space condition would be useful during install?

Anyway, sorry for the time lost.

[Ben Crisford (bencrisford)]

Don't worry about it! :)

The main thing it you have it fixed!

Enjoy Ubuntu!

[xteejx (xteejx-deactivatedaccount)]

Reopening bug report.
rhill, I believe this may actually be a bug. X should not fail to start just because your home partition is full, this is normally used for storage only. I am assuming you have a swap partition? Can you provide a full list of the partitions on your hard drive(s) please stating the size/type i.e. ntfs, ext3, swap, etc/and free space? Thank you.

[xteejx (xteejx-deactivatedaccount)]

Actually, this appears to be a duplicate of bug 22842, so it is being marked as such. If you feel you can provide any more helpful information, such as what we have requested above, can you please provide it in the other bug report. Thank you for reporting this.