Startup Disk Creator locks up Orca screen reader

[WaywardGeek]

Binary package hint: usb-creator

There is a know problem with python applications and at-spi, which is the code that provides an accessible description of GTK widgets to screen readers. If you try and update your GTK interface from a thread that was not the one that called gtk.main(), then the entire Gnome desktop locks up when your application exits. This always happens with usb-creator-gtk if Orca is running.

While this is technically a bug somewhere deep down in either the pyatspi code, or more likely at-spi-registryd, it would be great to have usb-creator-gtk be accessible sooner than later. What it takes is a fairly straight-forward, if not small, change in the apt callbacks. Rather than updating GTK widgets directly, they should register a change in some variables, and wake up the main thread so it can show the updates.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: usb-creator (not installed)
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-22.33-generic 2.6.32.11+drm33.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-22-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: fglrx
Architecture: amd64
Date: Thu May 27 09:24:26 2010
InstallationMedia: Vinux 3.0 RC4 X64 - Release amd64
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: usb-creator

[Isaac Porat (isaac-porat)]

This bug is confirmed and happens every time the accessibility profile is running. Thanks. Isaac Porat.

[komputes (komputes)]

Wayward, could you please provide sequential steps needed to reproduce this issue from a Live CD. Thank you.

[WaywardGeek (waywardgeek)]

To reproduce this, enable Orca in the Live CD. For the first 30 seconds after boot, press space bar every 4 seconds. There is a screen at the beginning of booting that expects you to press a key to get to the old boot menu. You should be at a screen asking for your language. Press Enter to select English. Then press F5 to open the accessibility options menu. Press 3 to turn on screen reader, and Enter to get back to the boot menu, and Enter one more time to start the boot process.

Orca should come up by default in the Gnome session, with the preferences dialog box showing. You can just click Cancel on the Preferences Dialog, and manually run System/Administration/Startup Disk Creator. I'll leave it to the reader to find some ISO somewhere to burn, and a USB key to format. Once you've done that, press Make Startup Disk. The progress will be shown with a progress bar. Everything works fine until the end, when the application tries to exit. At that point, the Gnome desktop locks up and becomes unresponsive. However, your USB key is ready for use, since the whole process actually worked. Let me know if there's anything else I can do.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for usb-creator (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]