Regression: Unity not launched on boot (no launcher/dash/panel)

[Steve Magoun]

After upgrading from 11.10 beta 1 to more recent packages, the launcher/dash/panel no longer launch on boot. I get just the desktop background with a nautilus menu at the very top of the screen. Unity itself seems to be not running:

steve@steve-laptop:~$ ps ax | grep unity
 1936 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/unity-window-decorator
steve@steve-laptop:~$

Compiz is still running, and I can start a terminal and launch applications that way. The apps work normally. Notifications work too.

I reproduced this with both Unity 4.16 and 4.18.

I see this in ~/.xsession-errors, which is a bit suspicious:

Initializing fade options...done
process 1833: arguments to dbus_message_iter_append_basic() were incorrect, assertion "*bool_p == 0 || *bool_p == 1" failed in file ../../dbus/dbus-message.c line 2549.
This is normally a bug in some application using the D-Bus library.
I/O warning : failed to load external entity "/home/steve/.compiz/session/10b1434d84665429da131706284686321300000017510041"
Initializing session options...done
Starting unity-window-decorator

Process 1833 is compiz. I've attached the full .xsession-errors file.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
Package: unity 4.18.0-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-12.19-generic 3.0.4
Uname: Linux 3.0.0-12-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu1
Architecture: amd64
CompizPlugins: [core,bailer,detection,composite,opengl,compiztoolbox,move,resize,place,decor,dbus,mousepoll,gnomecompat,imgpng,imgsvg,imgjpeg,text,commands,neg,wall,snap,animation,scale,scaleaddon,expo,staticswitcher,regex,resizeinfo,workarounds,ezoom,vpswitch,fade,session]
Date: Mon Sep 26 14:47:55 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" - Beta amd64 (20100901.1)
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: unity
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to oneiric on 2011-09-02 (24 days ago)

[Steve Magoun (smagoun)]

I launched ccsm and found the Unity compiz plugin had been disabled. I did not do anything intentional to disable this plugin. When I tried to enable the plugin via ccsm, it said that a number of keys conflicted with existing keys - for example the GNOME compatibility plugin, which used the same key for 'Run Dialog'. I don't have the exact error messages handy; there were about 6 conflicts. After getting through the conflicts, the plugin was enabled and unity launched in my running session.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[manny (estelar57)]

confirmed , but this happens to me at least 40% of the time i try to log in.

[manny (estelar57)]

pic attached

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

seems like bug #851345

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

could you add your .xsession-errors when having the issue?

[Mikkel Kamstrup Erlandsen (kamstrup)]

Attaching my .xsession-errors from a failed login attempt.

This happens to me maybe 1/10 times I try to log in. One thing that I've noticed consistently every time this failure has happened is that there is a slight glitch already at the moment I hit <enter> in lightdm: The screen flickers to my wallpaper and then back to the login screen where it hangs for ~5s until it changes back to my wallpaper and starts the login sequence; which then seems to fail miserably.

This could imply that there is an X11 or lightdm issue involved here, because the flicker between wallpaper and back to lightdm is at the instant I hit enter on the password, and I doubt we'd had time to do much (or maybe compiz exits immediately or and restarts something)....

[Mikkel Kamstrup Erlandsen (kamstrup)]

Interestingly... I notice this line in my .xsession-errors:

  Compiz (opengl) - Fatal: GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap is missing

I was just about to quip that this definitely wasn't a dupe of bug #851345 as Sebastian suggests, since I have an Intel HD 3000 (the default sandybridge one), but this seems to suggest otherwise...

[Mikkel Kamstrup Erlandsen (kamstrup)]

Looks like #863054 as well

[Mikkel Kamstrup Erlandsen (kamstrup)]

Ok. After much digging around, this is surely a dupe of bug #851345. It's a crash in lightdm on login.