Comment 2 for bug 474954

Confirmed on Ubuntu 9.10, Inkscape 0.47+dev rev. 9147, with almost the same error:

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The program 'inkscape' received an X Window System error.
This probably reflects a bug in the program.
The error was 'XI_BadDevice (invalid Device parameter)'.
  (Details: serial 109694 error_code 151 request_code 147 minor_code 13)
  (Note to programmers: normally, X errors are reported asynchronously;
   that is, you will receive the error a while after causing it.
   To debug your program, run it with the --sync command line
   option to change this behavior. You can then get a meaningful
   backtrace from your debugger if you break on the gdk_x_error() function.)

Program exited with code 01.
(gdb) bt
No stack.
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You don't need to wait 30 seconds. Just select another application and go back to Inkscape.