DMZ-White theme shows gray square in place of curson on Ubuntu 24.04

[Qwerty Chouskie]

From https://askubuntu.com/q/1411558:

"Just installed Ubuntu server 22.04 and as I needed a DE, followed some tutorials where most of them suggested that I can install gnome (or ubuntu-desktop) using the tasksel command.

After doing so I encountered two problems: the mouse pointer on desktop is showing as a solid gray square ⬛ and the hotspot is at upper left corner. However when I run any gui app the pointer is drawn perfectly fine.

How can I fix this issues?"

And the top answer, indicating it's happening more for 24.04:

"

I faced the same problem on Ubuntu 24.04 beta, on GNOME / Ubuntu desktops, using my preferred cursor theme DMZ-White. When the mouse is over the top bar or the dock/launcher (whatever it's called), the mouse pointer is a light gray (almost white) square.

It seems to me that the icon theme is missing the default file. For me this solution worked:

Check which cursor theme you're using. Start gnome-tweaks and go to Appearance -> Styles -> Cursor.

In a terminal, navigate to its directory under /usr/share/icons and then the cursors subdirectory underneath, e.g.

cd /usr/share/icons/DMZ-White/cursors/

(The cursor theme's name may not directly map to the filesystem directory name, use common sense to find it.)

Then create the missing symbolic link (or copy the file):

sudo ln -s left_ptr default

Then switch to a different cursor theme in gnome-tweaks and back to this one, for the change to take effect. Or log out and log back in."

I can confirm that I am also affected by this bug, and the suggested workaround appears to fix the issue.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Awol Nation (cutecat)]

I had the same issue as described above upgrading from 23.10 to 24.04.
I can confirm that creating the symlink in order to create the missing default file fixed this issue for me as well.

[Adrien Jarthon (bigbourin)]

+1, I also had this issue after an update from 23.10 to 24.04. Adding the symlink manually fixed the problem (thanks).