evolution crashes on startup

[Jeff Blanchard]

Binary package hint: evolution

After upgrading to 9.04 I decided to give Evolution another try. My email was working fine and I started adding events into the calendar. After a few events Evolution locked up. After force quiting, it now locks up at restart. When I try restarting in Terminal I get

jlb@FroggyPond:~$ evolution
Fontconfig error: "~/.fonts.conf", line 2: no element found
** (evolution:5966: DEBUG: EI: SHELL STARTUP

but Evolution is still crashes. Any suggestions?

evolution:
  Installed: 2.26.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.26.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2.26.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

Cheers, Jeff

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. However, your crash report is either missing or challenging to deal with as a ".crash" file. Please follow these instructions to have apport report a new bug about your crash that can be dealt with by the automatic retracer.

If you are running the Ubuntu Stable Release you might need to enable apport in /etc/default/apport and restart.

If you are using Ubuntu with the Gnome desktop environment - launch nautilus and navigate to your /var/crash directory and double click on the crash report you wish to submit.

If you are using Kubuntu or Xubuntu you can file the crash using /usr/share/apport/apport-qt --crash-file=/var/crash/_my_crash_report.crash in a terminal - where _my_crash_report.crash is the crash you would like to report.

I'm closing this bug report since the process outlined above will automatically open a new bug report which can then dealt with more efficiently. Thanks in advance for your cooperation and understanding.

[Jeff Blanchard (blanchard)]

Hello Pedro,

There are no files in /var/crash. When I launch Evolution it freezes
and I have to use force quit to close it. This doesn't seem to generate
a crash file. I generated a backtrace which is attached. Should I
submit this?

Cheers, Jeff

Pedro Villavicencio wrote:
> Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make
> Ubuntu better. However, your crash report is either missing or
> challenging to deal with as a ".crash" file. Please follow these
> instructions to have apport report a new bug about your crash that can
> be dealt with by the automatic retracer.
>
> If you are running the Ubuntu Stable Release you might need to enable
> apport in /etc/default/apport and restart.
>
> If you are using Ubuntu with the Gnome desktop environment - launch
> nautilus and navigate to your /var/crash directory and double click on
> the crash report you wish to submit.
>
> If you are using Kubuntu or Xubuntu you can file the crash using
> /usr/share/apport/apport-qt --crash-
> file=/var/crash/_my_crash_report.crash in a terminal - where
> _my_crash_report.crash is the crash you would like to report.
>
> I'm closing this bug report since the process outlined above will
> automatically open a new bug report which can then dealt with more
> efficiently. Thanks in advance for your cooperation and understanding.
>
> ** Changed in: evolution (Ubuntu)
> Status: New => Invalid
>
>

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

the stacktrace indicates an evolution-data-server crash, could you get a stacktrace for this one? you could also try the update on bug #368508 and see if it workaround the bug

[Jeff Blanchard (blanchard)]

I was able to get Evolution working again by renaming the .evolution
directory and then restarting. No big deal since I had only been using
it a few hours and my messages were still on the my email servers.
Unfortunately while I was trying to recreate the bug I accidently wrote
over the old .evolution directory. If it comes up again I will get the
stacktrace. I do like Evolution and will continue using it. The bug
did motivate me to learn backup/restore functions right away.

Cheers, Jeff

On Sat, 2009-05-09 at 10:02 +0000, Sebastien Bacher wrote:
> the stacktrace indicates an evolution-data-server crash, could you get a
> stacktrace for this one? you could also try the update on bug #368508
> and see if it workaround the bug
>
> ** Package changed: evolution (Ubuntu) => evolution-data-server (Ubuntu)
>
> ** Changed in: evolution-data-server (Ubuntu)
> Importance: Undecided => Medium
>
> ** Changed in: evolution-data-server (Ubuntu)
> Status: Invalid => Incomplete
>
> ** Changed in: evolution-data-server (Ubuntu)
> Assignee: (unassigned) => Ubuntu Desktop Bugs (desktop-bugs)
>

[Jeff Blanchard (blanchard)]

Well, without trying I was able to replicate the events that led to the first lock up. In Calendar, I was modifying a recurring event, selected All Instances and wham. I renamed the .evolution file, restarted and was able to replicate it a third time. I am not sure how to generate the stacktrace. Can you send me a link or directions?

[Jeff Blanchard (blanchard)]

I just tried the proposed evolution-data-server and it still freezes. I also tried the proposed libical
 as per bug #368508 but still no luck.

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

could you get an evolution-data-server stacktrace using gdb?

[Jeff Blanchard (blanchard)]

Hello Sebastien,

I am not sure of the difference between a stacktrace and a backtrace.
Here is what I do

In terminal

gdb evolution 2>&1 | tee gdb-evolution.txt
handle SIG33 pass nostop noprint
set pagination 0
run

Then in the Evolution gui

Create an event that recurs every week.
Save the event
Edit the event by changing the time.
Select all (freezes at this step).

In Terminal
ctr c
backtrace full
info registers
thread apply all backtrace
quit

Attached is the file.

Cheers, Jeff

Sebastien Bacher wrote:
> could you get an evolution-data-server stacktrace using gdb?
>
>

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

the way to get a stacktrace is either to use apport or gdb this way
- start evolution on the email component
- gdb --pid `pidof evolution-data-server-2.26`
(gdb) continue
- switch evolution to the calendar
- the gdb prompt will be stopped on the e-d-s crash
(gdb) backtrace

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

the log you got shows it's eds crashing and not evolution

the way to get a stacktrace is either to use apport or gdb this way

- start evolution on the email component
- gdb --pid `pidof evolution-data-server-2.26`
(gdb) continue
- switch evolution to the calendar
- the gdb prompt will be stopped on the e-d-s crash
(gdb) backtrace

[Jeff Blanchard (blanchard)]

When I do this it locks up when I switch to calendar.

 Here is what I get

(gdb) continue
Continuing.
[New Thread 0xb63a8b90 (LWP 4251)]
Cannot get thread event message: debugger service failed
(gdb) backtrace
#0 0xb7ef2430 in __kernel_vsyscall ()
#1 0xb73b6ae7 in poll () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
#2 0xb74e774b in g_poll () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#3 0xb74d9f82 in ?? () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#4 0xb74da5ba in g_main_loop_run () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#5 0xb7710cc3 in bonobo_main () from /usr/lib/libbonobo-2.so.0
#6 0x0804b96c in ?? ()
#7 0xb72f3775 in __libc_start_main () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
#8 0x0804a421 in ?? ()

Sebastien Bacher wrote:
> the log you got shows it's eds crashing and not evolution
>
> the way to get a stacktrace is either to use apport or gdb this way
>
> - start evolution on the email component
> - gdb --pid `pidof evolution-data-server-2.26`
> (gdb) continue
> - switch evolution to the calendar
> - the gdb prompt will be stopped on the e-d-s crash
> (gdb) backtrace
>
>

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

there is no crash listed there, do you get that every time?

[Anjang (syah)]

Just kill process 'evolution-data-server-2.26'.
Restart Evolution..

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Thanks for the report, it has been some time without any response or feedback in this bug report and we are wondering if this is still an issue for you with the latest release of Ubuntu the Natty Narwhal, May you please test with that version and comment back if you're still having or not the issue? Please have a look at http://www.ubuntu.com/download to know how to install that version.Thanks in advance.