Gnome-panel freezes regularly during use

[Kevin Kubasik]

I commonly find that the gnome panels have frozen and are completely unresponsive and I am forced to kill it, at which point it starts up fine and resumes with little issue. Until it freezes again. This might be something wrong with a gnome-applet, but I'm not entirely sure.

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

Thanks for your bug. What version of Ubuntu do you use? Could you install gnome-panel-dbg and get a backtrace of the freeze with it?
When the panel is frozen:
- gdb -p $(pidof gnome-panel)
(gdb) thread apply all bt

When that happens is the menu still working? Could you try killing applets and notice if stopping one of them unfreeze the panel?

[Kevin Kubasik (kkubasik)]

Sure, I'll do my best to get a trace next time it happens! Although, I think I have narrowed down the issue, it only happens when Java applications have a tray icon. (aka Azureus, Deskzilla, and Limewire) If none of those are running, gnome-panel never freezes. Dunno if that helps at all, I'll see what I can't do about that backtrace.

Oh, and I'm running edgy, installed from the CD about 2 weeks ago, and kept up to date since that.

[Kevin Kubasik (kkubasik)]

Ok, herse what that gets me:
(gdb) thread apply all bt

Thread 1 (Thread -1224964432 (LWP 5136)):
#0 0xffffe410 in __kernel_vsyscall ()
#1 0xb7617d1e in pthread_exit () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
#2 0xb75cceef in fork () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
#3 0xb76802d4 in fork () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libpthread.so.0
#4 0xb7f77192 in gnome_gtk_module_info_get () from /usr/lib/libgnomeui-2.so.0
#5 <signal handler called>
#6 0xb75a4c64 in free () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
#7 0xb75a653e in calloc () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
#8 0xb7781c4e in g_malloc0 () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#9 0xb7bd3080 in gtk_recent_info_has_application ()
   from /usr/lib/libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0
#10 0xb7bd53c5 in gtk_recent_info_get_icon () from /usr/lib/libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0
#11 0xb7bce75f in gtk_recent_chooser_menu_new ()
   from /usr/lib/libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0
#12 0xb7778aa1 in g_source_is_destroyed () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#13 0xb777a802 in g_main_context_dispatch () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#14 0xb777d7df in g_main_context_check () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#15 0xb777db89 in g_main_loop_run () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#16 0xb7b7c574 in gtk_main () from /usr/lib/libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0
#17 0x08061d8c in main ()
#0 0xffffe410 in __kernel_vsyscall ()

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

Thank you for your efforts. That looks like a GTK issue with the recently open files code. Could you install libgtk2.0-0-dbg and get a backtrace with it?

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

that bug is not really useful without a debug backtrace, closing for now, feel free to reopen if you still get the problem and can get one

[Erik (echakr)]

When I see this freezing in Gutsy, one can still click on the applets and buttons (e.g. the menu), but the icons are not updated with the mouseover highlight. This is the case for all buttons and applets. The most annoying part is that the clock doesn't update.

hiding the panel with the hide arrows and showing it again appears to refresh it enough to get everything working again. It is quite hard to notice when this happens, as the panel is still functional.