This is still going on in gnome-session 2.28.0-0ubuntu5. Also, no one has confirmed any of the "fixed" packages so far. When I first upgraded from jaunty to karmic, I also changed my graphics card and drivers from fglrx to nvidia, so I put all the troubles with my compiz desktop down to that... but this one persists. Basically, gnome-session is not loading properly, sometimes doesn't load at all, occasionally gives me a text login, etc but if run with the right command line works perfectly. The most frequent scenario is this: My desktop should load with compiz, but compiz is suddenly killed while gnome-session is loading. The compiz background blinks once for a fraction of a second, and then I get metacity. running "gnome-session & gnome-panel & compiz &" works perfectly running compiz --replace after login (and crashing to metacity) works, but it does NOT work as a startup (a workaround posted in some forums, which by all means should work but inexplicably stopped working for me one day--either way it is a workaround and not a solution) If i run just "gnome-session" in a terminal, it tells me something is "Terminated" immediately after it says "*Starting Compiz" then proceeds to act as if it were in fact starting compiz and outputs some warning messages about bad settings (none critical) then I get the following: *** glibc detected *** /usr/bin/compiz.real: double free or corruption (!prev): 0x00000000026bba60 *** ======= Backtrace: ========= /lib/libc.so.6[0x7f0306a5add6] /lib/libc.so.6(cfree+0x6c)[0x7f0306a5f74c] /usr/lib/libGL.so.1[0x7f030726ed28] ======= Memory map: ======== 00400000-0043c000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 398399 /usr/bin/compiz.real 0063b000-0063c000 r--p 0003b000 fc:01 398399 /usr/bin/compiz.real 0063c000-0063d000 rw-p 0003c000 fc:01 398399 /usr/bin/compiz.real 020f5000-04e13000 rw-p 00000000 00:00 0 [heap] 7f02f4000000-7f02f4021000 rw-p 00000000 00:00 0 7f02f4021000-7f02f8000000 ---p 00000000 00:00 0 7f02f9aa4000-7f02f9ca4000 rw-s 1f111a000 00:0e 8879 /dev/nvidia0 7f02ff3bd000-7f02ff3c9000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 212631 /lib/libnss_files-2.10.1.so 7f02ff3c9000-7f02ff5c8000 ---p 0000c000 fc:01 212631 /lib/libnss_files-2.10.1.so 7f02ff5c8000-7f02ff5c9000 r--p 0000b000 fc:01 212631 /lib/libnss_files-2.10.1.so 7f02ff5c9000-7f02ff5ca000 rw-p 0000c000 fc:01 212631 /lib/libnss_files-2.10.1.so 7f02ff5ca000-7f02ff5d4000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 212642 /lib/libnss_nis-2.10.1.so 7f02ff5d4000-7f02ff7d3000 ---p 0000a000 fc:01 212642 /lib/libnss_nis-2.10.1.so 7f02ff7d3000-7f02ff7d4000 r--p 00009000 fc:01 212642 /lib/libnss_nis-2.10.1.so 7f02ff7d4000-7f02ff7d5000 rw-p 0000a000 fc:01 212642 /lib/libnss_nis-2.10.1.so 7f02ff7d5000-7f02ff7eb000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 212592 /lib/libnsl-2.10.1.so 7f02ff7eb000-7f02ff9eb000 ---p 00016000 fc:01 212592 /lib/libnsl-2.10.1.so 7f02ff9eb000-7f02ff9ec000 r--p 00016000 fc:01 212592 /lib/libnsl-2.10.1.so 7f02ff9ec000-7f02ff9ed000 rw-p 00017000 fc:01 212592 /lib/libnsl-2.10.1.so 7f02ff9ed000-7f02ff9ef000 rw-p 00000000 00:00 0 7f02ff9ef000-7f02ff9f6000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 212615 /lib/libnss_compat-2.10.1.so 7f02ff9f6000-7f02ffbf6000 ---p 00007000 fc:01 212615 /lib/libnss_compat-2.10.1.so 7f02ffbf6000-7f02ffbf7000 r--p 00007000 fc:01 212615 /lib/libnss_compat-2.10.1.so 7f02ffbf7000-7f02ffbf8000 rw-p 00008000 fc:01 212615 /lib/libnss_compat-2.10.1.so 7f02ffbf8000-7f02ffc25000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 213287 /lib/libpcre.so.3.12.1 7f02ffc25000-7f02ffe24000 ---p 0002d000 fc:01 213287 /lib/libpcre.so.3.12.1 7f02ffe24000-7f02ffe25000 r--p 0002c000 fc:01 213287 /lib/libpcre.so.3.12.1 7f02ffe25000-7f02ffe26000 rw-p 0002d000 fc:01 213287 /lib/libpcre.so.3.12.1 7f02ffe26000-7f02ffe6a000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 394581 /usr/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f02ffe6a000-7f030006a000 ---p 00044000 fc:01 394581 /usr/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f030006a000-7f030006b000 r--p 00044000 fc:01 394581 /usr/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f030006b000-7f030006c000 rw-p 00045000 fc:01 394581 /usr/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f030006c000-7f030006d000 rw-p 00000000 00:00 0 7f030006d000-7f0300074000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 212762 /lib/librt-2.10.1.so 7f0300074000-7f0300273000 ---p 00007000 fc:01 212762 /lib/librt-2.10.1.so 7f0300273000-7f0300274000 r--p 00006000 fc:01 212762 /lib/librt-2.10.1.so 7f0300274000-7f0300275000 rw-p 00007000 fc:01 212762 /lib/librt-2.10.1.so 7f0300275000-7f03002b2000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 245576 /lib/libdbus-1.so.3.4.0 7f03002b2000-7f03004b2000 ---p 0003d000 fc:01 245576 /lib/libdbus-1.so.3.4.0 7f03004b2000-7f03004b3000 r--p 0003d000 fc:01 245576 /lib/libdbus-1.so.3.4.0 7f03004b3000-7f03004b4000 rw-p 0003e000 fc:01 245576 /lib/libdbus-1.so.3.4.0 7f03004b4000-7f03004d4000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 247394 /usr/lib/libdbus-glib-1.so.2.1.0 7f03004d4000-7f03006d4000 ---p 00020000 fc:01 247394 /usr/lib/libdbus-glib-1.so.2.1.0 7f03006d4000-7f03006d5000 r--p 00020000 fc:01 247394 /usr/lib/libdbus-glib-1.so.2.1.0 7f03006d5000-7f03006d6000 rw-p 00021000 fc:01 247394 /usr/lib/libdbus-glib-1.so.2.1.0 7f03006d6000-7f03006da000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 394583 /usr/lib/libgthread-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f03006da000-7f03008d9000 ---p 00004000 fc:01 394583 /usr/lib/libgthread-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f03008d9000-7f03008da000 r--p 00003000 fc:01 394583 /usr/lib/libgthread-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f03008da000-7f03008db000 rw-p 00004000 fc:01 394583 /usr/lib/libgthread-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f03008db000-7f0300937000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 547414 /usr/lib/libORBit-2.so.0.1.0 7f0300937000-7f0300b37000 ---p 0005c000 fc:01 547414 /usr/lib/libORBit-2.so.0.1.0 7f0300b37000-7f0300b46000 r--p 0005c000 fc:01 547414 /usr/lib/libORBit-2.so.0.1.0 7f0300b46000-7f0300b49000 rw-p 0006b000 fc:01 547414 /usr/lib/libORBit-2.so.0.1.0 7f0300b49000-7f0300b4c000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 394582 /usr/lib/libgmodule-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0300b4c000-7f0300d4b000 ---p 00003000 fc:01 394582 /usr/lib/libgmodule-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0300d4b000-7f0300d4c000 r--p 00002000 fc:01 394582 /usr/lib/libgmodule-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0300d4c000-7f0300d4d000 rw-p 00003000 fc:01 394582 /usr/lib/libgmodule-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0300d4d000-7f0300e12000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 212171 /lib/libglib-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0300e12000-7f0301011000 ---p 000c5000 fc:01 212171 /lib/libglib-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0301011000-7f0301012000 r--p 000c4000 fc:01 212171 /lib/libglib-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0301012000-7f0301013000 rw-p 000c5000 fc:01 212171 /lib/libglib-2.0.so.0.2200.3 7f0301013000-7f0301014000 rw-p 00000000 00:00 0 7f0301014000-7f030104c000 r-xp 00000000 fc:01 9761 /usr/lib/libgconf-2.so.4.1.5 7f030104c000-7f030124c000 ---p 00038000 fc:01 9761 Aborted This is followed by some warnings about bad settings in metacity... It never actually says when it decided to load metacity.