Clicking on fcitx applet hangs Ubuntu MATE

[Alkis Georgopoulos]

Method to reproduce in 1 minute:
1) Download the Ubuntu MATE 18.04 live CD.
2) Press space while booting to display the syslinux language menu. Select Ελληνικά (Greek) in order for fcitx to autorun. I guess the same will happen in other languages too.
3) Select Δοκιμάστε το Ubuntu MATE χωρίς εγκατάσταση (Try Ubuntu MATE without installing).
4) When the live session becomes available, the following applets show:
en [keyboard icon] ...
At that point, clicking on the keyboard icon causes no issues.
5) Open anything that displays a cursor, e.g. a terminal. Now the following applets show:
en [keyboard icon] us
It is a bug that the language is shown twice. But the main problem now is that if one clicks at the keyboard icon, an unpopulated (hanged) menu shows up, and the keyboard/mouse no longer work; no interaction with the desktop is possible.
6) If one presses Alt+Ctrl+F2 to switch to vt2, logs in with ubuntu-mate and empty pass, and types `killall fcitx`, and then presses Alt+Ctrl+F7 to switch back to vt7, the UI is unfrozen and works properly.

[Alkis Georgopoulos (alkisg)]

Attaching a screenshot of the issue.

When clicking on the "[keyboard] us" applet, the cursor is hidden, so the "us" keyboard language is hidden too, and isn't shown in the screenshot.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Ikuya Awashiro (ikuya-fruitsbasket)]

This issue may be caused by MATE instead of fcitx.

[csslayer (wengxt)]

I already had a workaround in newer fcitx, I'm not so clear whether it's my SNI implementation issue (I learn the spec from KDE xml files..):
https://github.com/fcitx/fcitx/commit/a3432fcb2d9d45f8702d811d7017ba6c0d7367dd

Log shows the commit is included in 4.2.9.4? Anyway this commit will help resolve it.

I also had a report on mate but no reply yet.
https://github.com/mate-desktop/mate-panel/issues/662

[Ikuya Awashiro (ikuya-fruitsbasket)]

Ubuntu 18.04 LTS is released with newest Fcitx 4.2.9.6.
So it may be another (MATE's?) issue.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[fottsia (fottsia)]

I reproduced the bug in ubuntu-mate-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso by just following the steps mentioned in the bug description.

And, killing fcitx from vt2 did allow the keyboard/mouse to work again.

[Mantas Kriaučiūnas (mantas)]

Maybe bug #1715173 is related to this bugreport?

[JB Duck-Mayr (duckmayr)]

I'm on Ubuntu MATE 18.10. Trying to implement Japanese language input caused the same issue for me. Is there any known workaround so far to enable non-English input without freezing up everything?

[Alkis Georgopoulos (alkisg)]

For Greek, we just remove fcitx and use plain old xkb.
It's been working fine for 20 years!
It's automatically configured so we don't need to do anything at all, but if someone needs to reconfigure it, he runs:

sudo dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration

I see some entries for Japanese there, but I don't know if they'll work for you.

[firefoxfans (firefoxfans)]

the same problem to me .In zh_CN.UTF-8 locale ,when in input chinese pinyin method,hit the indicator on mate-panel will correctly popup menu,but when after print shift key to change input method to input en state ,hit the indicator on mate-panel will popup a blank menu and system freeze ,all another window and application disable reponse to mouse click and keyboard hit. I have to kill fcitx in console .

[firefoxfans (firefoxfans)]

I found the solution .It's something related with the ui skin。first use keyboard shortcut to active the input method to chinese (or other instead of the default english), click the menu ,select the skin from ubuntu-XXXX to classic or dark。

[Jose Tejada (jotego)]

I have the same issue with Ubuntu Mate 19.04. The work around from firefoxfans worked for me.

If I click on the keyboard applet when any window (a terminal window, firefox...) is open, then it hangs. But I can click on it if no window is open. I selected mozc and then changed the skin to classic. It doesn't hang up now. Maybe I will need to do this each time I reboot?

[Kazuhiko Tanaka (tanakakz)]

The combination of Ubuntu 18.04.3 and the MATE desktop has the same problem.

And, I have found that this problem does not occur when moving from the fcitx-qimpanel icon to the fcitx icon. However, it occurs when click the fcitx icon directly.

Also, this problem does not occur when switching to fcitx-mozc. However, it happens again if change to another IM.

[Kazuhiko Tanaka (tanakakz)]

This can be improved by killing indicator-application-service instead of fcitx. However, nothing can be done from the GUI.

[Ruben Garcia (rubengarciahernandez)]

I am also affected. Lubuntu.
/etc/issue has: Ubuntu 18.04.3 LTS
I just followed the instructions from https://askubuntu.com/questions/671115/how-can-i-type-in-japanese-on-lubuntu/890375 and get the empty popup and hang. Ctrl+Alt+F2 does nothing either.

[Lazorne (lazorne)]

I also have the issue Ubuntu 18.04.3 LTS after I installed sogou Pinyin and other things needed for chinese input in the Welcome App.