Thunderbird does not start when second display is missing

[HfX]

I am on

Kubuntu 8.10
Linux 2.6.27-11-generic #1 SMP Wed Apr 1 20:57:48 UTC 2009 i686 GNU/Linux
 apt-cache policy thunderbird
thunderbird:
  Installiert: 2.0.0.21+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.10.1
  Kandidat: 2.0.0.21+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.10.1
  Versions-Tabelle:
 *** 2.0.0.21+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.10.1 0
        500 http://de.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid-updates/main Packages
        500 http://security.ubuntu.com intrepid-security/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.0.0.17+nobinonly-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://de.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/main Packages
 Architecture: i386
 Maintainer: Alexander Sack <email address hidden>

I have a dual screen configuration (see attached xorg.conf) configured with the "ATI Catalyst control center". It works fine.

When I am at work I use both monitors, my built in laptop screen and an external 1024x768 Compaq LCD. When I
start thunderbird it starts immediately and shows me my one and only configured newsgroup news.grc.com fine.

When I am at home I only use the notebooks built in LCD 1680x1050. When I start thunderbird via the KDE start menu it shows shortly in the control bar but then is gone.

Maybe similar to bug
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/mozilla-thunderbird/+bug/328608

Doing a "ps waux | grep thun" shows me, that it is running/hanging somewhere.

The program is not on the second screen and invisible. The GUI is not here!

Btw. I always use it on the primary screen (the builtin notebook screen) and never moved it to the other.

I had this bug a long ago and went to kmail because of this. Now I thought Thunderbird would work for news
and it did. As I found out now the problem (with mail and news) is the second screen missing.

I hope you could solve this bug. It prevents me from using Thunderbird.

Best regards

Peter

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

I also attached a screenshot of the ATI Catalyst Control Center.
The main screen (built in laptop LCD) is left, the external Compaq LCD is right.
left
1680x1050

right
1024x768

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

do you have any extensions installed that might cause this issue? like firetray that was mentioned in bug 328608?
Try to disable them please.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

Hi Alexander,
thanks for your quick reply. I have alltray installed but not used. Just to take care of your advise I uninstalled it
sudo apt-get --purge alltray
rm -r -f ~/.alltray

It made no difference. Still the same problem. Now I am at home and does not start. At work today afternoon wonderful.
I hope we can find out somehow where the bug is.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

I also have no thunderbird addons installed

cat ~/.mozilla-thunderbird/profiles.ini | grep Path | awk -F "=" '{print "ls -l ~/.mozilla-thunderbird/"$2"/extensions"}' | bash
shows 0 files

aptitude search thunderbird | grep "^i"

i mozilla-thunderbird - Transition package for mozilla-thunderbird
i A thunderbird - mail/news client with RSS and integrated s
i thunderbird-locale-de - Thunderbird German language/region package

I also tried "thunderbird -safe-mode"
Exactly the same problem.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

I found out one thing that might be of interest but I don't really think so.

Today (at work where thunderbird starts) when posting to a newsgroup in thunderbird I saw, that for a very short time (because I am on a fast line) the progress bar for sending the post came up and it came up on the secondary display.
I am sure, I never moved it there. Maybe at startup thunderbird verifies somehow if the last seen desktop geometry is
available?

Anyhow, some applications seem to think they have to popout their messages some pixels left or right from the virtual
center of my monitors and not the center of my main screen.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

I have additional information.
Earlier in this report I posted ati.png which showed my dual screen configuration (at work).
I am currently at home. I looked at it and saw that it seems, that at bootup my system detected that it only has 1 (the built in display) connected. So from the systems point of view, there is only one display.
see the new attached image.
thunderbird still not starting when using main display.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

Alex I have a colleague who is very good in liinux, he took a look at the current problem and said we should try to use a debug package for thunderbird so the can debug with gdb and see where thunderbird hangs arround.

I can not find a thunderbird-dbg package in kubuntu repository. Do you have one?

What I did in the meantime was disabling KDE-Styles for gTK Apps Themes and use the default (I think QT4 themes) for GTK Apps. It made no difference.

Thunderbird not starting when second display is attached.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

need debug package for thunderbird on kubuntu latest one for 8.10

[John Vivirito (gnomefreak)]

On 04/24/2009 09:57 AM, HfX wrote:
> need debug package for thunderbird on kubuntu latest one for 8.10
>
> ** Changed in: mozilla-thunderbird (Ubuntu)
> Status: Incomplete => Confirmed
>
> ** Changed in: mozilla-thunderbird (Ubuntu)
> Assignee: (unassigned) => Alexander Sack (asac)
>
The debugging packages are in a separate repo, please see
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingProgramCrash
for the repos to add for debug packages

--
Sincerely Yours,
    John Vivirito

https://launchpad.net/~gnomefreak
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/JohnVivirito
Linux User# 414246

"How can i get lost, if i have no where to go"
    -- Metallica from Unforgiven III

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

Hi,

did a backtrace as explained in
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Backtrace

The file is attached. Waiting for further instructions.

Regards

Peter

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

I also attached now a backtrace when I have my second display attached.
Everything works fine then.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

So to confirm: at home you never had a second display?

Do you share your profiles from work at home?

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

>So to confirm: at home you never had a second display?
Yes.I configured my thunderbird profile at work (with 2 displays) and take my laptop home every day, where
I do have only the built in display.

>Do you share your profiles from work at home?
I use exactly the same machine, with same logon and same profile at home. The only difference is
the missing LCD monitor (Of course I leave this at work :) )

I hope I could point that out clearly.

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

I don't know if it helps in any way, but today I found out some strange behaviour.

I usually start my applications by going into the K-Menu and enter some letters of the program name like "thun".
Then when the application appears eg. thunderbird, I press enter and the app starts.

When I start thunderbird from the k-menu in that way, it always opened on my external display.
If I close it and then tried it to start in a shell by entering "thunderbird" <enter> it started on my builtin laptop display.
I could do this about 3-5 times. (k-menu-search,command line)
Then I started thunderbird via the k-menu in the normal way by selecting programs->internet->thunderbird and it started on the main display. Since that it starts the same way always on the main display no matter if started from the k-menu quick shortcut, the k-menu shortcut or from command line.

Btw. kmail has similar strange beaviour. When started from the k-menu (search or programs) it starts in a resized window that stays on the bottom left of the main screen.

When started from a shell prompt it starts a resized window that is located at the bottom right of the main screen.

Maybe this information could help someone to step deeper into this problem. It is maybe possilbe that this is not only a thunderbird problem. I hope we can fix that somehow. I like using thunderbird at home.

[Tim Haak (tim-haak)]

Hi

Having the same problem with jaunty since I started thunderbird with a second monitor. Now can't get it to start with a single monitor.

It worked fine on a single monitor till I started using it with a dual monitor.

Any suggestions on how to fix this would be appreciated :) or steps I need to take to help resolve it.

[Tim Haak (tim-haak)]

Hi

found when running xrandr that the system was reporting the desktop size as if both monitors were still plugged in. Changing it to the correct resolution allowed thunderbird to start correctly :).

[scubadude (reaver33)]

I to am running 2.6.27-11-generic #1 SMP with dual monitors on an Lenovo ThinkPad w500

 apt-cache policy thunderbird
thunderbird:
  Installed: 2.0.0.21+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.10.1
  Candidate: 2.0.0.21+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.10.1
  Version table:
 *** 2.0.0.21+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.10.1 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid-updates/main Packages
        500 http://security.ubuntu.com intrepid-security/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.0.0.17+nobinonly-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/main Packages

The problem is exactly the same as described previously. I have two monitors at work, and thunderbird works fine. When I bring home the laptop, I can not get thunderbird to display while using the laptop's LCD. When I start thunderbird from the commandline, I do NOT get any errors, nor do I see any pop-ups unless I start with the "-P". Then I get a popup to use or create a profile. Either choice there, new or use existing will NOT display the main thunderbird window. I can do a ps and see:

ps -ef | grep thunder
user 7999 7841 0 16:27 pts/1 00:00:00 /bin/sh /usr/bin/thunderbird
user 8011 7999 0 16:27 pts/1 00:00:00 /bin/sh /usr/lib/thunderbird/run-mozilla.sh /usr/lib/thunderbird/thunderbird-bin
user 8015 8011 7 16:27 pts/1 00:00:02 /usr/lib/thunderbird/thunderbird-bin

Yet no window is present. I use the "gtk workspace switcher" and can see that thunderbird is NOT started in any other virtual desktop. The ATI/Catalyst control panel shows that the video driver is in SINGLE monitor mode. Any thoughts?

[Tim Haak (tim-haak)]

Try the following
when on single desktop run

xrandr

It will return something like

Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 2880 x 900, maximum 2880 x 900
default connected 2880x900+0+0 0mm x 0mm
   2880x900 60.0*
   2560x800 60.0
   1440x900 60.0
   1280x800 60.0
   1280x768 60.0
   1024x768 75.0 70.0 60.0
   800x600 75.0 72.0 60.0 56.0
   640x480 75.0 72.0 60.0
   640x400 75.0 60.0
   512x384 75.0 60.0
   400x300 75.0 60.0
   320x240 75.0 60.0
   320x200 75.0 60.0

As I know for a single screen is should actually be set to

   1280x800 60.0 *

Not

 2880x900 60.0*

You then run

 sudo xrandr --output default --mode 1280x800

Which then allows thunderbird to start
(kill any background thunderbirds started with the wrong screen resolution first)

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

Hi Tim,
your solution worked.

A little bit optimized for various users it should work with

sudo xrandr --output default --mode $(xdpyinfo | grep "dimensions" | sed -e 's/^\W*dimensions:\W*\([0-9]\{3,\}x[0-9]\{3,\}\).*/\1/g')

tested on Kubuntu/Ubuntu.

We should now somehow find out how we can fix the cause of the problem. This bug drove me crazy for a long time.
In general I think it is Thunderbird related since all other applications work and find there way to the main screen.
Also I accept, that the resolution setting is wrong.

Who can move this bug forward to the right person/group?

Greets

Peter

[HfX (krasnojarsk)]

My previous comment is wrong.

sudo xrandr --output default --mode $(xdpyinfo | grep "dimensions" | sed -e 's/^\W*dimensions:\W*\([0-9]\{3,\}x[0-9]\{3,\}\).*/\1/g')
does not correct the issue since it will use the current resolution. That does not help.
At this point use

sudo xrandr --output default --mode [width]x[height]

where [width] should be the width of your current connected default display
where [height] should be the height of your current connected default display

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for thunderbird (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]