XDG_DATA_DIRS XDG_CONFIG_DIRS MANDATORY_PATH DEFAULTS_PATH are not set correctly

[P]

after login to my plasma session I noticed the following strange path in some XDG env variables missing the : separator

pascal@minipc:~$ env | grep XDG
XDG_VTNR=7
XDG_SESSION_ID=264
XDG_SESSION_TYPE=x11
XDG_DATA_DIRS=/home/pascal/kde/share:/usr/share//usr/share/xsessions/plasma:/usr/local/share/:/usr/share/:/var/lib/snapd/desktop
XDG_SESSION_DESKTOP=KDE
XDG_SESSION_CLASS=user
XDG_SEAT_PATH=/org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Seat0
XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP=KDE
XDG_SEAT=seat0
XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/1026
XDG_SESSION_PATH=/org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Session5
XDG_CONFIG_DIRS=/etc/xdg/xdg-/usr/share/xsessions/plasma:/etc/xdg:/usr/share/kubuntu-default-settings/kf5-settings

pascal@minipc:~$ env | grep PATH
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/home/pascal/kde/lib:
MANDATORY_PATH=/usr/share/gconf//usr/share/xsessions/plasma.mandatory.path
DEFAULTS_PATH=/usr/share/gconf//usr/share/xsessions/plasma.default.path
XDG_SEAT_PATH=/org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Seat0
XDG_SESSION_PATH=/org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Session5
PATH=/usr/lib/ccache:/home/pascal/kde/bin:/home/pascal/bin:/home/pascal/.local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/local/games:/snap/bin

As you see the following 2 env variables are not setup correctly :

pascal@minipc:~$ env | grep PATH | grep '//'
MANDATORY_PATH=/usr/share/gconf//usr/share/xsessions/plasma.mandatory.path
DEFAULTS_PATH=/usr/share/gconf//usr/share/xsessions/plasma.default.path

The same for :

pascal@minipc:~$ env | grep XDG | grep '//'
XDG_DATA_DIRS=/home/pascal/kde/share:/usr/share//usr/share/xsessions/plasma:/usr/local/share/:/usr/share/:/var/lib/snapd/desktop

You can also notice the 'xdg-/usr/xxx' in the following :

XDG_CONFIG_DIRS=/etc/xdg/xdg-/usr/share/xsessions/plasma:/etc/xdg:/usr/share/kubuntu-default-settings/kf5-settings

For XDG variables they seem to be set up here :

pascal@minipc:~$ dpkg -S /etc/X11/Xsession.d/60x11-common_xdg_path
x11-common: /etc/X11/Xsession.d/60x11-common_xdg_path

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 17.04
Package: x11-common 1:7.7+16ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.10.0-28.32-lowlatency 4.10.17
Uname: Linux 4.10.0-28-lowlatency x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.4-0ubuntu4.5
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: KDE
Date: Mon Jul 24 18:51:03 2017
Dependencies: lsb-base 9.20160110ubuntu5
InstallationDate: Installed on 2016-05-14 (436 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Kubuntu 16.04 LTS "Xenial Xerus" - Release amd64 (20160420.1)
PackageArchitecture: all
SourcePackage: xorg
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Kenneth Hanson (khanson679)]

I have the this problem on Xenial. Double slash in XDG_DATA_DIRS and a minus in XDG_CONFIG_DIRS.

Even worse, when I tried to append paths for Flatpak to XDG_DATA_DIRS using an .env file in my home directory, the result was so broken that Plasma failed to start. I've undone the change since then, but I remember a double colon in there, and my additions appearing in the middle of the string rather than the beginning or end as expected.

This seems rather serious to me.

[Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton)]

fixed in bionic