6.2.1 .xsession-errors

**utu** · 07-14-2010, 01:30 AM

knoppix@Microknoppix:~$ ls -l ~/.config/autostart
total 12
-rw-r--r-- 1 knoppix knoppix 4832 Jul 7 09:05 nm-applet.desktop
-rw-r--r-- 1 knoppix knoppix 2532 Jul 7 09:05 polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1.desktop

knoppix@Microknoppix:~$ ls -l /etc/xdg/autostart
total 8
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4831 Jan 26 23:53 nm-applet.desktop
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2531 Jan 15 23:40 polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1.desktop

knoppix@Microknoppix:~$ cat -n /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE/autostart
1 @xscreensaver -no-splash
2 @lxpanel --profile LXDE
3 @pcmanfm --desktop --profile LXDE
4 @/usr/lib/policykit-1-gnome/polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1

Desktop Session Settings gui has two boxes checked:
Policy Authentication Agent; and Network Manager.
Perhaps the first box shouldn't be checked? Might that be the problem?

**mecho** · 07-14-2010, 02:09 AM

You can safely delete both .desktop files and just leave the line in /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE/autostart
This way you have 3 instances of polkit not 2

This will fix the error.

**utu** · 07-14-2010, 08:50 PM

@mecho

Thanks again, mecho.

Concerning my .xsession-errors, 'types one and two':
I'm not having much luck deleting the .desktop entries. Anyway,
I'd like to understand this PolicyKit stuff a little better before
just deleting these entries. These came with the distro;
I didn't invent them (at least knowingly).

**************

Concerning my .xsession-errors, 'types three & four', Compiz 0.8.2-6
in Knoppix 6.2.1 does not look in the right places for theme material.
Clearlooks is part of gtk2-engines 1:2; Ubuntu Human would also be
available if gtk2-engines-ubuntulooks 0.9 were added to the basic
Knoppix 6.2.1.

**mecho** · 07-14-2010, 09:04 PM

Hi Utu. One more time - you can safely delete the 2 .desktop files. If you want to know where all they come frrom - the starting link in /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE/autostart came with your last update of lxsession and is in conformance with the new pcmanfm2. The original starting .desktop file for polkit is /etc/xdg/autostart/policykit-1-gnome/polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1, I am not sure about the one that you have in your home folder, but it was not originally there. One thing is certain, that is you should only have 1 starting link for policykit-1-gnome/polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1 otherwise errors occur

**utu** · 07-18-2010, 07:16 PM

Summary regarding observed .xsession-errors in Knoppix 6.2.1, Flash/usb version:

By far, the greatest number of .xsession errors were due to 'XID collision warning's
due to Flash-content. The amount of errors logged per unit time at varied greatly
with the site. Results for a number of sites are summarized in 'Flash-content errors'.
Adobe, Hulu and Newegg sites showed the highest rates of these errors.

A smaller, but more persistent set of six error types were also consistently noted.
These are summarized in 'Non-Flash-content errors'. The first two of these types seem
both to be related to PolicyKit problems associated with the Desktop Session Setting gui.
The third and fourth of these types of errors seem both to be related to Compiz
and/or another program not finding Clearlooks and Ubuntu Human theme material where it
expects to find it. The Sixth of these types of errors is due to an unset gnome
interface setting.

In response to these observations we have done the following.
1. Changed our /etc/X11/Xsession script to keep only the current .xsession-errors,
rather than concatenate each new session with all the previous;
2. Added SQLite Manager to IceWeasel and instituted an occasional compaction
of the urlclassifier3 cache;
3. Set /desktop/gnome/interface/accessibility to false (unchecked the box);
4. Reported the notes concerning Non-Flash-content error types one thru' four
to Klaus Knopper; and
5. Reported the notes concerning Non-Flash-content error types three & four
also to the Compiz forum.

The 'XID collision warning' problem has been reported everywhere for most every distro.
It seems to lie somewhere between Adobe and gtk as a responsibility to fix. In my
case, I see no performance penalty or crashes to worry about, and I've cut back on
the overhead to record all these otherwise meaningless (to me) .xsession-error reports.

**mecho** · 07-25-2010, 06:28 AM

There is a new flash player available for Linux which will supposedly solve all our problems. It is called lightspark. It is still in alpha stage, but it has very promising future. Unlike Gnash, it is build on the official documentation released by Adobe. Hopefully soon Linux community will enjoy quality hardware accelerated flash content, because like it or not flash is not going away any time soon

**mecho** · 08-09-2010, 01:05 AM

I have a better idea regarding .xsession-errors, or at least sounds better to me.
Edit /etc/X11/xsession line61
ERRFILE=$HOME/.xsession-errors to ERRFILE=/var/log/xsession-errors
then create symlink ln -s /var/log/xsession-errors ~/.xsession-errors

/var/log uses tmpfs in Knoppix and exist only in RAM, This way you will save unnecessary writes to the flash drive. And since it exist only in RAM there is no need for changing the survival option
exec >>"$ERRFILE" 2>&1

The gain is longer flash drive life expectancy

**utu** · 08-09-2010, 02:03 AM

@mecho

I think this idea has some elegance.

However, If X dies, won't we want a log to refer to
on next boot to a command line to see what went wrong?