I ran "yum update" on my Fedora 20 system a few days ago. I normally don't do this as something always breaks and in this case it was the Mate-Terminal. I already had a few terminals open so I can still use the system. Clicking on either the Terminal icon in the panel, or using Applications->Mate Terminal does the same thing: There's a message on the bottom panel that says "Starting MATE" that stays there for about 6 seconds and then it disappears. No new terminal is created. I can still use my existing terminals and I can create a new one if I run "mate-terminal &" in it. I have looked at the Properties dialog of the Terminal and nothing seems out of place (i.e. looks just like my other systems).
I have not rebooted yet in case there is something I should do first. Any ideas? Of course a reboot might just fix this but I wanted to ask before I did that. Or maybe a reboot is needed after an update and I am too ignorant to know this.
BTW, I tried to find this problem on the net but did not have any luck. Also, this is not a critical issue, the system seems fine otherwise.
Jim Lewis
On Mon, 2015-02-23 at 12:49 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
I ran "yum update" on my Fedora 20 system a few days ago. I normally don't do this as something always breaks and in this case it was the Mate-Terminal.
I can't say that I have that experience, it's very rare that an update breaks something on my system. Sounds like you have something wrong with your system, more than Fedora in general.
On Mon, 2015-02-23 at 12:49 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
I ran "yum update" on my Fedora 20 system a few days ago. I normally don't do this as something always breaks and in this case it was the Mate-Terminal.
I can't say that I have that experience, it's very rare that an update breaks something on my system. Sounds like you have something wrong with your system, more than Fedora in general.
What does "very rare" mean? So it has happened to you on occasion? It happens to me on occasion and certainly does to others as well and so I don't trust it. I want an update to improve my system, not make it worse.
The problem is still there and no I have not rebooted yet. Actually, I should point out that the update did solve the audio problem I was having with Skype. Since the pulseaudio files were now brought up to the correct version I was now able to install the 32-bit ones. Works great.
Any idea if a reboot will fix this, or will I lose access to the Mate terminal completely?
Jim Lewis
Tim:
I can't say that I have that experience, it's very rare that an update breaks something on my system. Sounds like you have something wrong with your system, more than Fedora in general.
Jim Lewis:
What does "very rare" mean? So it has happened to you on occasion?
Way back on Fedora 17, playback of some video files became unstable with some yum update. I can't recall anything since then.
It happens to me on occasion and certainly does to others as well and so I don't trust it. I want an update to improve my system, not make it worse.
Fair enough, but avoiding a problem (while accumulating others, such as numerous security flaws), instead of fixing a fault (or several) by installing updates and debugging anything that screwed up, isn't really a good way of doing things.
The problem is still there and no I have not rebooted yet.
Well, that well may be the problem and solution, but can't tell without trying. Generally speaking, there is more than one terminal installed, so you can use another one to work on fixing a broken one.
Some (few) updates require a reboot, generally just kernel-related updates. Some updates do need you to log out and back in again. Some updates require you to quit using whatever software has been updated, and restart it. Some don't seem to require that, at all, you can carry on using the prior version until you want to quit it.
Tim:
I can't say that I have that experience, it's very rare that an update breaks something on my system. Sounds like you have something wrong with your system, more than Fedora in general.
Jim Lewis:
What does "very rare" mean? So it has happened to you on occasion?
Way back on Fedora 17, playback of some video files became unstable with some yum update. I can't recall anything since then.
It happens to me on occasion and certainly does to others as well and so I don't trust it. I want an update to improve my system, not make it worse.
Fair enough, but avoiding a problem (while accumulating others, such as numerous security flaws), instead of fixing a fault (or several) by installing updates and debugging anything that screwed up, isn't really a good way of doing things.
The problem is still there and no I have not rebooted yet.
Well, that well may be the problem and solution, but can't tell without trying. Generally speaking, there is more than one terminal installed, so you can use another one to work on fixing a broken one.
Some (few) updates require a reboot, generally just kernel-related updates. Some updates do need you to log out and back in again. Some updates require you to quit using whatever software has been updated, and restart it. Some don't seem to require that, at all, you can carry on using the prior version until you want to quit it.
Hi Tim,
I have been running Fedora 14 since it came out and have never installed an update (well, okay, I manually installed the Shellshock patch and do run my own custom kernel). I'm still waiting for an intrusion or something to go wrong. I am behind a pretty good firewall and don't do anything really stupid with my systems. I have to say 14 was and is the best Fedora they ever came out with.
Basically every time I run an update, on anything, something goes wrong. I was great at IBM as a quality control person because nothing ever got past me! But I didn't have many friends on the dev team. Until I got on the dev team.
Can you point me to where one of these other terminals is? The only reason I can still use one or make more is because there were some already opened before I ran the update. My attempts to find a way to create a terminal by not using a previous one have all failed.
Since I fully expect to have no terminals when I finally reboot I have opened Bug 1196472 for this issue. They have already begun to look at the problem.
Jim Lewis
On 02/27/15 09:03, Jim Lewis wrote:
Since I fully expect to have no terminals when I finally reboot I have opened Bug 1196472 for this issue. They have already begun to look at the problem.
FWIW, at times I've experienced "weird" things after updates. The latest one was segfaults in ibus after an update. Simply logging out and logging back in has always fixed this sort of thing.
Also, I happen to have an F20 VM with multiple desktops installed but not updated in quite some time. I just stated the VM, logged in as a MATE user and updated. I was not able to recreate the problem you're seeing.
On 02/27/15 09:03, Jim Lewis wrote:
Since I fully expect to have no terminals when I finally reboot I have opened Bug 1196472 for this issue. They have already begun to look at the problem.
FWIW, at times I've experienced "weird" things after updates. The latest one was segfaults in ibus after an update. Simply logging out and logging back in has always fixed this sort of thing.
Also, I happen to have an F20 VM with multiple desktops installed but not updated in quite some time. I just stated the VM, logged in as a MATE user and updated. I was not able to recreate the problem you're seeing.
Hi Ed,
Thanks for trying that out. I don't expect that many people have seen this problem or else I would have found it during my search. And, there's still a good chance a reboot will solve it. If only I wasn't such a big wuss ...
I have found one more data point: I noticed I could open another terminal from a root session but not a guest session. Turns out the DISPLAY variable needs to be set first. I exported it to ":0.0" and a guest terminal will now come up when I run mate-terminal &.
Jim Lewis
On 02/27/15 11:09, Jim Lewis wrote:
On 02/27/15 09:03, Jim Lewis wrote:
Since I fully expect to have no terminals when I finally reboot I have opened Bug 1196472 for this issue. They have already begun to look at the problem.
FWIW, at times I've experienced "weird" things after updates. The latest one was segfaults in ibus after an update. Simply logging out and logging back in has always fixed this sort of thing.
Also, I happen to have an F20 VM with multiple desktops installed but not updated in quite some time. I just stated the VM, logged in as a MATE user and updated. I was not able to recreate the problem you're seeing.
Hi Ed,
Thanks for trying that out. I don't expect that many people have seen this problem or else I would have found it during my search. And, there's still a good chance a reboot will solve it. If only I wasn't such a big wuss ...
I have found one more data point: I noticed I could open another terminal from a root session but not a guest session. Turns out the DISPLAY variable needs to be set first. I exported it to ":0.0" and a guest terminal will now come up when I run mate-terminal &.
It would seem that there is nothing wrong with the mate-terminal itself. I would check one thing however.
In the upper left there is a "Fedora" icon. I would "right click" on that and select "Edit Menus". I would then navigate to "System Tools" highlight "Mate Terminal" right click on it and display the properties and ensure it is set to just "mate-terminal" in the Command.
I may even create a new menu item with the needed information and see if I can create my own menu item that works.
On Thu, 2015-02-26 at 15:03 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
I have been running Fedora 14 since it came out and have never installed an update (well, okay, I manually installed the Shellshock patch and do run my own custom kernel). I'm still waiting for an intrusion or something to go wrong. I am behind a pretty good firewall and don't do anything really stupid with my systems. I have to say 14 was and is the best Fedora they ever came out with.
Been using since it was Red Hat Linux 6, if I recall correctly. Though I never tried 14, I skipped several releases after Fedora 9.
I can't say I've ever encountered an externally caused problems. I've had crashes related to video, that have usually gone away with updates, thanks to having to put with /some/ NVidia or ATI cards.
Basically every time I run an update, on anything, something goes wrong.
Can't say I've had that.
I was great at IBM as a quality control person because nothing ever got past me!
I work in video production, and one of the local equipment suppliers used to use me as their "fussy customer" litmus test. If I didn't pick something out as a problem, they were pretty sure that nobody else would.
Can you point me to where one of these other terminals is? The only reason I can still use one or make more is because there were some already opened before I ran the update.
Often, one can type "term" in a command line, and get a basic term, instead of gnome-term, or mate-term, or the command name for some other terminal type. I don't seem to be able to do that at the moment, but I have in the past. Perhaps my MATE install on Fedora 20 didn't bother installing extra ones. Might be worth doing so, for future problem solving.
On Thu, 2015-02-26 at 15:03 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
Can you point me to where one of these other terminals is? The only reason I can still use one or make more is because there were some already opened before I ran the update.
Often, one can type "term" in a command line, and get a basic term, instead of gnome-term, or mate-term, or the command name for some other terminal type. I don't seem to be able to do that at the moment, but I have in the past. Perhaps my MATE install on Fedora 20 didn't bother installing extra ones. Might be worth doing so, for future problem solving.
Hi Tim,
Well, I'm still trying to figure out how I can run a command to get a command line from the command line when I don't have a command line. Yes, I spent all night coming up with that :).
Anyway, you gave me an idea when you mentioned "term". I had been fussing with the panel trying to create my own Mate terminal. In Properties, putting exactly what is in the real one resulted in the same behavior, a box opening on the bottom panel for about 6 seconds saying "Starting Mate...". But then no terminal. I then tried calling a script which exported DISPLAY, and then calling mate-terminal. No good (an strace showed that this was never going to work). I should probably add that output to my bug.
I had already installed xterm (starting with Fedora 21 you have to yum install everything now). I changed it to xterm, fully expecting it to fail just like these others. No, it didn't! I now have an xterm on the panel, and can make others. I might actually put this on all my systems (yeah, I really like command lines). So, a gold star for you!
Jim Lewis
On Thu, 2015-02-26 at 15:03 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
Can you point me to where one of these other terminals is? The only reason I can still use one or make more is because there were some already opened before I ran the update.
Often, one can type "term" in a command line, and get a basic term, instead of gnome-term, or mate-term, or the command name for some other terminal type. I don't seem to be able to do that at the moment, but I have in the past. Perhaps my MATE install on Fedora 20 didn't bother installing extra ones. Might be worth doing so, for future problem solving.
Hi Tim,
Well, I'm still trying to figure out how I can run a command to get a command line from the command line when I don't have a command line. Yes, I spent all night coming up with that :).
Anyway, you gave me an idea when you mentioned "term". I had been fussing with the panel trying to create my own Mate terminal. In Properties, putting exactly what is in the real one resulted in the same behavior, a box opening on the bottom panel for about 6 seconds saying "Starting Mate...". But then no terminal. I then tried calling a script which exported DISPLAY, and then calling mate-terminal. No good (an strace showed that this was never going to work). I should probably add that output to my bug.
I had already installed xterm (starting with Fedora 21 you have to yum install everything now). I changed it to xterm, fully expecting it to fail just like these others. No, it didn't! I now have an xterm on the panel, and can make others. I might actually put this on all my systems (yeah, I really like command lines). So, a gold star for you!
I should have thought about running strace on mate-terminal sooner. I searched the net on this error message:
gabi1 ~ $ mate-terminal & [1] 22600 gabi1 ~ $ Failed to forward arguments: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.InvalidArgs: Type of message, ' type '(ayayayayay)'
[1]+ Exit 1 mate-terminal
and found quite a few hits. Seems a logout/login will fix it (or a reboot of course).
I had opened Bug 1196472 for this but that turned out to be an incredible waste of time. It has been closed NOTABUG.
Jim Lewis
On Fri, 2015-02-27 at 10:17 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
Well, I'm still trying to figure out how I can run a command to get a command line from the command line when I don't have a command line. Yes, I spent all night coming up with that :).
;-\
With some desktops ALT+F2 pops up a dialog box to enter a command.
As for alternative terminals, rxvt-unicode-256color (actual name of the package) is a nice starting point (you can customize it via ~/.Xdefaults). Another good alternative and more close to what I think you are used to is lxterminal, the terminal emulator from Xfce. Then you have Konsole (KDE's terminal) and GNOME's gnome-terminal, E17's fancy term, aterm, eterm, xterm...
And finally you have Terminator - albeit I'm not sure if it's a terminal emulator by its own or it needs gnome-terminal as an underlying base. In any case tmux+{your terminal of choice} should be a better choice.
On Fri, Mar 6, 2015 at 12:07 PM, Tim ignored_mailbox@yahoo.com.au wrote:
On Fri, 2015-02-27 at 10:17 -1000, Jim Lewis wrote:
Well, I'm still trying to figure out how I can run a command to get a command line from the command line when I don't have a command line. Yes, I spent all night coming up with that :).
;-\
With some desktops ALT+F2 pops up a dialog box to enter a command.
-- tim@localhost ~]$ uname -rsvp
Linux 3.18.7-100.fc20.i686 #1 SMP Wed Feb 11 21:16:53 UTC 2015 i686
All mail to my mailbox is automatically deleted, there is no point trying to privately email me, I will only read messages posted to the public lists.
George Orwell's '1984' was supposed to be a warning against tyranny, not a set of instructions for supposedly democratic governments.
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