panel and desktop broken

[Rex Dieter]

Glenn Holmer wrote:

> On 06/04/2015 09:30 AM, Rex Dieter wrote:
>> Glenn Holmer wrote:
>> 
>>> From time to time, I've seen that the panel, while it appears, becomes
>>> unresponsive (right- or left-click does nothing). When this happens, the
>>> desktop (right-click) also becomes non-responsive.
>>>
>>> Normally, I've been able to recover from this by dropping to console and
>>> issuing "systemctl restart sddm", but this morning even that doesn't
>>> work.
>>>
>>> Anybody else seen this? Know of a workaround or fix?
>> 
>> It's a not uncommon problem of plasmashell process getting stuck and
>> deadlocked (often due to some as-yet-unexplained interaction between
>> libxcb and video drivers).
>> 
>> the easiest workaround is to restart the plasmashell process:
>> 
>> ALT-F2(krunner): killall plasmashell
>> (wait a few moments)
>> ALT-F2(krunner): plasmashell
> 
> I just had this problem again and restarting plasmashell didn't help.
> Neither did dropping to console and restarting sddm. I actually
> rebooted, which is unthinkable.
> 
> I have to tell you, MATE is looking better and better to me.

Sounds like you're having bigger issues, and I'd suspect video driver-
related ones now... so maybe considering something that doesn't use 
compositing/opengl is indeed one option.

-- Rex