The typical user will not know how to make some free disk space when he cannot log into a graphical desktop

There is no need to link all upstream bugs in the ubuntu tracker...

I wouldn't actually consider this a duplicate of the bug which the upstream author indicated; similar, but not really a duplicate.

Free space issue is critical to lots of users, because gdm doesn't offer an userfriendly solution for user if there are no free space.
I'm suggesting improved solution for this bug, based on solutions, mentioned in gnome bug 339229:

 * Always keep a "place-holder file" in the user's home directory that is big enough for GDM to "do its job", so, when they log in, GDM can merely write over top of this file as it needs.
 * Provide some kind of "hook" that would allow each distribution to take further steps in helping an user to fix the problem.

So, gdm should create place-holder file of needed size (for example ~200 kb) in /tmp after gdm starts (and display a warning message if there are no enough space for creating such file) and erase this file in /tmp before gdm starts.

Also gnome-session should check for free space during login and create place-holder file (for example ~200 kb) if there are enouch space and display a warning message if there are less than ~1 Mb free space (gdm should erase place-holder file in user's home, created by gnome-session when user starts to login).

Should I report a bug agains gnome-session in Ubuntu ?

Hi Mantas. Do you have any knowledge of how GDM/gnome-session work? For instance, why a lock file is needed (?) and where the lock file is stored (?).

Creating a place-holder file under /tmp is not fool-proof, unless that is the same directory where the temporary lock file (or whatever file) is stored. The /tmp directory could have a partition mounted to it that is different from the partition where the lock file will need to be written.

I wouldn't bother reporting a another bug, against gnome-session, until it is determined, for certain, where the problem exists.

You get notification bubbles from gnome-volume-manager when your disk is running low space

> You get notification bubbles from gnome-volume-manager when your disk is
> running low space

How long has this been in place? Since Dapper?

That's certainly an improvement, but having users get "locked out"
when/if they do run out of disk space still seems a bit harsh.

Dapper seems about right for that feature. I don't discuss the bug, that comment was a reply to comment about displaying a warning made before

Has there been any progress on this ? There are a number of situations that can lead to a full disk (badly managed log files, backups, importing media /video unattended).

A bubble will hardly prevent this kind of lockout.

No,or the bug would have been updated. There is thousand of desktop bugs open and the team is small, we can't work on everything

triaged in 2008 and still not fixed. Now the problem is worse because many people are using encrypted files and the existing solutions (e.g., deleting files to make space) no longer work because .trash file will be encrypted so you can delete all the files you want and it will no decrease the size of the disk. This is definitely a big and still as yet unaddressed problem.

Thank you for posting this bug.

Is this an issue in Maverick?

rusivi1: No reason to believe it isn't. Other than the fact that it's completely insane that it hasn't been fixed in the four years since the upstream bug was opened.