Unity spread trigger ruins windows and freezes desktop

It's odd that apport did not include a stacktrace with this. There's a segfault in libscale.so reported in the dmesg log.

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

apport information

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

Affects me; can be worked around by restarting the graphical manager. On a laptop, putting the machine into hibernation by closing the lid rectifies the situtation by (seemingly) restarting Unity, although it will freeze again if window spread is used again.

A permanent workaround: Install unity-tweak-tool and disable window spread feature. This will prevent Unity from showing open windows when clicking on a launcher icon and preventing you from accidentially crashing your desktop environment.

I just want to emphasize that this is a bug with Unity. I have not used Unity Tweak Tool before this bug appeared. It started right after a fresh install on my new desktop system. I do not see this bug on any of my laptops.

I'd be happy to do anything necessary to solve this annoying bug.

I don't know why it was broken on a fresh install but this fixed the problem for me:
http://speculator.diandian.com/post/2014-07-01/40062129998

I am having this problem too. Thanks for the workaround Hendrik but I would like to get the windows spread feature back (as soon as possible when this bug is fixed).

MY SOLUTION:

Recently when i turned the hot corners on my window spread started crashing everything.
here's the workaround:

1. Turn off window spread (no don't its awesome)
2. disable hot corner command (if it's conflicting with another command)
###3. install compiz manager then _> unity plugin -> on the left side there you'll see "use this plugin" uncheck the box unity will crash but the window will remain opened. Then check "use this plugin" again and you'll see it says conflicting key bindings found. disable conflicting keybindings. and you are all SET :) :) :)

CAUSES FOR THIS:

It seems that multiple command for a single function of unity causes this. for me i had cntrl+super+d -> show desktop, then i enabled the hotcorner show desktop and it started crashing on window spread.

thanks

MY SOLUTION:

Recently when i turned the hot corners on my window spread started crashing everything.
here's the workaround:

1. Turn off window spread (no don't its awesome)
2. disable hot corner command (if it's conflicting with another command)
###3. install compiz manager then _> unity plugin -> on the left side there you'll see "use this plugin" uncheck the box unity will crash but the window will remain opened. Then check "use this plugin" again and you'll see it says conflicting key bindings found. disable conflicting keybindings. and you are all SET :) :) :)

CAUSES FOR THIS:

It seems that multiple command for a single function of unity causes this. for me i had cntrl+super+d -> show desktop, then i enabled the hotcorner show desktop and it started crashing on window spread.

thanks

#36

This seems to work for me. It asked me to activate "scale".

I've had problems with window spread before, too, but only on a laptop with Nvidia graphics. On another one with Intel graphics, it works flawlessly.

Anyways, after upgrading to vivid, I tried to enable window spread using unity-tweak-tool again, and I got that freeze plus (after a while) crash again. But this time, it was so bad that I could not even log in any more. Afer entering my password, and after a second or so, I was always presented with a completely white (or light gray) screen, and after a mouse click, there was the login screen again. A reboot did not help, either.

So after removing some config files in my home directory also did not help, I removed all nvidia-* packages. Now I could log in again, and finally I had a chance to switch window spread off again! (By the way, it still crashes.)

I also got many apport crash popups after being able to login again (Xorg, compiz, apport).

I guess I was hit by multiple bugs at once. Do you need any additional information?

thanks for the info :)

On Mon, May 4, 2015 at 5:11 PM Stephan Springer <email address hidden> wrote:

> I've had problems with window spread before, too, but only on a laptop
> with Nvidia graphics. On another one with Intel graphics, it works
> flawlessly.
>
> Anyways, after upgrading to vivid, I tried to enable window spread using
> unity-tweak-tool again, and I got that freeze plus (after a while) crash
> again. But this time, it was so bad that I could not even log in any
> more. Afer entering my password, and after a second or so, I was always
> presented with a completely white (or light gray) screen, and after a
> mouse click, there was the login screen again. A reboot did not help,
> either.
>
> So after removing some config files in my home directory also did not
> help, I removed all nvidia-* packages. Now I could log in again, and
> finally I had a chance to switch window spread off again! (By the way,
> it still crashes.)
>
> I also got many apport crash popups after being able to login again
> (Xorg, compiz, apport).
>
> I guess I was hit by multiple bugs at once. Do you need any additional
> information?
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
> report.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1295909
>
> Title:
> Unity spread trigger ruins windows and freezes desktop
>
> Status in Compiz:
> Triaged
> Status in Unity:
> Confirmed
> Status in compiz package in Ubuntu:
> Triaged
> Status in unity package in Ubuntu:
> Confirmed
>
> Bug description:
> The latest update disabled window spreading and when triggered crashes
> the desktop. Everything freezes and windows cannot be switched. The
> only way to close an application is to shut down.
>
> ProblemType: Bug
> DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
> Package: unity 7.1.2+14.04.20140320.1-0ubuntu1
> ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-18.38-generic 3.13.6
> Uname: Linux 3.13.0-18-generic x86_64
> .tmp.unity.support.test.0:
>
> ApportVersion: 2.13.3-0ubuntu1
> Architecture: amd64
> CompizPlugins: No value set for
> `/apps/compiz-1/general/screen0/options/active_plugins'
> CompositorRunning: compiz
> CompositorUnredirectDriverBlacklist: '(nouveau|Intel).*Mesa 8.0'
> CompositorUnredirectFSW: true
> CurrentDesktop: Unity
> Date: Fri Mar 21 20:59:17 2014
> DistUpgraded: 2014-03-19 22:45:03,298 DEBUG enabling apt cron job
> DistroCodename: trusty
> DistroVariant: ubuntu
> DkmsStatus:
> vboxhost, 4.3.8, 3.11.0-18-generic, x86_64: installed
> vboxhost, 4.3.8, 3.13.0-18-generic, x86_64: installed
> EcryptfsInUse: Yes
> GraphicsCard:
> Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller
> [8086:0156] (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
> Subsystem: Toshiba America Info Systems Device [1179:fa20]
> InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-01-03 (77 days ago)
> InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" - Release amd64
> (20130424)
> MachineType: TOSHIBA Satellite C55-A
> ProcEnviron:
> LANGUAGE=en_US
> PATH=(custom, no user)
> XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
> LANG=en_US.UTF-8
> SHELL=/bin/bash
> ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/vmlinuz-3.13.0-18-generic
> root=UUID=6b37c...

When you get this crash, please upload the /var/crash/_usr_bin_compiz.*.crash file that gets generated, or we don't have enough info to debug this.

Thanks.

This is the compiz crash file. Please tell me if I can do anything else to help or debug.

I have tested this on 15.10 and cannot reproduce it.

My GPU and drivers are:
VGA compatible controller : Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Wrestler [Radeon HD 6290] (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
Gallium 0.4 on AMD PALM (DRM 2.43.0, LLVM 3.6.2)

Nope. I'm running 15.10., too, and just tried it out: Compiz is still crashing. Crash file is attached.

@#36, thanks, that helped.
Had the same problem, compiz segfaulting in libscale, the conflicting shortcuts was the problem, unity/compiz restarting. Ubuntu 15.10

shaon121's solution at @#36 also worked for me, running 16.04.

Thank you.

shaon121's solution at @#36 is, apparently, temporary. Problem persists.

Rerunning shaon121's solution shows no warning of conflicting key bindings, though trigger now functions again as expected (maybe due to unity restart?).

I could fix the bug on Ubuntu 16.10 by following this tutorial: https://www.computersnyou.com/4945/re-install-xorg-xserver-completely-ubuntu/

Then, after reinstalling and rebooting, just click on "Restore Defaults" under the "Window Spread" tab on Unity Tweak Tool.