Ubuntu
mutter package

"libinput bug: timer offset negative" keeps coming up in syslog

Bug #1588009 reported by Wise Melon
68
This bug affects 14 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
Ubuntu GNOME
New
Undecided
Unassigned
libinput
Invalid
Medium
gnome-shell (Ubuntu)
Won't Fix
Low
Unassigned
libinput (Ubuntu)
Invalid
Undecided
Unassigned
mutter (Ubuntu)
Won't Fix
Low
Unassigned

Bug Description

I have just recently looked in my syslog and discovered that the following message shows up a lot daily so I thought I should report it:

/usr/lib/gdm3/gdm-x-session[1707]: (EE) libinput bug: timer offset negative

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
Package: libinput10 1.2.3-1ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-22.40-generic 4.4.8
Uname: Linux 4.4.0-22-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.1
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: GNOME
Date: Wed Jun 1 18:39:08 2016
InstallationDate: Installed on 2016-05-15 (17 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-GNOME 15.10 "Wily Werewolf" - Release amd64 (20151021)
SourcePackage: libinput
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to xenial on 2016-05-28 (4 days ago)

Revision history for this message
Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount) wrote :
Revision history for this message
In , Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount) wrote :

I have just recently looked in my syslog and discovered that the following message shows up a lot daily so I thought I should report it:

/usr/lib/gdm3/gdm-x-session[1707]: (EE) libinput bug: timer offset negative

I am running Ubuntu GNOME 16.04 with GNOME 3.20, more information (logs and other system information etc) can be found in my LaunchPad bug report that I made through apport: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu-gnome/+bug/1588009

Revision history for this message
In , Peter Hutterer (peter-hutterer) wrote :

is this reproducible? the most common cause of this is a slow compositor/X server busy with rendering. libinput does timer setups based on event timestamps from the kernel and relies on the caller to keep calling libinput_dispatch() often enough, if that isn't the case then a 150ms timer may be set for an event from 500ms ago - resulting in an offset of -350ms from the current time.

Unless you can reproduce this reliably with a specific interaction there is not much we can do here.

Revision history for this message
In , Peter Hutterer (peter-hutterer) wrote :

any updates here?

Revision history for this message
In , Peter Hutterer (peter-hutterer) wrote :

Closing after almost a month of no updates

Revision history for this message
In , termite (rb6) wrote :

I've been getting a lot of this since switching to using Gnome on Wayland (from X). My system freezes completely, and I need to hard restart. Looking at /var/log/messages, I see a lot of these errors just before the freeze, plus:

org.gnome.Shell.desktop[2961]: libinput error: kernel bug: Touch jump detected and discarded.
debian-x1yoga org.gnome.Shell.desktop[2961]: See https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.4.0/touchpad_jumping_cursor.html for details

I'd be happy to help if you let me know how.

Revision history for this message
In , Peter Hutterer (peter-hutterer) wrote :

The jumping touch is unrelated and can be ignored for this bug.

But comment #1 still stands, this is almost always a slow compositor.

Revision history for this message
In , bmansurov (bmansurov) wrote :

I have the same issue and would like to help with consistent steps to reproduce the bug. Please let me know what information I can share.

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in libinput:
importance: Unknown → Medium
status: Unknown → Invalid
Revision history for this message
In , Peter Hutterer (peter-hutterer) wrote :

Here's a patch that'll make tracking things down a bit easier: https://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/wayland-devel/2017-July/034396.html

Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

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

Changed in libinput (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
In , Nils Kaiser (nils-kaiser) wrote :

I can confirm I have this on Arch Kernel 4.15.14-1-ARCH Gnome 3.28 on Wayland on Thinkpad X1 Carbon 2017 model. Libinput version is 1.10.3

Here some sample logs:

libinput error: client bug: timer event17 debounce short: offset negative (-42ms)
libinput error: client bug: timer event15 trackpoint: offset negative (-1720ms)

Cristian Aravena Romero (caravena)
tags: added: cosmic
Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)
Changed in gnome-shell (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Changed in mutter (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
knb (knb) wrote :

Here : https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=96312 some people said this is caused by a "slow compositor" . In my case, it seems to me, these log entries are probably caused by a Xorg process running with 100% cpu blocking the UI for ~ 1 minute. This happens after animations played (e.g. progressbars), window resizing, scrolling, when I have many GUI apps open. I am still investigating.

My system: nvidia driver, 2 old GPUs, 18.04 with gdm3+Xorg

Revision history for this message
Lucas Rizzini da Costa Lima (lucasrizzini) wrote :

Same problem here. I'm using Ubuntu 18.10 LiveCD and from time to time my Ubuntu just freezes and when it happens my pendrive LED blinks like crazy. It's hard to recover from it, but yesterday I did. The log it at the post below.

Here's my post about it: https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/483898/my-shell-script-to-periodically-free-some-memory-up-with-ubuntu-18-10-livecd-wit#_=_

Revision history for this message
In , Thommen (thommen) wrote :

Hi,
@Nils Kaiser I have KDE, but I have same problem on Arch Linux (4.19.12-arch1-1-ARCH)

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in libinput:
status: Invalid → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
In , Peter Hutterer (peter-hutterer) wrote :

Please see https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/faqs.html#what-causes-the-timer-offset-negative-warning, this is almost never a libinput bug.

fwiw, libinput has moved to gitlab, any future issues should be filed at https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/libinput/libinput

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in libinput:
status: Confirmed → Invalid
Revision history for this message
In , PocketSam (pocketsam) wrote :

Same problem on Arch
Kernel 4.20.6-arch1-1-ARCH
xorg-server 1.20.3-1
KDE Plasma: 5.14.5
Qt: 5.12.1
KDE Frameworks: 5.54.0
64-bit
Intel® Core™ i7-2620M CPU @ 2.70GHz
with integrated graphics on HP EliteBook 2560p

Revision history for this message
Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt) wrote :

Per the documentation [1], this is a bug in mutter/gnome-shell. Not a bug in libinput.

[1] https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/faqs.html#what-causes-the-timer-offset-negative-warning

Changed in libinput (Ubuntu):
status: Confirmed → Invalid
Changed in gnome-shell (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Low
Changed in mutter (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Low
tags: added: performance
Revision history for this message
jnns (jnns) wrote :

I'm affected by this as well. I can't really interact with my system anymore because input and scrolling is interrupted every few seconds. /var/log/syslog keeps filling up with messages like:

> libinput error: client bug: timer event7 tap: offset negative (-495ms)

htop reports gnome-shell using 100% CPU very often as well. I'm using a Thinkpad X1 Carbon 2018 with
- gnome-shell 3.30.2-0ubuntu1.18.10.1
- libinput-bin 1.12.1-1
- mutter 3.30.2-1~ubuntu18.10.4

Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)
tags: removed: cosmic
Revision history for this message
Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt) wrote :

Thank you for reporting this bug to Ubuntu.
Ubuntu GNOME 16.04 (xenial) reached end-of-life in April 2019.

https://ubuntugnome.org/ubuntu-gnome-16-04-lts-is-here/
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/XenialXerus/ReleaseNotes/UbuntuGNOME

We appreciate that this bug may be old and you might not be interested in discussing it any more. But if you are then please upgrade to the latest Ubuntu version and re-test. If you then find the bug is still present in the newer Ubuntu version, please add a comment here telling us which new version it is in.

Changed in gnome-shell (Ubuntu):
status: Confirmed → Won't Fix
Changed in mutter (Ubuntu):
status: Confirmed → Won't Fix
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