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#1 2016-09-07 23:26:33

mprovost
Member
Registered: 2016-09-07
Posts: 3

DE freezes when special keys are pressed

Hi,

I've been having an issue with my system lately where every time I press certain keys (so far, I have identified "fn" on my laptop keyboard and play/pause on my wireless keyboard) the desktop environment seems to freeze. I've been trying to troubleshoot, but I'm unsure how to pursue fixing the issue.

Computer :
- Lenovo T440s
- single boot Arch install
- no window manager
- Gnome DE
- all packages up to date

Symptoms :
- When keys are pressed, the system seems to hang. I am unable to move, select or otherwise do anything with the visible application.
- the "activities overview" will not show either when the mouse is sent to the hot corner or the window-key is pressed.
- Mouse movement is still visible and the cursor changes according to where it is on the screen (does not always correspond to visible application)
- I can change to another tty with the key combination and the CLI works flawlessly
- htop shows barely any CPU or memory use
- GUI applications will not stop running even after sending the "killall" command
- the output of "systemctl -l" shows no failed services
- the output of my Xorg log shows the following new lines

[   617.639] (**) Option "fd" "12"
[   617.640] (**) Option "fd" "15"
[   617.640] (**) Option "fd" "16"
[   617.640] (**) Option "fd" "17"
[   617.641] (**) Option "fd" "18"
[   617.641] (**) Option "fd" "19"
[   617.641] (**) Option "fd" "20"
[   617.641] (**) Option "fd" "21"
[   617.641] (**) Option "fd" "22"
[   617.641] (**) Option "fd" "23"
[   617.642] (**) Option "fd" "19"
[   617.642] (II) AIGLX: Suspending AIGLX clients for VT switch
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 226:0
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:79
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:82
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:80
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:66
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:67
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:70
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:68
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:81
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:64
[   618.071] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:83

- journalctl shows many warnings for "tracker-extract.desktop" before the error and only shows information regarding the login on tty2 after. No other errors.

Troubleshooting :
I've read through the troubleshooting wiki page and have come to wits end to even try and figure out what the error is. All logs seem to show no change and the processes don't seem to be using system resources (even though they can't be killed). Any help to point me in the right direction would be appreciated.

Thanks

Last edited by mprovost (2016-09-07 23:27:06)

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#2 2016-09-09 13:50:38

mprovost
Member
Registered: 2016-09-07
Posts: 3

Re: DE freezes when special keys are pressed

I've continued my troubleshooting by trying to see if it's associated with any specific application. On a freshly opened desktop, I disabled conky with the same result. I then diabled all the gnome extensions and still had the same result. Is there any way I can track or log what's going on when I press the key?

Thanks

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#3 2016-09-09 18:57:12

Proofrific
Member
Registered: 2008-01-05
Posts: 215

Re: DE freezes when special keys are pressed

I might be experiencing a similar problem. I updated a bunch of packages after not upgrading for months (shame on me), and now when I press any special key on my Thinkpad X61 (Fn, ThinkVantage, Pageback, Pageforward), my desktop environment (Xfce) "freezes." Not a complete freeze--I can still move the mouse, but the panel and windows decorations stop responding. I can Ctl+Alt+F2 to switch TTY and kill xinit from there.

The special keys work fine in the console when running `showkey --scancodes` and `showkey --keycodes.` They also work fine in xev when running a clean X server (with just xterm). When running Xfce, however, xev doesn't show the special keys because it freezes the moment I push one of them.

I'm also experiencing the problem in LXDE, which uses openbox. But when I run openbox directly, it's fine.

Last edited by Proofrific (2016-09-09 20:05:34)

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#4 2016-09-10 07:35:52

FelledTreeNo9
Member
Registered: 2015-05-05
Posts: 23

Re: DE freezes when special keys are pressed

I've just had this problem maybe; I'm using XFCE, on a desktop machine and after my latest system upgrade the graphical session froze whenever I pressed one of the special media keys (internet, mail, volume up/down etc) on my keyboard.

I fixed my issue by following a suggestion from this thread - specifically, to replace files in /etc/pam.d with their newer .pacnew versions where present (I just had systemd-user.pacnew). If that doesn't help then perhaps some of the other ideas in that thread might.

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#5 2016-09-10 14:51:58

Proofrific
Member
Registered: 2008-01-05
Posts: 215

Re: DE freezes when special keys are pressed

FelledTreeNo9 wrote:

I've just had this problem maybe; I'm using XFCE, on a desktop machine and after my latest system upgrade the graphical session froze whenever I pressed one of the special media keys (internet, mail, volume up/down etc) on my keyboard.

I fixed my issue by following a suggestion from this thread - specifically, to replace files in /etc/pam.d with their newer .pacnew versions where present (I just had systemd-user.pacnew). If that doesn't help then perhaps some of the other ideas in that thread might.

Thanks! That fixed it for me! (I had both systemd-user.pacnew and login.pacnew).

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#6 2016-09-11 02:21:57

mprovost
Member
Registered: 2016-09-07
Posts: 3

Re: DE freezes when special keys are pressed

I had no pacnew files in /etc/pam.d. However, the thread did help since it hinted towards downgrading dbus and libdbus thus solving the issue. Thanks for the help.

Should I contribute this information to the other thread or report this bug somewhere?

Thanks

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