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#1 2021-04-02 13:25:37

livetheenergy
Member
From: It
Registered: 2018-05-30
Posts: 42

Install gnome40

Hi everyone,
I'm writing because I intended to try gnome 40, but before installing it on my arch I tried to boot from some live dvd (fedora/suse) without any luck though.
xserver starts correctly but I get some generic error without any detail about it.
Before trying to install it on arch, I was wondering if anybody knows about some specific requirements for gnome40.
I have a core-duo and an ati x1100 (pretty old, but it works good). Gnome 3 worked well here.
Thanks

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#2 2021-04-02 13:58:03

seth
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Registered: 2012-09-03
Posts: 49,951

Re: Install gnome40

Afaiu it's just a change in the version scheme and DESKTOPS ARE NOW HORIZONTAL!!! (gnome …), but not a massive technical change.
(Therefore you'll also not be able to avoid it - it's just another gnome update)

If you get the useless "something went wrong, ask somebody who doesn't use gnome" error image (gnome …), move to an interactive shell and inspect the journal - there's typically an actual error/segfault listed that can inform what is actually going on.
Usually it's some incompatible extension, because gnome treats API and ABI stability as "maybe".

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#3 2021-04-02 13:59:56

Head_on_a_Stick
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From: London
Registered: 2014-02-20
Posts: 7,679
Website

Re: Install gnome40

livetheenergy wrote:

xserver starts correctly but I get some generic error without any detail about it.

I don't know about Fedora but GNOME in Arch defaults to the Wayland desktop so "xserver" isn't involved unless you pick that option.

livetheenergy wrote:

I was wondering if anybody knows about some specific requirements for gnome40.

I don't think the changes from v3.38 to v40 are particularly significant in respect of the hardware requirements. I've been using v40 for a few days without any issues at all but I have a fairly recent Ryzen machine.

Just be sure to backup before adding the [gnome-unstable] repositories so you can rollback if there are any problems.

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#4 2021-04-02 14:02:27

Awebb
Member
Registered: 2010-05-06
Posts: 6,272

Re: Install gnome40

You could use the arch-install-scripts to install a barebones Arch with gnome 40 on a USB dongle and try that.

I looked up your GPU and it only supports OpenGL 2.0. I have no actual clue, but I suspect this new NGL renderer doesn't play well with ancient OpenGL. According to the GTK 4.2 release announcement, you can turn on the older GTK 4.0 renderer by setting GSK_RENDERER=gl.

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:

I don't think the changes from v3.38 to v40 are particularly significant in respect of the hardware requirements.

https://phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news … 2-Released

Last edited by Awebb (2021-04-02 14:07:47)

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#5 2021-04-02 14:15:09

seth
Member
Registered: 2012-09-03
Posts: 49,951

Re: Install gnome40

According to https://blogs.gnome.org/chergert/2021/0 … -renderer/ the GL renderer already required the 3.2 core protocol and modesetting/glamor will fail on 2.0 as well…

Edit, @livetheenergy: please post the output of "glxinfo", you may be running on the SW rasterizer already.
Edit, 2, @Awebb: that's not strictly related to gnome and only gnome-chess seems to use it as of this date, https://archlinux.org/packages/extra/x86_64/gtk4/
Yeah, no. Gnome's version scheme is confusing me ;-)

Last edited by seth (2021-04-02 14:20:28)

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#6 2021-04-02 14:26:47

CarbonChauvinist
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Registered: 2012-06-16
Posts: 412
Website

Re: Install gnome40

Are there even any packages currently on gnome-unstable? I was updating late last night and the repo appeared bare (maybe the packages are being transitioned to testing? Or maybe I caught it betwixt updates being pushed? see quote below)

eschwartz wrote:

Gnome-Unstable, in contrast, is considered to be a somewhere between a staging repository and a testing repository -- packages in there are often just built from the latest git master, and more often than not they are an opportunity for the packager to experiment with *how* to build the latest version.

You could run Gnome-Unstable if you want, but there's no strict guarantee it will work. It often does, and those packages get moved straight to testing, but, not always.

The Gnome-Unstable maintainer specifically asked that the repository not be shown by default on the web index, in order to avoid people who don't know what they're doing, stumbling across the repo and deciding to enable it.


"the wind-blown way, wanna win? don't play"

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#7 2021-04-02 14:27:29

livetheenergy
Member
From: It
Registered: 2018-05-30
Posts: 42

Re: Install gnome40

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:
livetheenergy wrote:

xserver starts correctly but I get some generic error without any detail about it.

I don't know about Fedora but GNOME in Arch defaults to the Wayland desktop so "xserver" isn't involved unless you pick that option.

livetheenergy wrote:

I was wondering if anybody knows about some specific requirements for gnome40.

I don't think the changes from v3.38 to v40 are particularly significant in respect of the hardware requirements. I've been using v40 for a few days without any issues at all but I have a fairly recent Ryzen machine.

Just be sure to backup before adding the [gnome-unstable] repositories so you can rollback if there are any problems.


So, maybe it is the problem. I suspected that. I had problems with wayland years ago and I've been using xserver + lightdm + a variety of DE through the time (and gnome 3 worked well about a year ago).
In addition, these live distros use kernel 5.10/11 and it's surely a problem with this machine. I currently use 5.4 or 5.8 (that works good).

Anyway thanks to you all guys for these precious advices. I'll give it a try, and get back to you.

Thanks so much

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#8 2021-04-02 14:45:56

Head_on_a_Stick
Member
From: London
Registered: 2014-02-20
Posts: 7,679
Website

Re: Install gnome40

Ah, interesting, I missed that. Thanks for the correction.

CarbonChauvinist wrote:

Are there even any packages currently on gnome-unstable?

v40 has been there since last week but it looks like it's all being moved through to the main repositories now — the gnome-shell package is in [staging] and some of the other packages are already in [extra] & [community].

eschwartz wrote:

The Gnome-Unstable maintainer specifically asked that the repository not be shown by default on the web index, in order to avoid people who don't know what they're doing, stumbling across the repo and deciding to enable it.

That plan didn't work with me — if you try to make something idiot-proof then somebody will just invent a better idiot  big_smile

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#9 2021-04-02 17:16:35

livetheenergy
Member
From: It
Registered: 2018-05-30
Posts: 42

Re: Install gnome40

seth wrote:

According to https://blogs.gnome.org/chergert/2021/0 … -renderer/ the GL renderer already required the 3.2 core protocol and modesetting/glamor will fail on 2.0 as well…

Edit, @livetheenergy: please post the output of "glxinfo", you may be running on the SW rasterizer already.
Edit, 2, @Awebb: that's not strictly related to gnome and only gnome-chess seems to use it as of this date, https://archlinux.org/packages/extra/x86_64/gtk4/
Yeah, no. Gnome's version scheme is confusing me ;-)

This sounds not very good for old devices, but I understand that. I think it will be tricky to have it working here, but I'll try. I'll roll back in case of no luck, even though rolling back is not always straight.

Btw, what's your quickest way for rolling back in case of massive updates? Pacman is a great thing of arch, and I always have my local repository with an updated list.

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#10 2021-04-02 18:01:50

seth
Member
Registered: 2012-09-03
Posts: 49,951

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#11 2021-04-02 19:22:24

livetheenergy
Member
From: It
Registered: 2018-05-30
Posts: 42

Re: Install gnome40

seth wrote:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ar … cific_date
Or a filesystem snapshot (for btrf/zfs)

Thanks, it's always ready in my pacman config, i use it quite often actually. In my experience rolling back from massive updates is not always "clean", and it can require unexpected steps. So, maybe someone after years found a way better than the others.
By the way I appreciated your prompt reply.

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#12 2021-04-04 08:23:47

livetheenergy
Member
From: It
Registered: 2018-05-30
Posts: 42

Re: Install gnome40

I made a further little test on this machine and booted with kde neon (daily iso). It gives me some errors like gnome, and as it happened for gnome i couldn't investigate much since the system got stuck on a loop of same generic messages on gui.
So, for checking if wayland could run here, I reminded about weston and installed it.
It works well.
I will post the updates.
A blessed Sunday to everyone

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