[SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

tucuxi · 2021-05-29 12:43:03

TL;DR Resolved by removing ~/.drirc

Not completely happy with font rendering in alacritty, I want to try out kitty (0.20.3-1). However, even with the default configuration I don't get anything but a blank window with black background.

Observations:
1. ps shows that an instance of zsh was created.
2. kitty reacts to key presses, e.g. ctrl-shift-enter creates a new zsh instance.

I have the following output and no ideas how to get to the root cause.

➜ kitty --debug-gl
GL version string: '4.6 (Core Profile) Mesa 21.1.1' Detected version: 4.6

~
➜ kitty --debug-config
kitty 0.20.3 created by Kovid Goyal
Linux arch 5.12.7-arch1-1 #1 SMP PREEMPT Wed, 26 May 2021 22:03:57 +0000 x86_64
Arch Linux \r (\l)
Running under: X11

Config options different from defaults:

~
➜ kitty --debug-rendering
GL version string: '4.6 (Core Profile) Mesa 21.1.1' Detected version: 4.6

I use amdgpu (xf86-video-amdgpu 19.1.0-2) without issues elsewhere. Any hints?

Last edited by tucuxi (2021-05-31 16:30:43)

seth · 2021-05-29 17:12:15

Font & color config?
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Kitty#Configuration

Can you run sth. from the zsh instance (eg. mpv or another kitty or whatever)?

MrNeuneu · 2021-05-29 20:03:37

Have you checked that the package doge is not installed? Kitty might be afraid.

Last edited by MrNeuneu (2021-05-29 20:04:25)

tucuxi · 2021-05-29 21:20:38

Thanks for the ideas. Here is what I got meanwhile.

1. doge is not installed.
2. I configured a different color scheme with a gray background but the kitty window again comes up pitch black (#000000). Nothing I do in the window (select with the mouse, type on the keyboard) has any visible effect.
3. In the kitty window I can run commands normally even if invisibly. Commands that are expected to open a new window do so: `alacritty` opens a new terminal, `kitty` opens a new pitch black window.
4. I have tested kitty on another machine, a laptop without dedicated graphics card, with the same setup (xorg, dwm, no compositor), and I see the same behavior there.

Edit:
1. I repeated the test with spectrwm instead of dwm. Same result.
2. I tried a few random kitty.conf files from github. Same result.
3. I tested with a compositor (picom). Same result.

Last edited by tucuxi (2021-05-29 21:36:02)

merlock · 2021-05-30 04:51:26

Do you have mesa installed?

seth · 2021-05-30 06:08:21

See post #1
@tucuxi, have you tried resizing the window?

Also randomly try installing https://archlinux.org/packages/communit … thon-glfw/ and https://archlinux.org/packages/extra/any/python-opengl/
Do you get any errors when running kitty from alacritty?

twelveeighty · 2021-05-30 14:22:34

It's either a color scheme issue (Kitty is working, but just showing black-on-black colors), or it's not working at all. Does opening a new tab (Ctrl-Shift-T in the default key binding) do anything? Try setting the 'foreground' and 'background' options in ~/.config/kitty/kitty.config to a random color to see if that makes a difference. The defaults should work, though, so it's likely a graphics/OpenGL issue.

Edit: posting a screencap might be useful - make sure to not post large images inline here, though, use a image service and post a link here.

Last edited by twelveeighty (2021-05-30 14:25:26)

tucuxi · 2021-05-30 16:46:26

Resizing the window did not help nor installing additional python packages. I would also rule out a color scheme issue as I tried different themes including the default configuration. It is more like rendering does not work at all while everything except rendering is fine.

I have been able to narrow the root cause down to a permission problem: `sudo kitty` (after `xhost si:localuser:root`) opens a kitty window with text being displayed normally.

Here is the Xorg.0.log. The log covers the time period in which I tried to open kitty as normal user and then as root. Nothing unusual in it as far as I can tell. Any ideas what could be the issue with my account and what must be changed? I do run rootless Xorg.

EDIT:
1. Adding the user to the `render` and `video` group does not help.
2. Here is a screenshot for when I open kitty as non-root.

Last edited by tucuxi (2021-05-30 18:03:01)

seth · 2021-05-30 19:36:56

strace kitty |& grep -C3 EPERM

?

twelveeighty · 2021-05-31 13:52:30

tucuxi wrote:

I do run rootless Xorg.

Just to add a datapoint of comparison: I have a display manager, so I'm not running rootless Xorg. I would hope that's not the issue here, and I couldn't find any obvious hits when doing a quick search on "kitty terminal rootless".

seth · 2021-05-31 14:21:39

What typically happens is that logind doesn't control the VT and you lose ACL access to the drm device, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xinit#xserverrc

tucuxi · 2021-05-31 15:46:31

seth wrote:

What typically happens is that logind doesn't control the VT and you lose ACL access to the drm device, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xinit#xserverrc

That might be the issue although my `.xserverrc` is exactly as in the Wiki.

➜ \ls -l /dev/dr*
crw------- 1 root root 239, 0 May 31 17:16 /dev/drm_dp_aux0
crw------- 1 root root 239, 1 May 31 17:16 /dev/drm_dp_aux1
crw------- 1 root root 239, 2 May 31 17:16 /dev/drm_dp_aux2

/dev/dri:
total 0
drwxr-xr-x  2 root root         80 May 31 17:16 by-path
crw-rw----+ 1 root video  226,   0 May 31 17:16 card0
crw-rw-rw-  1 root render 226, 128 May 31 17:16 renderD128

The strace does not contain any EPERMs, though:

strace kitty |& grep -C3 EPERM

Here is the complete strace output in case you can spot anything suspicious.

seth · 2021-05-31 16:16:29

openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/kds/.drirc", O_RDONLY) = 6
openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/kds/.cache/mesa_shader_cache/index", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_CLOEXEC, 0644) = 9
openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/kds/.config/fontconfig/fonts.conf", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 4

Delete the mesa_shader_cache and post the other two files.

tucuxi · 2021-05-31 16:23:15

.drirc:

<driconf>
  <device screen="0" driver="radeonsi">
    <application name="Default">
      <option name="mesa_glthread" value="true" />
      <option name="pp_jimenezmlaa" value="8" />
      <option name="pp_jimenezmlaa_color" value="8" />
    </application>
  </device>
</driconf>

fonts.conf:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM 'fonts.dtd'>

<fontconfig>
    <alias>
        <family>monospace</family>
        <prefer>
            <family>JetBrains Mono</family>
        </prefer>
    </alias>
    <alias>
        <family>serif</family>
        <prefer>
            <family>Noto Serif</family>
        </prefer>
    </alias>
    <alias>
        <family>sans-serif</family>
        <prefer>
            <family>Noto Sans</family>
        </prefer>
    </alias>
</fontconfig>

Deleting the cache didn't change the observed behavior.

EDIT: After also deleting `.drirc`, I can open kitty normally. I wonder where `.drirc` came from in the first place.

Last edited by tucuxi (2021-05-31 16:25:49)

seth · 2021-05-31 19:59:15

You hopefully added that at some point ;_)
Do you happen to have it's timestamps archieved?

tucuxi · 2021-05-31 20:49:38

The file was likely generated by `adriconf` half a year ago during its 12-minute dwell time.

➜ fgrep driconf /var/log/pacman.log
[2020-12-15T00:01:57+0100] [PACMAN] Running 'pacman -S --config /etc/pacman.conf -- community/adriconf'
[2020-12-15T00:02:00+0100] [ALPM] installed adriconf (2.4-3)
[2020-12-15T00:14:19+0100] [PACMAN] Running 'pacman -R -s --config /etc/pacman.conf -- adriconf'
[2020-12-15T00:14:20+0100] [ALPM] removed adriconf (2.4-3)

I stand corrected with respect to insufficient permissions being the root cause. All it took was a user account without that `.drirc` file.

Thanks to all for your awesome support.

sophrantic · 2023-08-19 14:40:26

I had the same problem and it turned out to be a driver issue:

https://github.com/alacritty/alacritty/issues/6609 (solved the issue for kitty as well for me)

Just in case anybody else needs help solving the same problem.

Last edited by sophrantic (2023-08-19 14:41:04)

2ManyDogs · 2023-08-19 18:48:01

Closing this old solved topic.

Arch Linux

#1 2021-05-29 12:43:03

[SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#2 2021-05-29 17:12:15

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#3 2021-05-29 20:03:37

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#4 2021-05-29 21:20:38

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#5 2021-05-30 04:51:26

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#6 2021-05-30 06:08:21

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#7 2021-05-30 14:22:34

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#8 2021-05-30 16:46:26

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#9 2021-05-30 19:36:56

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#10 2021-05-31 13:52:30

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#11 2021-05-31 14:21:39

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#12 2021-05-31 15:46:31

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#13 2021-05-31 16:16:29

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#14 2021-05-31 16:23:15

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#15 2021-05-31 19:59:15

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#16 2021-05-31 20:49:38

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#17 2023-08-19 14:40:26

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

#18 2023-08-19 18:48:01

Re: [SOLVED] kitty terminal shows only empty black window

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