[SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

GameLostException · 2024-09-16 15:17:59

TL;DR
When trying to logon at machine startup, via CLI, I get the error:

Could not get properties: Unknown objet '/org/freedesktop/login1/user/self'

Then the screen is cleared and the logon prompt shows again.

Context
The issue first appeared after a full system upgrade (pacman -Syu) and a reboot.

Details
Using a bootable USB stick, I was able to mount and arch-chroot into my "/" and "/home" and get the following from the journal, at the time of failed logons. The only thing that seemed out of the ordinary is:

Sep 16 13:35:04 foo-hostname dbus-broker-launch[1105]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.xfce.xfce4-notifyd.Notifyd.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.xfce.Notifyd'.
Sep 16 13:35:04 foo-hostname dbus-broker-launch[1105]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.xfce.xfce4-notifyd.Notifications.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.freedesktop.Notifications'.
Sep 16 13:35:04 foo-hostname dbus-broker-launch[1105]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.xfce.Tumbler.Thumbnailer1.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.freedesktop.thumbnails.Thumbnailer1'.
Sep 16 13:35:04 foo-hostname dbus-broker-launch[1105]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.xfce.Tumbler.Manager1.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.freedesktop.thumbnails.Manager1'.
Sep 16 13:35:04 foo-hostname dbus-broker-launch[1105]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.xfce.xfce4-notifyd.Notifyd.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.xfce.Notifyd'.
Sep 16 13:35:04 foo-hostname dbus-broker-launch[1105]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.xfce.Thunar.FileManager1.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.freedesktop.FileManager1'.

I have also used arch-chroot to, using pacman, re-install some at first, then all of the existing package on my setup, but it did not change a thing.

Appart from that, I have tried:
- Changing TTY (CTRL+ALT+Fx) but other TTY show the same issue
- Use another user (e.g. root, instead of my default user) but they show the same issue
- re-installing all the pacman known packages (hundreds of them), it did not help
- remove the lines auto-starting xfce4 from my zshrc, it did not help

Setup
My setup is a vanilla LTS 6.6.51-1-lts arch distrib using xfce as Desktop Environment and Awesome as WindowManager.
The whole setup has been running on a laptop without any major issues for a couple years now, and I do a full system upgrade every week or so.

Any help or idea is more than welcome, I'd rather avoid a full reset as the backup of my home dir would be cumbersome...

[EDIT] Full verbose journal from the latest boot showing the issue: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BslpRS … drive_link

Last edited by GameLostException (2024-09-23 14:18:05)

seth · 2024-09-16 16:20:20

Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd-logind[953]: New session 3 of user foo.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd[1]: Started Session 3 of User foo.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname login[1127]:  -- foo[1127]: LOGIN ON tty1 BY foo
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname login[1127]: pam_unix(login:session): session closed for user foo
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname login[1127]: pam_systemd(login:session): New sd-bus connection (system-bus-pam-systemd-1127) opened.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd[1]: getty@tty1.service: Deactivated successfully.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd[1]: run-credentials-getty\x40tty1.service.mount: Deactivated successfully.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd[1]: session-3.scope: Deactivated successfully.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd-logind[953]: Session 3 logged out. Waiting for processes to exit.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd[1]: getty@tty1.service: Scheduled restart job, restart counter is at 2.
Sep 16 13:35:13 foo-hostname systemd[1]: Started Getty on tty1.

There's probably some spurious "exit" call in your shell rc or /etc/profile - but since all users are affected you're likely looking at some global config, except

remove the lines auto-starting xfce4 from my zshrc, it did not help

if all you users use zsh and you've install OMZ. Then it's OMZ.

GameLostException · 2024-09-17 09:32:50

Thanks for your reply seth.

I don't have OMZ installed but I use powerlevel10k which is kinda similar it seems.

I looked into /etc/profile and /etc/profile.d/*, there is no such thing as an exit instruction. All the profiles files and their contents are pretty vanilla. My tinkering of profiles are now dated, made only to my current user's .zshrc, and limited to harmless aliases and PATH additions.
I have tried to switch my user to /usr/bin/bash instead of zsh via /etc/passwd, the issue remains the same.

IMO the issue revolves around this error message I never saw before I had the issue at logon:

Could not get properties: Unknown objet '/org/freedesktop/login1/user/self'

Which looks like a systemd and/or dbus issue.

I am now trying some new suggestions given by an AI before I wipe out my "/"...

Last edited by GameLostException (2024-09-17 09:35:16)

seth · 2024-09-17 13:23:19

I'd refrain from both, stupid ShitGPT instructions as well as nuking the system, in doubt you'll end up recreating the problem.

That message, typo or not, isn't in the log you posted.
And google only has https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=232933 but that does apparently no lead to a login failure - whatever you see is most likely an outfall of that immediate termination and something grabbing into the gone session.

The login /is/ successful, the session just closes immediately what indicates a problem w/ the shell setup

pacman -Qikk filesystem zsh bash
ls -lR /etc/profile* /etc/zsh*

Sep 16 13:34:56 foo-hostname sudo[995]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0)
Sep 16 13:34:56 foo-hostname sudo[995]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session closed for user root
Sep 16 13:35:56 foo-hostname sudo[1346]:     root : PWD=/ ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/timedatectl set-timezone Europe/London
Sep 16 13:35:56 foo-hostname sudo[1346]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0)
Sep 16 13:35:56 foo-hostname sudo[1346]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session closed for user root
Sep 16 13:35:56 foo-hostname sudo[1353]:     root : PWD=/ ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/pdnsd-ctl empty-cache
Sep 16 13:35:56 foo-hostname sudo[1353]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0)
Sep 16 13:35:56 foo-hostname sudo[1353]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session closed for user root
Sep 16 13:35:57 foo-hostname sudo[1371]:     root : PWD=/ ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/timedatectl set-timezone Europe/London
Sep 16 13:35:57 foo-hostname sudo[1371]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0)
Sep 16 13:35:57 foo-hostname sudo[1371]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session closed for user root

How does this happen if you cannot login?

GameLostException · 2024-09-18 10:03:35

seth wrote:

That message, typo or not, isn't in the log you posted.

Absolutely, it shows only on screen on the terminal login prompt, flashes 1 sec or so before the screen reset to the logon prompt again:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/14xYo8q … drive_link

seth wrote:

The login /is/ successful, the session just closes immediately what indicates a problem w/ the shell setup

Your reading of the logs seems more educated than mine, I'll trust you on that.

seth wrote:

pacman -Qikk filesystem zsh bash

Name : filesystem
Version : 2024.04.07-1
Description : Base Arch Linux files
Architecture : any
URL : https://archlinux.org
Licenses : GPL-3.0-or-later
Groups : None
Provides : None
Depends On : iana-etc
Optional Deps : None
Required By : base fakeroot glibc mkinitcpio
Optional For : None
Conflicts With : None
Replaces : None
Installed Size : 22.33 KiB
Packager : David Runge <dvzrv@archlinux.org>
Build Date : Sun Apr 7 19:02:30 2024
Install Date : Mon Sep 16 13:56:30 2024
Install Reason : Installed as a dependency for another package
Install Script : No
Validated By : Signature
backup file: filesystem: /etc/fstab (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/fstab (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/fstab (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/group (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/group (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/group (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/gshadow (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/gshadow (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/gshadow (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/hosts (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/hosts (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/hosts (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/passwd (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/passwd (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/passwd (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/resolv.conf (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/resolv.conf (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/resolv.conf (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/shadow (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/shadow (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/shadow (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/shells (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/shells (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/shells (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/subgid (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/subgid (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/subgid (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/subuid (Modification time mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/subuid (Size mismatch)
backup file: filesystem: /etc/subuid (SHA256 checksum mismatch)
filesystem: 124 total files, 2 altered files
Name : zsh
Version : 5.9-5
Description : A very advanced and programmable command interpreter (shell) for UNIX
Architecture : x86_64
URL : https://www.zsh.org/
Licenses : custom
Groups : None
Provides : None
Depends On : pcre2 libcap gdbm
Optional Deps : None
Required By : manjaro-zsh-config zsh-autosuggestions zsh-completions zsh-history-substring-search zsh-syntax-highlighting zsh-theme-powerlevel10k-git
Optional For : None
Conflicts With : None
Replaces : None
Installed Size : 6.56 MiB
Packager : Christian Hesse <eworm@archlinux.org>
Build Date : Thu Mar 14 22:28:04 2024
Install Date : Mon Sep 16 13:57:06 2024
Install Reason : Explicitly installed
Install Script : Yes
Validated By : Signature
zsh: 1210 total files, 0 altered files
Name : bash
Version : 5.2.032-2
Description : The GNU Bourne Again shell
Architecture : x86_64
URL : https://www.gnu.org/software/bash/bash.html
Licenses : GPL-3.0-or-later
Groups : None
Provides : sh
Depends On : readline libreadline.so=8-64 glibc ncurses
Optional Deps : bash-completion: for tab completion [installed]
Required By : at-spi2-core autoconf automake base bash-completion bison bzip2 ca-certificates-utils cairo cups-filters db db5.3 dhcpcd diffutils djvulibre dkms e2fsprogs ebook-tools fakeroot fbrokendesktop fftw findutils firefox flex freetype2 gawk gdbm gettext glib2 gnupg gpm gradle grub gtk-update-icon-cache gtk4 gzip hunspell icu ijs iptables java-runtime-common keyutils krb5 libassuan libcamera libcups libdca libgpg-error libksba libnet libpcap libpng libreoffice-fresh libteam libtool libxml2 libxslt lm_sensors lsb-release lsdesktopf lvm2 m4 man-db meson mkinitcpio mysql-clients80 mysql80 neofetch netpbm npth nspr nss p7zip pacman pahole pcre pkgconf rasqal redland rust spirv-tools steam systemd taglib texinfo tracker3 unzip vala vlc which wxwidgets-gtk3 xdg-user-dirs xdg-utils xmlsec xorg-server xz
Optional For : alsa-utils audit mdadm ncurses nvm openssh pcre2 tzdata usbutils vim-runtime
Conflicts With : None
Replaces : None
Installed Size : 9.20 MiB
Packager : Tobias Powalowski <tpowa@archlinux.org>
Build Date : Tue Aug 27 06:59:54 2024
Install Date : Mon Sep 16 13:56:31 2024
Install Reason : Installed as a dependency for another package
Install Script : Yes
Validated By : Signature
bash: 257 total files, 0 altered files

seth wrote:

ls -lR /etc/profile* /etc/zsh*

-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 993 Apr 7 19:02 /etc/profile
/etc/profile.d:
total 56
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 674 Jul 22 18:43 debuginfod.csh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 596 Jul 22 18:43 debuginfod.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 488 Aug 13 04:30 freetype2.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1107 Aug 28 09:51 gawk.csh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 757 Aug 28 09:51 gawk.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 105 Jul 23 19:19 gpm.sh
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 52 Sep 9 09:06 gradle.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 207 Jan 19 2023 jre.csh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 211 Jan 19 2023 jre.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 293 Sep 12 15:32 libreoffice-fresh.csh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 293 Sep 12 15:32 libreoffice-fresh.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 766 Apr 7 19:02 locale.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 468 Sep 1 12:21 perlbin.csh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 464 Sep 1 12:21 perlbin.sh
/etc/zsh:
total 8
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 36 Mar 14 2024 zprofile
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Sep 14 12:14 zshrc-manjaro
/etc/zsh/zshrc-manjaro:
total 0

This

 grep -iR "exit" /etc/profile* /etc/zsh* /etc/profile

returns nothing

seth wrote:

How does this happen if you cannot login?

I'd like to know

Just after I did all that, I created a new user just to double check if the issue was really in "/" and not an existing "/home/*"... and I was able to login with it! I am also able to su to my usual user and even start xfce4, even though I had to tinker a lot to get the GUI back.
The good news is I can now have a look at the status of dbus and systemd on my system, the logon issue being still present but workaround-able. I have new leads now, but any educated suggestion based on the above would still be very welcome.

seth · 2024-09-18 13:03:34

returns nothing

It doesn't have to be a literal "exit" call.

and I was able to login with it!

So it's in your $HOME and possibly also in /root

ls -ld ~/.*{profile,rc}

GameLostException · 2024-09-23 09:34:30

Thanks seth, ls -ld ~/.*{profile,rc} gives:

/home/foo/.bash_profile
/home/foo/.bashrc
/home/foo/.nvidia-settings-rc
/home/foo/.yarnrc
/home/foo/.zshrc

Nothing out of the ordinary in these files "unfortunately". I already tried a run while removing everthing from my broken user .zshrc but the result was the same.
I suspect something in / (/etc? /usr?) that has been setup/written in there for my existing users at the time of the issue, like a potential hook during a pacman or yay update that has messed them up but without having anything particular done to their respective ~/

I'm nuking / now, really need that laptop to go back to prod so I won't be able to investigate the root cause further I'm afraid.

Thanks again for your brain-time though, it's much appreciated.

GameLostException · 2024-09-23 10:51:19

Good news, out of sheer luck: while prepping to nuke "/", I started to backup a couple config files in "/etc" I knew I needed.

One of them was a PAM config for USB stick authentication, PAMUSB: I noted this new file "/etc/security/pamusb.cong.pacnew" that was created by pacman as a change of config required by a PAMUSB package upgrade I suppose, and indeed, this config is taking care of the authentication of my current user and root on the machine.

Using the .pacnew instead of my legacy config, I was able to logon again, I guess the legacy config syntax would not be recognised anymore and causing the logon issue.

Last edited by GameLostException (2024-09-23 10:52:04)

seth · 2024-09-23 13:44:16

\o/
Please always remember to mark resolved threads by editing your initial posts subject - so others will know that there's no task left, but maybe a solution to find.
Thanks.

GameLostException · 2024-09-23 14:20:11

Done, thanks again! (spent more time googling how to rename a topic on that forum than I should have )

Arch Linux

#1 2024-09-16 15:17:59

[SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#2 2024-09-16 16:20:20

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#3 2024-09-17 09:32:50

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#4 2024-09-17 13:23:19

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#5 2024-09-18 10:03:35

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#6 2024-09-18 13:03:34

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#7 2024-09-23 09:34:30

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#8 2024-09-23 10:51:19

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#9 2024-09-23 13:44:16

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

#10 2024-09-23 14:20:11

Re: [SOLVED] Can't logon: "Could not get properties: Unknown objet"

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