When attempting to open the pamac GUI from the application launcher, the loading cursor appears for a few seconds and then disappears. Here are a few dynamics I’ve noticed:
-
It loads when I right click and select ‘software update’, however as soon as I select either the ‘browse’ or ‘installed’ tab it will then crash.
-
It runs as expected when launched with the pamac-manager command from the terminal.
It started occurring after installing foot. I opened it shortly before this and attempted shortly after. Whether this is related or a coincidence, I’m not sure. I have attempted to find possible crash logs to no success. The var/log/pacman.log for today is pasted below:
[2024-07-13T16:18:01+1000] [PAMAC] synchronizing package lists
[2024-07-13T16:18:34+1000] [ALPM] transaction started
[2024-07-13T16:18:34+1000] [ALPM] installed mutt (2.2.13-3)
[2024-07-13T16:18:34+1000] [ALPM] installed dma (0.13-4)
[2024-07-13T16:18:34+1000] [ALPM] transaction completed
[2024-07-13T16:18:34+1000] [ALPM] running '30-systemd-update.hook'...
[2024-07-13T16:18:34+1000] [ALPM] running '90-packagekit-refresh.hook'...
[2024-07-13T22:53:11+1000] [PAMAC] synchronizing package lists
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] transaction started
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] installed foot-terminfo (1.17.2-1)
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] installed libutf8proc (2.9.0-1)
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] installed fcft (3.1.8-1)
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] installed foot (1.17.2-1)
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] transaction completed
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] running '30-systemd-daemon-reload-user.hook'...
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] running '30-systemd-update.hook'...
[2024-07-13T22:53:33+1000] [ALPM] running '90-packagekit-refresh.hook'...
[2024-07-13T22:53:34+1000] [ALPM] running 'gtk-update-icon-cache.hook'...
[2024-07-13T22:53:34+1000] [ALPM] running 'update-desktop-database.hook'...
I appreciate any help/ideas in advance 
You can run desktop database update manually from terminal and see if it crashes. Maybe some of the last programs you installed has a broken desktop file and crashes the database update leaving unprocessed files.
sudo update-desktop-database -v
No success on opening from the applications launcher after updating the the desktop database unfortunately
interestingly if i right click → edit application → application -. advanced and tell it to run in terminal it works as expected
Well, since it launches from terminal, it is broken .desktop file. Either it is broken itself, or not correctly parsed.
You can try to test making a new desktop file
/usr/share/applications/org.manjaro.pamac.manager2.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Name=pamac2
Icon=system-software-install
Exec=pamac-manager %U
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Categories=GNOME;GTK;System;PackageManager;Settings;X-XFCE-SettingsDialog;X-XFCE-SystemSettings;
StartupNotify=true
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/appstream;x-scheme-handler/snap;application/vnd.flatpak;application/vnd.flatpak.repo;application/vnd.flatpak.ref;application/vnd.snap;
X-GNOME-UsesNotifications=true
X-Purism-FormFactor=Workstation;Mobile;
StartupWMClass=pamac-manager
DBusActivatable=true
Actions=updates;
[Desktop Action updates]
Name=Software Update
Exec=pamac-manager --updates
restart and see if the new start menu icon pamac2 does the job. If it does - the original .desktop is broken. If not, you have a problem with parsing the shortcut files…
When I tried this I received the error:
Launching pamac2 (failed)
the name is not activatable
as a KDE notification
Additionally setting the icon as a desktop shortcut and running will get the error:
Launching add/remove software (failed)
remote peer disconnected
I am out of ideas for now, sorry. Maybe there is something in the journal about the the crash.
All good, thanks for the help so far. I’ll give an update if i fix it but it’s late where I am so probably another time
Ok so i “Fixed” it. Warning to everyone, I haven’t been using linux for very long so some of this might sound kinda dumb. Apologies in advance
I’ve had the suspicion that there are two different versions of pamac-manager on my system. One that would crash on the browse or installed tab but not the update tab, maybe a flatpak or something. I looked at the names of the applications in the system monitor and found when open from the terminal it would say ‘add or remove programs’ and with the launcher it would be dbus-:1.2-org.manjaro.pamac.manager…
In my limited experience I thought this looked like a flatpak so I ran:
flatpak list
Name Application ID Version Branch Installation
Steam com.valvesoftware.Steam 1.0.0.78 stable user
Freedesktop Platform org.freedesktop.Platform 23.08.10 23.08 user
i386 org.freedesktop.Platform.Compat.i386 23.08 user
Mesa org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.default 23.3.2 23.08 user
Mesa (Extra) org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.default 23.3.2 23.08-extra user
Mesa org.freedesktop.Platform.GL32.default 23.3.2 23.08 user
Mesa (Extra) org.freedesktop.Platform.GL32.default 23.3.2 23.08-extra user
openh264 org.freedesktop.Platform.openh264 2.1.0 2.2.0 user
So they dont look like they’re what im looking for. I tried:
whereis pamac-manager
/usr/bin/pamac-manager
Then setting that as the program explicitly through the GUI. Right clicking the icon in the launcher and going into Edit Application → Application and in the Program field it would have ‘pamac-manager’ but changing this to ‘/usr/bin/pamac-manager’ would allow me to open from the launcher. I searched the .desktop file before and after and couldn’t find any instance of ‘usr’ or ‘bin’ in either so I don’t know how I would make this change otherwise
There’s alot I don’t really know that some more experienced linux users might find trivial about this situation, like:
- I don’t know where this extra program is coming from, can my system have flatpaks that aren’t listed when running flatpak list.
- I don’t know what the Program field is actually doing, I assumed it would check application names in the environment paths like what the terminal does but they seem to run different things with the same input.
- Additionally, I don’t know why adding /usr/bin/ to the Program didn’t change it in the .desktop file
Curious. You can also try
which pamac-manager
and
locate pamac-manager
1 Like
When you used the GUI to modify the .desktop file, the modified version was saved in your ~/.local/share/applications/ directory. Your local version then overrides the original, unchanged version in /usr/share/applications/.
2 Likes