Xfce4-panel disappears

Support Xfce
1

For a couple of weeks I have had the problem that after monitor was sent to suspend, after waking up the panels were gone. Sometimes also when I changed display / monitor configuration. I could fix that with xfce4-panel -r.
Since yesterday, panel is already missing after starting the computer. When I start xfce4-panel manually, it’s apparently working without issue.

I don’t see any related messages via dmesg nor journalctl. I don’t know where else I should look. Are there log files I can activate or find for the panel?

System:
  Host: LEXX Kernel: 6.14.0-1-MANJARO arch: x86_64 bits: 64
  Desktop: Xfce v: 4.20.1 Distro: Manjaro Linux
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: Micro-Star model: PRO Z690-A DDR4(MS-7D25) v: 1.0
    serial: <superuser required> UEFI: American Megatrends LLC. v: 1.F0
    date: 11/03/2023
CPU:
  Info: 6-core 12th Gen Intel Core i5-12400F [MT MCP] speed (MHz): avg: 800
    min/max: 800/5600
Graphics:
  Device-1: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Navi 22 [Radeon RX 6700/6700
    XT/6750 XT / 6800M/6850M XT] driver: amdgpu v: kernel
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.16 with: Xwayland v: 24.1.6 driver: X:
    loaded: amdgpu unloaded: modesetting,radeon dri: radeonsi gpu: amdgpu
    resolution: 1: 1920x1080~60Hz 2: 3440x1440_60.00~60Hz
  API: EGL v: 1.5 drivers: kms_swrast,radeonsi,swrast
    platforms: gbm,x11,surfaceless,device
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: amd mesa v: 25.0.3-arch1.1
    renderer: AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT (radeonsi navi22 LLVM 19.1.7 DRM 3.61
    6.14.0-1-MANJARO)
  API: Vulkan v: 1.4.309 drivers: radv surfaces: xcb,xlib
  Info: Tools: api: eglinfo, glxinfo, vulkaninfo de: xfce4-display-settings
    gpu: corectrl,radeontop x11: xdpyinfo, xprop, xrandr
Network:
  Device-1: Intel Ethernet I225-V driver: igc
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 2.35 TiB used: 956.53 GiB (39.7%)
Info:
  Memory: total: 32 GiB available: 31.2 GiB used: 3.55 GiB (11.4%)
  Processes: 333 Uptime: 16m Shell: Zsh inxi: 3.3.38
2

… do you have “save session … and restore” active?
(that is not the actual name - but the switch is in “System → Session and Startup”)

I never used that feature as it seems to create problems and I have nothing to restore anyway …

Toggle that switch and leave it in the off position - just for the sake of trying.

Next step is to reset the session to defaults … or try with another user.

3

You mean “Automatically save session on logout”?
Thanks, I’ll try.

One additional tidbit of information:
Since I had xfce4-panel started from a shell today, I got these error messages from the process when the screen went to sleep:

image
image1043×308 34 KB

Update: Definitely unrelated.

4

That is what I meant - and to

disable it.

I have no opinion on it - it was not errors - it was warnings.
Was there any problem because of it?
Likely not …

5

These warnings came while the display was off. And after I woke it up, the panel was gone again. I don’t know if the warnings are related to my problem or not. Just thought it might ring a bell for someone.

6

Hasn’t changed anything, unfortunately.

7

then:
reset to defaults

and/or:
new user → is it the same there?

it gets applied the defaults …

8

I created a new user. No problems with the panel there.
I then replaced my whole ~/.config/xfce4 folder with that from the other user. Still no panel after boot or resuming monitor from sleep.

Which other config might be responsible?

9

It matters how you did this.

The defaults are in /etc/skel - copy it from there.
But:
make sure that the Xfce user session is not running when you do this - either do it from that other users account or from a TTY while logged out of the graphical session.
The session of the user you want to reset to defaults can’t be running when you replace the config files.

10

I think I got that covered. I had logged out of the XFCE4 session and replaced the config from a text terminal.

I have manged to solve the problem that the panel was not started after starting the machine by deleting the old default session and creating a new one.

I still have no clue what causes the panel to disappear after the monitor goes to sleep. (Note that the panel process it is still running, but the panel is not displayed.)

11

If (when) you did this, all that was in there where the contents of /etc/skel.

So my suggestion stands:

mv ~/.config ~/.config-backup
cp -r /etc/skel/.config ~/

What that does:
move ~/.config out of the way
and then copy from /etc/skel instead, not from the new user.

That get’s you to the same default state as the new user account, where all is working as it should.

… and then you can go on to recover whatever config files you might want or need from the backup (~/.config-backup)

A console file manager like mc makes working in TTY much easier …

12

Hi All,

I encountered this issue as well. I copied over the defaults of the xfce4 config, and that has seemed to fix it.

mv ~/.config/xfce4/ ~/.config/xfce4-bak

cp -r /etc/skel/.config/xfce4 ~/.config/

Best,
James

13

No necro-bumping, please.

14

Of course it works.
But a precondition is that the Xfce4 session is not running/active.
See my previous post.

Otherwise not all files will be moved out of the way/replaced.

It might work with the session running, but you won’t get a clean default environment that way.

… but this thread is closed now

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