windows and icons flickering

jyoung · 2017-08-11 17:08:11

Hi Folks,

A few months ago my xfce desktop started showing flickering of some windows and icons. It seems to be a refresh problem, because windows that refresh their contents immediately (like evince) flicker quite badly, while others that don't need to refresh their contents if there's no keyboard/mouse activity (like xterm) don't flicker at all. The panel clock, as an intermediate case, flickers sometimes when the seconds change.

Some things I've tried with no effect: uninstalling and reinstalling xfce, wiping my .config folder, logging in as a different user

At first I thought it might be an issue with X, so I installed fluxbox, and the problem doesn't occur in fluxbox. That seems to suggest that the problem isn't with X. (that experiment aside, I prefer xfce quite a bit, so I'd like to solve this).

Any ideas?

ToZ · 2017-08-11 19:33:14

Hello and welcome.

Strange that it does't happen with fluxbox as it sounds like a video driver issue. Can you try disabling the compositor (in Window Manager Tweaks) and see if that makes a difference? Also, which distro are you running and can you provide more info about the video card(s), drivers, and any special video driver configs you may be using?

jyoung · 2017-08-11 20:18:53

Thanks!

Disabling the compositor got rid of the flickering, although there's now a thick black outline around the evince windows.

I'm running gentoo. My box has an Intel graphics card. dmesg says it's VGA, although my monitor is plugged into display port. I'm not using any special video drivers, and I have no xorg.conf files.

ToZ · 2017-08-11 21:25:59

Are you using the intel driver or the modesetting driver? There is more info at the gentoo wiki.

If you are using the intel driver, try with the modesetting driver. And vice versa. Also try enabling SNA with the intel driver. See if any of those scenarios work with the compositor enabled.

jyoung · 2017-08-12 21:00:04

I'm using the intel driver. I'm seeing some of the options for this driver have been enabled, but some not. I'd be happy to provide more information.

I also noticed that the black boarder around the evince windows does not appear on nearly created windows. It immediately appeared on all the evince windows that I had open when I turned the compositor off (and disappeared when I turned the compositor back on, as a check), but new evince windows look normal. From my standpoint, I could consider this problem solved, although I'd be willing to continue experimenting in the interest of finding a solution for anyone who actually needs to use the compositor.

sixsixfive · 2017-08-13 14:25:36

not sure about the intel issue but the shadow from evince comes through GTK3 client side decorations, when you disable the compositor evince still runs with CSD's however its now impossible to draw the shadow around the window. best way to avoid CSD issues is to use GTK3-nocsd ( https://github.com/PCMan/gtk3-nocsd ) for Evince there is an even a better option, use Atril the cool CSD-free Evince fork from the Mate-desktop: https://github.com/mate-desktop/atril

Last edited by sixsixfive (2017-08-13 14:27:25)

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#1 2017-08-11 17:08:11

windows and icons flickering

#2 2017-08-11 19:33:14

Re: windows and icons flickering

#3 2017-08-11 20:18:53

Re: windows and icons flickering

#4 2017-08-11 21:25:59

Re: windows and icons flickering

#5 2017-08-12 21:00:04

Re: windows and icons flickering

#6 2017-08-13 14:25:36

Re: windows and icons flickering

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