manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

ginahoy · 2026-01-12 16:08:59

I recently installed Mint 22.2 Xfce and noticed a problem with the "Time and Date" GUI. First, there's no Unlock button, which is fine by me (Time & Date required authentication in v18.2). I normally have it set to 'synchronize with servers' but when I set Configuration to manual, the GUI not only fails to hold onto any date change, the newly selected date jumps to a random month and day about a second after I make my selection. Strange.

I tried opening the GUI from the terminal, with and without sudo. Either way, this is the output when I set Configuration to to Manual and I change the date:

david@david-desktop:~$ sudo time-admin
[sudo] password for david:       

(time-admin:3774): GLib-CRITICAL **: 20:36:50.342: g_date_time_to_unix: assertion 'datetime != NULL' failed

** (time-admin:3774): CRITICAL **: 20:36:50.353: Set time failed: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.InvalidArgs: Invalid absolute time

(time-admin:3774): GLib-CRITICAL **: 20:36:50.353: g_date_time_unref: assertion 'datetime != NULL' failed

Is this possibly a bug, or is something else going on?

eriefisher · 2026-01-12 17:40:11

What id the bios time and date set to? Is it correct?

hwclock

ginahoy · 2026-01-12 19:16:50

Thanks. When I enter that command, I just get the current time and date:

david@linux-desktop ~ $ sudo hwclock
[sudo] password for david:
Mon 12 Jan 2026 11:57:20 AM MST .592191 seconds

Not sure what you mean by "what id the bios time and date set to"... how do I check that?

Last edited by ginahoy (2026-01-13 01:24:54)

eriefisher · 2026-01-12 20:06:21

Sorry, typo. is not id.
hwclock reads the hardware clock in the bios. But you say the time is correct. It is possible the hardware clock is set to local time and the system clock is setting the time +/- GMT. This is of course dependent on your location in the world.
You could try setting the bios clock to GMT then set the system time appropriately. GMT +/-.

ginahoy · 2026-01-13 02:10:59

I'm not sure how the bios clock (timezone) could impact functionality of Manual config for system clock GUI. In any case, I just checked and my hardware clock is already set to UTC.

BTW, just noticed the time/date format of the hwclock command output is different now than when I posted its output previously:

david@david-desktop:~$ sudo hwclock
[sudo] password for david:       
2026-01-12 19:05:06.082088-07:00

Then I remembered I was booted into my previous OS (Mint Xfce 18.2) when I ran that command roll

Last edited by ginahoy (2026-01-13 02:11:45)

gogogadget · 2026-01-13 06:45:56

ginahoy wrote:

I recently installed Mint 22.2 Xfce and noticed a problem with the "Time and Date" GUI.
Is this possibly a bug, or is something else going on?

Your time-admin application is not provided by Xfce, but your distribution, maybe Mint have some docs about it that could help you.
I guess Mint use systemd, you can have some info with timedatectl.

It should look like this (RTC for real time clock is the hardware clock) :

$ timedatectl status
               Local time: mar. 2026-01-13 07:38:13 CET
           Universal time: mar. 2026-01-13 06:38:13 UTC
                 RTC time: mar. 2026-01-13 06:38:13
                Time zone: Europe/Paris (CET, +0100)
System clock synchronized: yes
              NTP service: active
          RTC in local TZ: no

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/System_time

Last edited by gogogadget (2026-01-13 06:48:09)

eriefisher · 2026-01-13 11:14:48

I just looked up your time-admin application, it's part of gnome-system-tools. I'm not sure it will even work in Xfce4, at least not without a tonne Gnome junk.
I would switch to timedatectl as mentioned above.

ginahoy · 2026-01-14 01:21:49

I appreciate the responses. Now that I understand what to look for, I found a slew of online traffic re: issues with time-admin beginning with Mint 21.3 (Xfce and Mate). Doesn't look like anyone (Gnome) is working on it.

I already know how to use timedatectl's date command to reset system clock from the terminal. What I really want is a functional clock/calendar GUI that supports time/date adjustments.

I spent a fair amount of time searching my repository -- lots of hits on clock, time and/or date, most without ratings (I avoid software without some sort of recommendation). My repo has a handful of time/date GUI packages with positive ratings but the descriptions don't mention changing system clock. That's exactly what time-admin provided, before it broke. Suggestions would be appreciated smile

Last edited by ginahoy (2026-01-14 01:56:31)

oldrust · 2026-01-15 19:48:24

This works for me

https://github.com/kraj/xfce4-datetime-setter/

(A fork of (early) gnome-control-center datetime panel for XFCE. It is based upon
GTK3 and embedds into recent xfce4-settings.)

ginahoy · 2026-01-17 16:45:03

oldrust wrote:

This works for me
https://github.com/kraj/xfce4-datetime-setter/

Thanks for that tip! I'm not familiar with how to install code without instructions. Assistance would be appreciated!

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#1 2026-01-12 16:08:59

manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#2 2026-01-12 17:40:11

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#3 2026-01-12 19:16:50

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#4 2026-01-12 20:06:21

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#5 2026-01-13 02:10:59

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#6 2026-01-13 06:45:56

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#7 2026-01-13 11:14:48

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#8 2026-01-14 01:21:49

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#9 2026-01-15 19:48:24

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

#10 2026-01-17 16:45:03

Re: manual Time and Date adjustments don't work for me

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