Xfce Forum

sebastian-65

Member

Registered: 2022-01-12

Posts: 14

[CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

Yesterday, I was doing some administrative tasks, and end up with crippled Xfce today when I logged in.

• My keyring is undetected

• Empty application finder - no apps found

• Empty settings manager - no apps found

• Keyboard shortcuts empty and cannot be setup (won't be saved)

• Windows manager shortcuts empty and cannot be setup

• Default wallpaper, desktop settings, default panel

• My home folder looks intact - I can see my old settings e.g. in ~/.config/xfce4/xfconf/xfce-perchannel-xml

• Permissions of these files seem to be normal

• No partitions are full in terms of volume or inodes

• Apps (like browser and such) do work fine when launched directly - and seem to remember all settings

This never happened to me before, so I'm thinking what might have cause this. I was doing couple of things yesterday:

• Connecting my home folder to syncthing as a one-way backup from my laptop to NAS - sync is now paused

• Sync has generated lot of sync-conflict files - which I removed afterwards

• Included 2 files with global variables to /etc/profile - now commented out

• Edited cronjobs

• Changed permissions of files and folders recursively in work folder (outside of ~/home) - that shouldn't do any harm elsewhere

In the morning, I backed up my home folder (presumably corrupted) locally, and then tried to rsync home directory from NAS backup back to my own. However, to no avail.

I'm out of ideas for now, and curious. What should I check for?

Thank you!

------
OS: Arch Linux x86_64
Host: VivoBook_ASUSLaptop X435EA_S435EA 1.0
Kernel: 5.18.14-arch1-1
Packages: 1173 (pacman), 6 (flatpak)
Shell: bash 5.1.16
DE: Xfce 4.16
WM: Xfwm4
Theme: Adwaita [GTK2], Arc-Darker [GTK3]
Icons: Adwaita [GTK2], Flat-Remix-Blue [GTK3]
Terminal: xfce4-terminal
Terminal Font: JetBrains Mono Variable weight
CPU: 11th Gen Intel i7-1165G7 (8) @ 4.700GHz
GPU: Intel TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics]
Memory: 14565MiB / 15680MiB

Last edited by sebastian-65 (2022-08-15 09:00:44)

KBar

Moderator

Registered: 2021-11-05

Posts: 689

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

What kind of "administrative tasks" you performed exactly?

This seems to be out of scope. You'll get better solutions posting this on generic Linux forums.

---

Remember to edit the subject of your topic to include the [SOLVED] tag once you're satisfied with the answers or have found a solution (in which case, don't forget to share it as well), so that other members of the community can quickly refer to it and save their time. Pretty please!

sebastian-65

Member

Registered: 2022-01-12

Posts: 14

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

What I've been doind is listed in the description:

• Connecting my home folder to syncthing as a one-way backup from my laptop to NAS - sync is now paused

• Sync has generated lot of sync-conflict files - which I removed afterwards

• Included 2 files with global variables to /etc/profile - now commented out

• Edited cronjobs

• Changed permissions of files and folders recursively in work folder (outside of ~/home) - that shouldn't do any harm elsewhere

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,056

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

You journal might have some useful information to help identify the issue.

---

Please remember to mark your thread [SOLVED] to make it easier for others to find
--- How To Ask For Help | FAQ | Developer Wiki  |  Community | Contribute ---

Skaperen

Member

From: right by Jesus, our Saviour

Registered: 2013-06-15

Posts: 819

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

try creating a totally new user and see how much of Xfce works for that user.  how much may be informative.  if Xfce works fully normal, then focus on changes to the affected user.  if it has the same or similar issues, then focus on the system itself.

sebastian-65

Member

Registered: 2022-01-12

Posts: 14

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

Good idea, Skaperen. When trying to log into new user's account, xfce won't start and only the cross mouse icon is visible on the black screen. Interestingly, when logged in tty as a new user, it can be seen that system is looking for /root/.bash_profile, also for /root/.config/systemd/user.conf, and echo $USER returns root instead of the user. So it seems that system has users mixed up with root somehow.

I'm still investigating.

Last edited by sebastian-65 (2022-08-12 19:30:29)

sebastian-65

Member

Registered: 2022-01-12

Posts: 14

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

For others in similar situation, $USER issue is also posted here on stackexchange.

sebastian-65

Member

Registered: 2022-01-12

Posts: 14

Re: [CLOSED] Xfce settings broken down

I have resolved this by reinstalling the system. Closing the thread.