Mint 12 driving me mad!

[FNC]

Hi everyone,

I have upgrade Mint 11 to 12 and now I'm having endless problems.
My HDD is partitioned to that my /home is on it's own partition and I was running Mint 11 about 6 months and absolutely loved it. I was really excited about Mint 12 and really wanted to try it because everyone was raving about it.
Yesterday I installed Mint 12 overriding my Mint 11 install, but keeping my /home intact.
My biggest problem is that after some time my window manager seems to go crazy. I am unable to minimize windows or open the menu. When I press "alt-tab" it brings up the application selector but it does nothing, and stays on the screen. The only way that I can recover my system is to do a "alt-backspace" and re login.

Has anyone else had similar problems in Mint 12 or is it something with my system?
I am using a Lenovo R61 laptop with 2GB ram and a second monitor.

[ibm450]

Yes. Same issues at my end also. M12 is still VERY young. Unfortunately I've uninstalled 12 as it was just a little buggy for me. I reverted back to m10.

[FNC]

I am now running gnome (no effects), so far it seems to be stable.

[Inprogress]

I found Mint 10 to be the best I have tried thus far. Just a general observation.

[henrydubb]

HDD is partitioned to that my /home is on it's own partition and I was running Mint 11 about 6 months and absolutely loved it. I was really excited about Mint 12 and really wanted to try it because everyone was raving about it.
Yesterday I installed Mint 12 overriding my Mint 11 install, but keeping my /home in

Well that's the problem. I always end up doing the same and it seems to have issues. While having a dedicated home is a great idea, across distros not so much. I had issues in using my home partition until I created one fresh for M12. Its easy to forget that in Linux home has a lot of setting files not just Docs.

My suggestion is create a dedicated home for each distro you are using.

[Aethyr]

Hi everyone,

I have upgrade Mint 11 to 12 and now I'm having endless problems.
My HDD is partitioned to that my /home is on it's own partition and I was running Mint 11 about 6 months and absolutely loved it. I was really excited about Mint 12 and really wanted to try it because everyone was raving about it.
Yesterday I installed Mint 12 overriding my Mint 11 install, but keeping my /home intact.
My biggest problem is that after some time my window manager seems to go crazy. I am unable to minimize windows or open the menu. When I press "alt-tab" it brings up the application selector but it does nothing, and stays on the screen. The only way that I can recover my system is to do a "alt-backspace" and re login.

Has anyone else had similar problems in Mint 12 or is it something with my system?
I am using a Lenovo R61 laptop with 2GB ram and a second monitor.

I'm doing exactly the same, except I have no issues at all. However, you need to be aware of the existence of the hidden config directories in ~/ (that is supposed to be a tilde, it looks weird). If you know what is there and how to control your personal configuration files for your user, then you should have no problem. The fact that the personalised config files are stored there is a convenience, not a hindrance; That way, when you install a new distro with the same home you get the same configurations for apps without the hassle. In fact, in some cases it might be preferable to keep other directories on separate partitions so that they can be left intact on upgrade as well, I think /usr/local is the most common example. Of course, the less stable the system, the bigger the chances of something going wrong with this. Debian almost always behaves nicely for example, while Fedora probably won't.

I really can't see how this is what is causing your WM to freak out though. I assume you were using compiz in Mint 11, as that is what it defaults to once 3D drivers are installed. What are you using now? If you are using GNOME Shell, then what's getting you is probably the fact that Shell is a terrible DE with almost completely broken proprietary graphics driver support. I suggest installing a decent DE for a change and if your problems persist then you start worrying. Terrible Desktop Environment + Bad graphics driver support + dual monitor = recipe for 1000% disaster.

[FNC]

Thank you all for your replies.

Since I posted this I have been running GNOME classic (no effects) from the login screen and my system has been stable. I don't think the fact that my /home is on a separate partition is causing any problems. It simply means all my settings and documents are kept in tack, for instance after the install I did not need to configure mail in Thunderbird, everything is already setup.

Also a bunch of updates was installed which might have fixed some of the problems. I have not tried mate, so I don't know how that would perform.

[wei2912]

Hi everyone,

I have upgrade Mint 11 to 12 and now I'm having endless problems.
My HDD is partitioned to that my /home is on it's own partition and I was running Mint 11 about 6 months and absolutely loved it. I was really excited about Mint 12 and really wanted to try it because everyone was raving about it.
Yesterday I installed Mint 12 overriding my Mint 11 install, but keeping my /home intact.
My biggest problem is that after some time my window manager seems to go crazy. I am unable to minimize windows or open the menu. When I press "alt-tab" it brings up the application selector but it does nothing, and stays on the screen. The only way that I can recover my system is to do a "alt-backspace" and re login.

Has anyone else had similar problems in Mint 12 or is it something with my system?
I am using a Lenovo R61 laptop with 2GB ram and a second monitor.

This is a bug which can be found at https://bugs.launchpad.net/linuxmint/+bug/889706 (i reported it). Please add your reports there. Thanks for your effort.

[DrMartinus]

Hm, I tried to report a bug but cannot login - I get only a blank screen in Firefox.
I've observed the following after installing LM 12 (on a newly formatted partition, but with the old home folder):
it seems that after moving to the top left corner, the system gets messed up, i.e. gnomes virtual desktops. I figured out that windows are shown on other desktops than where they actually are. And all menus don't respond to clicks any more. Example: I have firefox on desktop 3, but after the change (I don't know if it's really related to the move with the mouse to the left top corner - it was last time) it#s suddenly on desktop 4. However, I can still click on menu items and scroll through the window on desktop 3 (needless to say that it's hard to hit anything correctly, as I don't see firefox - it's visible on desktop 4 only!). When I go to desktop 4 I can see the changes I've caused on desktop 3.
Is there any solution to this yet? I probably will also try the Gnome classic, but I also think that renaming the old .gnome folder to maybe .gnome-old might help. I'll try that, too. However, I'm not sure if this problem is related to the home folder at all. And I find it rather useless to say that one should create a new homefolder for every new installation. All apps put their settings in the homefolder, not just gnome. And usually all apps adapt their settings to new versions, when they are being installed - that's how they should work (I also did some programming and this was the most important part of it, to allow a smooth upgrade). Gnome must be able to see that it has to do with an old config-folder and update it accordingly. Besides, I have tons of other docs etc. in my home folder (it has multiple Gigabytes of data), all collected over years of work...
The whole purpose of the home folder is the adaptability and keeping personal stuff away from the system. To create a new home folder would mean to have to configure all apps from scratch. That can't be it!

EDIT:
I just checked my homefolder, there are three different .gnome folders:

Code: Select all

.gnome
.gnome2
.gnome2_private

The last is empty, the .gnome2 folder contains all settings for gnome 2, and the .gnome folder was last updated in October, so Gnome 3 doesn't write anything in there. Actually, Gnome 3 seems to use the .gnome2 configuration folder. I just found out that there is also the .gconf folder which has been heavily used by Gnome 3, most folders in there have been updated at installation time.

[wei2912]

Hm, I tried to report a bug but cannot login - I get only a blank screen in Firefox.
I've observed the following after installing LM 12 (on a newly formatted partition, but with the old home folder):
it seems that after moving to the top left corner, the system gets messed up, i.e. gnomes virtual desktops. I figured out that windows are shown on other desktops than where they actually are. And all menus don't respond to clicks any more. Example: I have firefox on desktop 3, but after the change (I don't know if it's really related to the move with the mouse to the left top corner - it was last time) it#s suddenly on desktop 4. However, I can still click on menu items and scroll through the window on desktop 3 (needless to say that it's hard to hit anything correctly, as I don't see firefox - it's visible on desktop 4 only!). When I go to desktop 4 I can see the changes I've caused on desktop 3.
Is there any solution to this yet? I probably will also try the Gnome classic, but I also think that renaming the old .gnome folder to maybe .gnome-old might help. I'll try that, too. However, I'm not sure if this problem is related to the home folder at all. And I find it rather useless to say that one should create a new homefolder for every new installation. All apps put their settings in the homefolder, not just gnome. And usually all apps adapt their settings to new versions, when they are being installed - that's how they should work (I also did some programming and this was the most important part of it, to allow a smooth upgrade). Gnome must be able to see that it has to do with an old config-folder and update it accordingly. Besides, I have tons of other docs etc. in my home folder (it has multiple Gigabytes of data), all collected over years of work...
The whole purpose of the home folder is the adaptability and keeping personal stuff away from the system. To create a new home folder would mean to have to configure all apps from scratch. That can't be it!

EDIT:
I just checked my homefolder, there are three different .gnome folders:

Code: Select all

.gnome
.gnome2
.gnome2_private

The last is empty, the .gnome2 folder contains all settings for gnome 2, and the .gnome folder was last updated in October, so Gnome 3 doesn't write anything in there. Actually, Gnome 3 seems to use the .gnome2 configuration folder. I just found out that there is also the .gconf folder which has been heavily used by Gnome 3, most folders in there have been updated at installation time.

I'll be adding your report there, thanks for this. Also, the home partition is not the cause of this problem - many users do a fresh install instead of keeping their configuration files.

I suspect its incompatibility with gtk 2 apps and gnome-shell 3.2.

[DrMartinus]

I've now reverted to Gnome classic (not the "no effects" version), that works without any problems. But it's ugly and lacks a lot of features - or I didn't find them yet. Still digging my way through...

[Joe_Linux]

Instead of creating a separate /home, you need to create a /user-data partition for your personal data that you want to save. For example inside my /user-data I have /jl-data. (/user-data/jl-data or /user-data/jl) There are just too many hidden configuration files inside of /home to keep it, particularly in a radical change between Gnome2 and Gnome3. Try to rename the /home partition you created before into /data or /user-data and then do a reinstall with /home inside the root partition. Ditch all the folders like Music inside of the /home inside of / and then create symbolic links to the real folders inside of your /user-data. To be honest, this is not a bug, but your inexperience with modern ever changing Linux distributions. In the old days you could get away with with you did, but not now.

[DrMartinus]

Basically, your suggestion still means that I loose all settings that I've made in softwares like thunderbird, mozilla, LibreOffice, etc.
As mentioned before: when I (me personally) program an application, I take care that old settings are still used (as long as they exist), and the configuration files are adjusted to the new version. If applications do that, it's what I call user-friendliness. If I have to give up every 6 months what I have set up over that period, I would rather stop using a computer, because it's a tremendous step backwards.
The transition to Gnome 3 may be difficult, because the entire concept changes, but there are many ways to make it easier. That's part of the responsibility of the programmers.
I may be old, but I hope I'll never be too old to learn new things. The only thing I expect from the new things is that they make sense. In terms of software, it's usability what is the top priority (or should be). Still I am able to handle commandline apps as well as gui apps. But I prefer the gui environment, because it (supposedly) makes things easier. And Gnome is all about that (supposedly).

Edit: I find it already quite tedious that, with every new release, I have to reinstall the printer and scanner drivers, which involves editing some system files. But that's something one has to do with other OSs as well, except that it's much easier there.
With Gnome, I haven't found anything yet that makes it better than the previous version. That may be because I use the classic version, since the shell doesn't work reliably (which is known). But the basis is the same. So I will continue to look for the better things.

[raymulder]

I agree with the concept of a separate partition or drive for your personal stuff.
I have a /media/data disc which mounts at startup and all my Documents, Pictures, Videos etc are there.
I also have personal configuration for Thunderbird, Libre Office there.
The fact is that operating systems are sometimes going to change the way they act and the way they store configurations.
If you have done any programming you will realise that you are always trying to use better and more effective ways of making your program work.
I run dual boot with Windows 7 and Mint and even use the same profile for Thunderbird on Win7 and Mint, So I can access the same emails no matter which OS I am in.
In Libre Office you can setup, under "Paths" where your stuff is.
When you install a new release of any operating system don't thing there is a magician in there somewhere who can read your mind..
You will just have to do some setting up after installation and make sure your home mount point is /.
Wishing you well.

[DrMartinus]

Thanks for your reply. There's only one thing I would like to comment on:

When you install a new release of any operating system don't thing there is a magician in there somewhere who can read your mind..

I'm not expecting it to read my mind, but I'm expecting it to read its own. I just expect that configuration settings, if they continue to exist in a newer version, will be transfered into that newer version. It doesn't matter to me at all how it's done, where the settings are stored etc. The programmers know how previous versions stored the settings - I don't know it. So they can easily add a comparatively small routine to transfer these configurations into the new version.

You will just have to do some setting up after installation and make sure your home mount point is /.
Wishing you well.

My home mount point is "/"? Do you really mean that? Thanks for your kind wishes, the same to you!

[Aethyr]

You will just have to do some setting up after installation and make sure your home mount point is /.

Please don't give crappy uneducated advice. The /home mount point is, and is meant to be, /home, not /. / is root. And if you have minimal sense of how Linux runs then you would NOT want your /home in the / partition. While to the average Joe it might make no difference, to someone who is not just using Linux as a replacement to windows it might mean a world of difference. There's a good reason why it is always recommended to have separate / and /home (and as I also mentioned, /usr/local), and you probably don't even have any idea of the difference it makes. It's not just about backing up your files. If you read my previous reply to this topic you might get some minimal insight into Linux, which your post totally lacks currently.

Also, you're in the forums of Linux Mint, a distro which claims to work out of the box. "Doing some setting up" is against what this distro is trying to achieve.

[raymulder]

Yes "/" was an unfinished typo, I actually mean't the home directory should go in the "/" directory which would make it /home.
I do apologise for any misleading.
And to Aethyr:
And whilst I may not be as "educated" as you I am not blind and can see where I am posting.
I have been using Ubuntu for many many years and Windows since 1988, and have been programming with C+ etc etc for donkeys years, have written Windows apps for international companies without any problems so if you think you are so educated you should know that installing a new release may inevitably lead to some input and setting up.
You say:: ""Doing some setting up" is against what this distro is trying to achieve." well dream on for now, Microsoft have been trying to do this for years. You only have to look at the difference between WIndows 98 and Windows 7....night and day !
And maybe you should lighten up a bit, get some sleep, and realise we are all humans.
Regards to you and wishing you well over the season.

[tacoz]

My biggest problem is that after some time my window manager seems to go crazy. I am unable to minimize windows or open the menu. When I press "alt-tab" it brings up the application selector but it does nothing, and stays on the screen. The only way that I can recover my system is to do a "alt-backspace" and re login.

To come back to the original post... +1 on being driven mad!
Seriously, this has to be unfortunately the worst transition of Mint ever... fortunately we know this is more about Gnome than it is about Mint. I've put my video problems down to the lack of ATI support and gone back to Katya. I can do without a badly behaving desktop!

[Joe_Linux]

To come back to the original post... +1 on being driven mad!
Seriously, this has to be unfortunately the worst transition of Mint ever... fortunately we know this is more about Gnome than it is about Mint. I've put my video problems down to the lack of ATI support and gone back to Katya. I can do without a badly behaving desktop!

I don't think it is any big secret that Gnome 3 is horrible as compared to Gnome 2. That's why my installation is still Ubuntu 10.04 and I just run Mint 12 on live USB stick to play around with it. At the present time there is no sane reason to upgrade to anything if you have something that actually works.

[DrMartinus]

I don't think it is any big secret that Gnome 3 is horrible as compared to Gnome 2. That's why my installation is still Ubuntu 10.04 and I just run Mint 12 on live USB stick to play around with it. At the present time there is no sane reason to upgrade to anything if you have something that actually works.

I disagree on that one. There are numerous upgraded apps which have great improvements. To install them all from repositories that are not maintained by mint/ubuntu may be ok, but it can cause a mess and equal problems as with gnome 3.

I switched to Gnome because of the upgrade from KDE 3.x to KDE 4. Frequently I had a look back and was never really happy with the new KDE. The same thing now happens with Gnome. I have no idea why developers through something that is half ready on the "market". I agree that in open development, users also are a test base (and also Microsoft and consorts sometimes treat their customers this way), but then the thing should at least be stable so that it can be used in a production environment and offer functions which existed already in the older version and were widely used. To start more or less from scratch is not very reasonable.