Gnome main Applications menu panel applet not visible

Thanks for your bug. That's a gamin issue, reassigning

same issue here, kill `pidof gam_server` solves it for the current session though...

(In reply to comment #2)
> same issue here, kill `pidof gam_server` solves it for the current session
though...

Reproduced here as well, killing solves it here as well.

*** Bug 26146 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 26416 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

I've seen this too; the menu appears, then vanishes immediately and is redrawn
with an empty menu and borders (about 8px*8px):

  http://www.paul.sladen.org/ubuntu/bugs/ubuntu-no-app-menu.png

running:

  killall gam_server

fixes it.

There is a launchpad bug about that:
https://launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/+source/gamin/+bug/5176
It has been forwarded upstream: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=323064

*** Bug 26695 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

I have a very similar bug. The menu works fine once I click on it, however, the
actual words on the panel are blanked out, ie Applications, Place Desktop are
just opne big black block, next to which I have my shortcut icons.

*** Bug 26824 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 26867 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

I can also confirm this bug on a recent Dapper system. Killing gam_server also
solves it for me.

*** Bug 26932 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

I can also confirm that bug
but the bug appeared just after today apt-get upgrade
here is my log from synaptic

seems to have to to with menu-xdg
killing gam_server works to

Commit Log for Sat Dec 17 17:47:43 2005

Die folgenden Pakete wurden entfernt:
gstreamer0.8-wavpack
libcrypto++5.2c2
libgnomecupsui1.0-1
mozilla-browser
mozilla-cascades
mozilla-dev
mozilla-psm

Die folgenden Pakete wurden aktualisiert:
adesklets (0.4.12-2) to 0.5.0-2
amule (2.0.3-3ubuntu1) to 2.0.3-3ubuntu2
autoconf-archive (20050927-1) to 20051014-1
cdbs (0.4.32ubuntu9) to 0.4.32ubuntu10
firefox (1.4.99+1.5rc3.dfsg-1ubuntu4) to 1.4.99+1.5rc3.dfsg-1ubuntu6
firefox-dom-inspector (1.4.99+1.5rc3.dfsg-1ubuntu4) to 1.4.99+1.5rc3.dfsg-1ubuntu6
firefox-gnome-support (1.4.99+1.5rc3.dfsg-1ubuntu4) to 1.4.99+1.5rc3.dfsg-1ubuntu6
gnome-cups-manager (0.31-1ubuntu1) to 0.31-1.1ubuntu1
gnome-media (2.12.O-0ubuntu2) to 2.12.O-0ubuntu3
gnome-phone-manager (0.6-0ubuntu4) to 0.6-0ubuntu6
gnupg (1.4.2-2ubuntu1) to 1.4.2-2ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-a52dec (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-alsa (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-audiofile (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-cdio (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-cdparanoia (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-dv (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-dvd (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-esd (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-flac (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-gnomevfs (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-gsm (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-gtk (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-hermes (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-jpeg (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-mad (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-misc (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-mms (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-mpeg2dec (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-musepack (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-oss (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-plugin-apps (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-sdl (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-speex (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-swfdec (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-theora (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-vorbis (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gstreamer0.8-x (0.8.11-2ubuntu1) to 0.8.11-3ubuntu2
gucharmap (1:1.4.4-1ubuntu1) to 1:1.5.0-0ubuntu2
java-gcj-compat (1.0.44-0ubuntu1) to 1.0.44-1
kdelibs (4:3.5.0-0ubuntu1) to 4:3.5.0-0ubuntu3
kdelibs-bin (4:3.5.0-0ubuntu1) to 4:3.5.0-0ubuntu3
kdelibs-data (4:3.5.0-0ubuntu1) to 4:3.5.0-0ubuntu3
kdelibs4c2a (4:3.5.0-0ubuntu1) to 4:3.5.0-0ubuntu3
libglibmm-2.4-1c2a (2.8.2-2ubuntu1) to 2.8.3-0ubuntu1
libglibmm-2.4-dev (2.8.2-2ubuntu1) to 2.8.3-0ubuntu1
libgnome2-0 (2.13.3-0ubuntu2) to 2.13.4-0ubuntu1
libgnome2-canvas-perl (1.002-1) to 1.002-1ubuntu1
libgnome2-common (2.13.3-0ubuntu2) to 2.13.4-0ubuntu1
libgnome2-dev (2.13.3-0ubuntu2) to 2.13.4-0ubuntu1
libgnomevfs2-0 (2.13.2-0ubuntu2) to 2.13.3-0ubuntu1
libgnomevfs2-common (2.13.2-0...

*** Bug 27388 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 27419 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Hi!

I can confirm that killing gam_server solves the problem so far!

*** Bug 27517 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 27528 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

(In reply to comment #3)
> (In reply to comment #2)
> > same issue here, kill `pidof gam_server` solves it for the current session
> though...
>
> Reproduced here as well, killing solves it here as well.

I have the same menu issue, and the "kill `pidof gam_server`" fixed it
im running gnome 2.13.3, ubuntu dapper

I've done some work tracing this down. You can see my comments on
bugzilla.gnome.org for details. The short version is that it seems like this is
mostly upstream's fault, but the actual bug(s) are only exposed because Dapper
seems to ship a file called '/etc/xdg/menus/debian-menu.menu' which points to
the (currently) non-existent '/var/lib/menu-xdg/menus/debian-menu.menu'.
Removing the symlink should get your system working nicely again (without
resorting to killing daemons or weird gamin config hacks).

It's probably kinda silly to ship a file which symlinks to nowhere by default. I
have no idea what the intention here was though (or what the best fix is), I'll
leave the final resolution on that to the gnome packaging team.

Who of you has the 'menu' package installed?

"menu" is not installed. Should it?

(In reply to comment #23)
> "menu" is not installed. Should it?

not, bug that bug is triggered by the fact menu-xdg is installed and not menu

I have both *menu* and *menu-xdg* installed, and have the problem.

Sorry -- I *don't* have the problem. I was thinking of a different bug (20022).

*** Bug 27866 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 27980 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 28175 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

It appears there is an issue with there being a symbolic link in
/etc/xdg/debian-menu.menu to /var/lib/menu-xdg/menus/debian-menu.menu, when I
remove the symbolic link and copy the debian-menu.menu from
/var/lib/menu-xdg/menus to /etc/xdg this issue goes away.

*** Bug 28090 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 28249 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

To fix this, I did the following:

apt-get install menu
dpkg-reconfigure menu-xdg

This appears to fixup the symlink issue described above.

I had 'menu-xdg' installed and 'menu' not installed.

Installing 'menu' fixed the problem instantly, without the need to log out,
reboot, or anything.

Seems to be fixed after some updates and menu menu-xdg (re)install.

Installing 'menu' is just a workaround. We can't have 'menu' in main, because it
gives the Debian menu, which we don't want to have. The *real* fixing is
two-fold: 1) Fixing gamin not to choke on broken symlinks (which as I understand
it has a proposed fix upstream) and the menu/menu-xdg packaging/system to work
differently.

This upload of gnome-menus fixes the issue:

 gnome-menus (2.12.0-2ubuntu1) dapper; urgency=low
 .
   * Sync with Debian
   * debian/control.in:
     - builds with libgamin-dev
   * debian/patches/06_menus_rename.diff:
     - not required for Ubuntu, the menus are not renamed
   * debian/patches/06_desktop_rename.diff:
     - we rename the panel menu System instead of Desktop
   * debian/patches/07_admin_entries.diff:
     - admin tools are for admin users only
   * debian/patches/07_use_gnome_vfs.diff:
     - bugzilla patch to use gnome-vfs instead of gam directly
   * debian/patches/08_autogen.diff:
     - runned autogen.sh
   * debian/patches/09_app_install_entry.diff:
     - put the gnome-app-install entry on the bottom of the application menu
   * debian/rules:
     - don't rename the menus we use the stock names for Ubuntu

I'm encountering this problem after (stupidly) removing a number of desktop-manager related packages. I have gnome-menus (2.20.1-0ubuntu1), menu (2.1.34). There is no process called gam_server to kill, nor does update-menus work.

Bismillah

no process called gam_server
the solution worked is:
mv ~/.config/menus/applications.menu ~/.config/menus/applications.menu.bak

thank you all