[SOLVED] Graphical environment won't boot up after today's update.

Question

Hi
I've performed a -Syu today morning and so far I haven't been able to get my graphical environment (gnome 3) up.
The update didn't seem to be faulty, no unusual messages caught my eye. Here's a complete list of packages that were upgraded (from pacman.log)
- shared-color-profiles removed
- upgraded colord (1.0.6-1 -> 1.2.0-1)
- upgraded gtk3 (3.12.1-1 -> 3.12.1-2)
- upgraded colord-gtk (0.1.25-1 -> 0.1.25-2)
- upgraded cronie (1.4.11-1 -> 1.4.11-2)
- upgraded elfutils (0.158-1 -> 0.158-2)
During the next bootup, when the information 'reached target graphical interface' appeared, I got some screen blinking and this:
"[drm:hsw_unclaimed_reg_clear] *ERROR* Unknown unclaimed register before writing to 4a000
This error message and the blinking appears about 8 times, then the process just hangs.
I have tried downgrading each of the aforementioned packages, but it didn't help. There's a bunch of diagnostic stuff coming out of pacman on every operation though:
http://ix.io/bZg
The first kind of error message, by the glib-2.0 files is Polish for 'file is empty or only contains spaces'; the other kind, by the ldconfig lines, means 'file empty, left unchecked'.
For good measure, here's my entire dmesg output. It seems to contain a bit more information about the unclaimed register error at the end.
http://ix.io/bZh
Please assist me in getting this fixed.
Last edited by samyazza (2014-04-30 08:57:18)

Answer 1

No, I don't have nouveau-dri installed. It might be the kernel driver. Messages from 'nouveau' have been appearing ever since I've installed the system actually, and I've learned to ignore them, but they did initially make me raise an eyebrow. Anyway, everything was fine and dandy for about 4 months now, until this morning's update, when the packages mentioned in my initial post were installed.
As for the second matter, see my initial post:
The first kind of error message, by the glib-2.0 files is Polish for 'file is empty or only contains spaces'; the other kind, by the ldconfig lines, means 'file empty, left unchecked'.
The one you're asking about is the second ('file is empty, it has not been checked')
I'm now in the process of locating and reinstalling the packages to which these files belong. I've already handled the QT libs (I think) and I'm going to try to handle the others:
all in the lib32 folder:
- libelf.so and .so.1 and -0.158.so
- libdw.so and .so.1 and -0.158.so
- libasm.so and .so.1 and -0.158.so
- liblcms2.so and .so.2 and .so.2.0.6
I have no knowledge of how these affect the bootup of Gnome however...
edit:
I have successfully reinstalled the following packages:
lib32-lcms2
lib32-elfutils
lib32-qt4
rebooting...
...and still just a mouse cursor over the bootup log...
The last line of dmsg says:
systemd-journald[204] Failed to write entry (26 items, 170304121 bytes) despite vacuuming, ignoring: Argument list too long
is there a way to get a hold of what can't be written in there? I don't know where else to look for information on what's wrong.
There's also this in the journalctl (both the last one and the previous one I pasted). The problem _is_  Gnome rendering nothing but a cursor, so perhaps this could be of use...
kwi 29 19:59:18 wapiti gnome-session[465]: (gnome-shell:500): GLib-GIO-ERROR **: Settings schema 'org.gnome.settings-daemon.peripherals.touchscreen' is not installed
kwi 29 19:59:18 wapiti kernel: traps: gnome-shell[500] trap int3 ip:7fb603707993 sp:7fff2a1a55f0 error:0
I have pursued that trail. Indeed, it turned out that my gnome-settings-manager package was completely broken. Its configuration files were empty (the ones in /usr/share/glib-2.0/schemas), as was /var/lib/pacman/local/gnome-settings-daemon-3.12.1-2/files file.
I have performed a pacman -S --force gnome-settings-daemon and I'm no longer writing from my girlfriend's PC
I have a follow-up question to the more knowledgable - how and why can a package become corrupted like this??
My Gnome booted up, however it works pretty damn choppy. It's as fast as normal, but there are no animations. Also, there are frequent glitches before a window is rendered. Part of the screen becomes all scrambled for a moment before the window appears.
I'll try to look for reasons on my own, but I'd still appreciate advice on debugging my glitchy Gnome and explanations as to why gnome-settings-daemon had basically wiped itself out...
Ok, on a final note in this topic: the glitches were fixed by force reinstalling xf86-video-intel and intel-dri.
Last edited by samyazza (2014-05-01 15:10:41)