Nemo won't open and requires a reboot

[jonnyabu1]

Distribution

Manjaro

Package version

5.8.4

Frequency

Quite often

Bug description

I keep running into something with Nemo where it simply won't open. I haven't found a commonality. I just go to open Nemo and nothing happens. If I open it from a terminal, it just returns back to the shell.

When this happens I haven't figured out how to fix it other than just reboot

This behavior started around the 5.8 update

Steps to reproduce

Just randomly try to open Nemo and it won't open. I have no specific way to know how to make that happen or when it will, other than it is fine for a while after a reboot then at some point later I'll hit the issue. I would not mind gathering info if you have something specific you want me to do when the issue is happening

Expected behavior

Nemo opens when I tell it to

Additional information

Looking at the logs, I'm not sure if these are helpful info:

Could not register nemo as a remote: Timeout was reached

Or this but that I would suppose was me just trying to kill anything called nemo so this I think showed up after I did a ps for org.Nemo and killing that process. I'd have to see if it shows up when I don't do that next time the issue happens.

cinnamon-session[3344]: WARNING: t+86984.54128s: Client '/org/gnome/SessionManager/Client33' failed to reply before timeout
cinnamon-session[3344]: WARNING: t+86984.55896s: Unable to find desktop file 'org.Nemo.desktop': Valid key file could not be found in search dirs
cinnamon-session[3344]: WARNING: t+86984.55928s: Unable to find desktop file 'gnome-org.Nemo.desktop': Valid key file could not be found in search dirs

I don't think this related but I see a few of these in the logs too so I'll include it just in case:

** (zeitgeist-datahub:3658): WARNING **: 14:16:00.351: zeitgeist-datahub.vala:207: Error during inserting events: GDBus.Error:org.gnome.zeitgeist.EngineError.InvalidArgument: Incomplete event: interpretation, manifestation and actor are required

[MarkkuR]

This started happening to me too every few days with Nemo 5.2.4 on Mint 20.3. Running Nemo from the command line just gets stuck and no window pops up. After a while the command quits. Fixing the image cache didn't help. With --debug there's the following output:

(nemo:630545): GLib-DEBUG: 16:57:01.740: unsetenv() is not thread-safe and should not be used after threads are created
(nemo:630545): Gtk-DEBUG: 16:57:01.740: Connecting to session manager
(nemo:630545): Gtk-DEBUG: 16:57:01.741: Failed to get the GNOME screensaver proxy: The name org.gnome.ScreenSaver is not owned
(nemo:630545): Gtk-DEBUG: 16:57:01.741: Registering client 'org.Nemo' ''
(nemo:630545): Gtk-DEBUG: 16:57:01.741: Registered client at '/org/gnome/SessionManager/Client75'
(nemo:630545): GLib-GIO-DEBUG: 16:57:01.742: _g_io_module_get_default: Found default implementation dconf (DConfSettingsBackend) for ‘gsettings-backend’
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.742: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/preferences/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.742: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/window-state/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.742: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/icon-view/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.742: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/list-view/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.742: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/compact-view/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/desktop/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/sidebar-panels/tree/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/plugins/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/preferences/menu-config/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/search/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/preferences/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/lockdown/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/window-state/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/background/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/icon-view/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/media-handling/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/list-view/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/applications/terminal/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/compact-view/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/privacy/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/desktop/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/interface/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/sidebar-panels/tree/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/plugins/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/preferences/menu-config/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/nemo/search/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/lockdown/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/background/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/media-handling/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/applications/terminal/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/privacy/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.743: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/interface/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): GLib-DEBUG: 16:57:01.764: setenv()/putenv() are not thread-safe and should not be used after threads are created
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.815: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/interface/" (establishing: 0, active: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.884: watch_fast: "/org/nemo/preferences/" (establishing: 0, active: 1)
** (nemo:630545): DEBUG: 16:57:01.884: Open called on the GApplication instance; 1 files
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.930: watch_fast: "/org/x/apps/favorites/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:57:01.931: watch_established: "/org/x/apps/favorites/" (establishing: 1)

[long wait here]

(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:15.614: change_fast
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:15.614: change_notify: /org/nemo/window-state/start-with-sidebar
Couldn't get disk full info for: No such interface “org.gtk.vfs.Mount” on object at path /org/gtk/vfs/mount/1
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:15.936: watch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/thumbnailers/" (establishing: 0, active: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:15.936: watch_established: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/thumbnailers/" (establishing: 1)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.750: change_fast
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.750: change_notify: /org/nemo/window-state/geometry
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.750: change_fast
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.750: change_notify: /org/nemo/window-state/maximized
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.761: sync
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/preferences/" (active: 2, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/window-state/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/icon-view/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/list-view/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/compact-view/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/desktop/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/sidebar-panels/tree/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/plugins/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/preferences/menu-config/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/nemo/search/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/lockdown/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/background/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/media-handling/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/applications/terminal/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/privacy/" (active: 1, establishing: 0)
(nemo:630545): dconf-DEBUG: 16:59:18.762: unwatch_fast: "/org/cinnamon/desktop/interface/" (active: 2, establishing: 0)

[MarkkuR]

It seems at least my problem has to do with a Samba share. If I unmount it, Nemo will start again as usual.

[jminer]

I just saw this issue happen I think. A few hours after I booted, when I had a couple Nemo windows open, Nemo hung. I had to kill it. And now I can't open it. I tried running nemo --debug like @MarkkuR, and I get the same output. He isn't kidding about the "[long wait here]". I think it hung there for around 10 minutes. But then it finally opened a window and printed this message in the terminal:

Nemo-Share-Message: 00:46:25.273: Called "net usershare info" but it failed: 'net usershare' returned error 255: net usershare: cannot open usershare directory /var/lib/samba/usershares. Error No such file or directory
Please ask your system administrator to enable user sharing.

But since it eventually opened a window, maybe this isn't the same issue?

I did disconnect from WiFi for a couple minutes while it was hung. When I try to open another window, it hangs again.

Edit: I'm using Nemo 5.8.4 on Mint 21.2. I don't have samba installed, but I have a separate home partition, and I think I had a share before I installed Mint 21.2. I tried running net usershare info myself, and it shows the same error immediately (doesn't hang). The Nemo hang must be before it runs that command.

[mtwebster]

I'm pretty sure this is an issue with bookmarks for remote filesystems (including samba mounts). If you have any it's possible the background process that provides this connection is hanging (it shouldn't, it should immediately say it's unavailable but here we are..).

You can edit your bookmarks file (~/.config/gtk-3.0/bookmarks) and remove any bookmark to a remote filesystem, then save.

This is a known issue being worked on.

[jonnyabu1]

samba shares could well be, or remote shares. i do have some marked and was probably connected to them at the time. i didn't put that together but i haven't had the issue since opening the report, but then again haven't connected to the shares since then that i recall

[MarkkuR]

Just came across the same slowdown today but it wasn't because of the Samba share this time but a mobile phone instead. Unplugging the phone immediately popped up the Nemo window. The issues are probably somehow related, as both are kind of non-standard volumes (compared to hard drives).

[jonnyabu1]

This hasn't really happened for a long time but today it did. I did have a connection open to a Samba server. I did open Nemo as root to see if that worked and it did. Rebooted

Then I opened Nemo for some file stuff and tried to open a second Nemo window immediately after. So open nemo > open nemo. The first window opened. The second would not. I could not browse my home directory but I could browse the file system. Rebooted

[jminer]

I checked ~/.config/gtk-3.0/bookmarks and didn't have any samba shares. I had Nemo hang a couple times since and found out it was caused by my phone being plugged in (Pixel 3). When I unplugged it, Nemo started working again.

[jdussouillez]

I had Nemo hang a couple times since and found out it was caused by my phone being plugged in (Pixel 3). When I unplugged it, Nemo started working again.

Thanks for the tip, it was driving me insane! As soon as I unplug my Pixel 6a my nemo windows open.

Linuxmint 21.2
Cinnamon 5.8.4
nemo 5.8.5

[bbbbbr]

I had Nemo hang a couple times since and found out it was caused by my phone being plugged in (Pixel 3). When I unplugged it, Nemo started working again.

Thanks for the tip, it was driving me insane! As soon as I unplug my Pixel 6a my nemo windows open.

Linuxmint 21.2
Cinnamon 5.8.4
nemo 5.8.5

Seconding this. It happened even though the phone was not mounted as a drive. Once it cleared that initial problem and started, it didn't seem to seem to matter if the phone was plugged in when starting nemo without any instances already running.

[rsholmes]

Came here to report the same: If I connect my Pixel 6 phone then after a while (15 min? 30 min? More? Varies?) Nemo becomes unresponsive. It resumes responding the instant I unplug the phone.

I just tried doing this with both Nemo and Nautilus windows open. Nemo hung, Nautilus did not.

Linux Mint 21.2
Cinnamon 5.8.4
nemo 5.8.5
nautilus 42.6

[ry8806]

also seeing this when a phone is plugged in.

Nemo works fine in normal usage, however - when plugging in my Pixel 8 Pro. Nemo wont open. If i try to open nemo, nothing happens - the instant I unplug my phone, nemo opens

Can provide details etc for any one looking to diagnose further

[jonnyabu1]

All these months later I still get the issue. Mine is not related to a phone in any way as I never have cause to plug it in to my desktop.

Mine appears to be related to connections to other systems via SSH or SMB. If I connect either way to any servers then invariably Nemo will stop working at some point and I have to reboot. Though it's not always that which causes Nemo to refuse to open.

Last week I rebooted my work desktop, which I do usually on Mondays, and got various programs opened back up. I went to open Nemo for something and it wouldn't pop up at all and I rebooted again. So in that instance I had not made any SSH / SMB connection to an outside system.

That is rare though. It's happened a handful of times but more often than not it's when I have connected to a server and let it sit open more than a few minutes. It'll appear fine and work if I stay inside the same directory I had open, up until I either try to open a new Nemo window and then nothing happens, or change directories and it just sits there frozen.

So given that, it seems to me to be an issue somewhere with displaying contents of external systems janks up Nemo in some way. This could be a phone or a server on the LAN. But you display something from somewhere outside your own computer and then it will hang up and become unresponsive.

This issue still occurs in the latest version of Linux Mint with Nemo

[claudiux]

Try using dconf-editor to set /org/nemo/preferences/show-image-thumbnails to 'local-only'.
The available values are:

• 'always' (even remote documents will be thumbnailed; this can be problematic with samba shares)
• 'local-only' (only local documents will be thumbnailed)
• 'never'