GNOME maintenance

astyle · May 11, 2025

fff2024g said:
Dear astyle :
thanks for your help . i am working in china , so we can't use ports to install any app. the GOV block most internet site. that cause much more problem. thanks

I understand that there's pretty stiff Internet traffic regulations, but I have a hard time accepting that 'most internet sites' are actually 'blocked'. Basically, there's usually very specific ways that one can use to block, and once you have a good handle on how the blocking actually works, there's usually workarounds available. As a famous example, a fair amount of VPN traffic originates in China...

It's not out of question that maybe I did not understand, and the rules in China are in fact that tight. Cultural differences and lack of concrete information/details usually contribute to that.

fff2024g · May 11, 2025

astyle said:
I understand that there's pretty stiff Internet traffic regulations, but I have a hard time accepting that 'most internet sites' are actually 'blocked'. Basically, there's usually very specific ways that one can use to block, and once you have a good handle on how the blocking actually works, there's usually workarounds available. As a famous example, a fair amount of VPN traffic originates in China...

It's not out of question that maybe I did not understand, and the rules in China are in fact that tight. Cultural differences and lack of concrete information/details usually contribute to that.

in china , if you used vpn , you will be sent to jail by police.

T-Aoki · May 11, 2025

fff2024g said:
in china , if you used vpn , you will be sent to jail by police.

Detected and blocked by so-called "Great Fiirewall"? Sigh.

fff2024g · May 11, 2025

T-Aoki said:
Detected and blocked by so-called "Great Fiirewall"? Sigh.

when police used Great firewall to test and detected your vpn, they will find your ID and location , sent me to jail. so in china network. you can't find any "vpn" word . thanks for your help .

astyle · May 11, 2025

There should be still other kinds of proxies and mirrors for upstream sources. And bittorrent should be helpful, too.

Edit: In other threads, fff2024g mentioned that he'd git clone some repos. Those repos live on Github, mostly. Based on that, I can say that there should be no fear of using ports - a LOT of those source tarballs are on Github anyway.

fff2024g · May 12, 2025

astyle said:
There should be still other kinds of proxies and mirrors for upstream sources. And bittorrent should be helpful, too.

Edit: In other threads, fff2024g mentioned that he'd git clone some repos. Those repos live on Github, mostly. Based on that, I can say that there should be no fear of using ports - a LOT of those source tarballs are on Github anyway.

dear astyle :
some times the github can't open , can't access it. that be blocked by GOV. so i can't use ports install app always. we can't get tar file from most site. thanks.

astyle · May 12, 2025

Sometimes, it's more productive to work with specifically errors that you see on your screen, rather than smoke and mirrors of global politics. It's not like you're a pen tester, there's usually public information available to resolve the errors you see on your screen...

larshenrikoern · May 12, 2025

fff2024g said:
dear james777:
can you tell me how to install gnome46/47 in freebsd14.2 ? i am new guy. thanks.

The short answer is: You cannot currently install gnome46/47 on Freebsd. But gnome 42 might be working OK. Because of the restrictions of China you probably have have to use what is provided. So if you are not satisfied with Freebsd current Gnome version, you can look at other supported desktops (xfce or kde, budgie,) or choose a linux distro (maybe even a Chinese one. I have heard some of them are quite good). I do not think life is worth problems that might arise otherwise. Hope this is to some help

fff2024g · May 12, 2025

larshenrikoern said:
The short answer is: You cannot currently install gnome46/47 on Freebsd. But gnome 42 might be working OK. Because of the restrictions of China you probably have have to use what is provided. So if you are not satisfied with Freebsd current Gnome version, you can look at other supported desktops (xfce or kde, budgie,) or choose a linux distro (maybe even a Chinese one. I have heard some of them are quite good). I do not think life is worth problems that might arise otherwise. Hope this is to some help

DEar larshenrikeorn:
you answer was life article . thanks. now i have used awesome GUI and gnome 42 in the same time. thanks.

James777 · May 25, 2025

olivierd said:
astyle, It is good idea! I will split my patch for better re-use.

fff2024g, Avoid to clone my repository, because some ports are not in this one. Use directly my patch git apply 0001-x11-gnome-Update-to-47.patch. I have shell script which clones, merges, but currently it is useless. I need to write a good documentation.

Beastie7, GNOME depends mainly of systemd (we sometimes find logind support). ConsoleKit and logind are pretty close (to the DBus interface), so it is easy to find an equivalent.

Even though I have activated wayland support everywhere, only Xorg session is functional. If we want wayland, we need to rewrite patches in x11/gdm and x11-wm/mutter. It takes time.

Just for record:

x11/gnome-shell depends of x11-wm/mutter (Xorg/wayland) → needs DRM kmod modules

x11/gnome-shell-extensions depends of x11-wm/mutter (Xorg/wayland) → needs DRM kmod modules

x11/gnome-flashback (new port) depends of x11-wm/metacity (Xorg only)

x11/gnome-shell-extensions looks like traditional desktop found in GNOME2 (a screenshot), but it based on mutter and gnome-shell.

Thanks for your work, I used your patch (the version of patch from yesterday) but I have some problems. From gnome-shell I had to remove some patches to start building without errors... but then building mutter stops on:

FAILED: src/libmutter-15.so.0.0.0.p/backends_edid-parse.c.o
cc -Isrc/libmutter-15.so.0.0.0.p -Isrc -I../src -I. -I.. -Iclutter -I../clutter -Iclutter/clutter -I../clutter/clutter -Imtk -I../mtk -Imtk/mtk -I../mtk/mtk -Icogl -I../cogl -Icogl/cogl -I../cogl/cogl -I../src/third_party/xcursor -Isubprojects/gvdb -I../subprojects/gvdb -Isrc/meta -I/usr/local/include/glib-2.0 -I/usr/local/lib/glib-2.0/include -I/usr/local/include -I/usr/local/include/gio-unix-2.0 -I/usr/local/include/graphene-1.0 -I/usr/local/lib/graphene-1.0/include -I/usr/local/include/libepoll-shim -I/usr/local/include/pixman-1 -I/usr/local/include/atk-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/cairo -I/usr/local/include/freetype2 -I/usr/local/include/libpng16 -I/usr/local/include/pango-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/harfbuzz -I/usr/local/include/fribidi -I/usr/local/include/gsettings-desktop-schemas -I/usr/local/include/colord-1 -I/usr/local/include/gnome-settings-daemon-47 -I/usr/local/include/gdk-pixbuf-2.0 -I/usr/local/include/libei-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/gnome-desktop-4.0 -I/usr/local/include/libxml2 -I/usr/local/include/gudev-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/startup-notification-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/pipewire-0.3 -I/usr/local/include/spa-0.2 -I/usr/local/include/gobject-introspection-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/libdrm -fvisibility=hidden -fdiagnostics-color=never -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -Wall -Winvalid-pch -D_GNU_SOURCE -fno-omit-frame-pointer -mno-omit-leaf-frame-pointer -fno-strict-aliasing -Wpointer-arith -Wmissing-declarations -Wformat=2 -Wstrict-prototypes -Wmissing-prototypes -Wnested-externs -Wold-style-definition -Wundef -Wunused -Wcast-align -Wmissing-noreturn -Wmissing-format-attribute -Wmissing-include-dirs -Wignored-qualifiers -Werror=redundant-decls -Werror=implicit -Werror=nonnull -Werror=init-self -Werror=main -Werror=missing-braces -Werror=sequence-point -Werror=return-type -Werror=trigraphs -Werror=array-bounds -Werror=write-strings -Werror=address -Werror=int-to-pointer-cast -Werror=pointer-to-int-cast -Werror=empty-body -Werror=write-strings -Werror=strict-aliasing -Wno-sign-compare -Wno-cast-function-type -Wno-unused-parameter -Wno-missing-field-initializers -Wno-type-limits -Wshadow -Wfloat-conversion -O2 -pipe -Wno-unknown-warning-option -Wno-format-nonliteral -fstack-protector-strong -isystem /usr/local/include -fno-strict-aliasing -fno-omit-frame-pointer -isystem /usr/local/include -fPIC -D_REENTRANT -pthread -D_THREAD_SAFE -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 -DCOGL_ENABLE_MUTTER_API -DSN_API_NOT_YET_FROZEN=1 '-DGETTEXT_PACKAGE="mutter"' -DWITH_VERBOSE_MODE '-DG_LOG_DOMAIN="libmutter"' -MD -MQ src/libmutter-15.so.0.0.0.p/backends_edid-parse.c.o -MF src/libmutter-15.so.0.0.0.p/backends_edid-parse.c.o.d -o src/libmutter-15.so.0.0.0.p/backends_edid-parse.c.o -c ../src/backends/edid-parse.c
../src/backends/edid-parse.c:33:10: fatal error: 'libdisplay-info/cta.h' file not found
33 | #include <libdisplay-info/cta.h>
| ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1 error generated.
[ 48% 359/732] cc -Isrc/libmutter-15.so.0.0.0.p -Isrc -I../src -I. -I..

olivierd · May 26, 2025

James777, Which patches did you remove in gnome-shell?

I don't understand error for mutter, libdisplay-info/cta.h header is provided by
sysutils/libdisplay-info, it is already a dependency.

astyle · May 26, 2025

James777 said:
Thanks for your work, I used your patch (the version of patch from yesterday) but I have some problems. From gnome-shell I had to remove some patches to start building without errors... but then building mutter stops on:

I would just wait until the whole thing is in ports properly. I did play with KDE 6 last year, but that's because the whole ports tree was forked into an experimental branch where the changes were tested. I got my ports tarball from the experimental branch for a while, using it on clean installs.

I think GNOME would benefit from a similar strategy - fork the entire ports tree, and do the work in the experimental branch. When stuff compiles OK in the experimental branch, that means it's ready to be merged into the main branch.

James777 · Jun 6, 2025

olivierd said:
James777, Which patches did you remove in gnome-shell?

I don't understand error for mutter, libdisplay-info/cta.h header is provided by
sysutils/libdisplay-info, it is already a dependency.

I think it was patch-data-* and some of patch-js* but I returned them back and then build start without errors. Today I solved the problem with mutter, I had to build libdisplay-info first and then mutter builds ok. The only issue I’ve got right now is building gnome-control-center (even with the changes from this week in your repo), but gnome-shell 47 runs fine anyway

(but with older gnome-control-center) and have problem with installing extensions through browser, in librewolf the gnome website complain about 'No such native application org.gnome.chrome_gnome_shell' even when I have installed the chrome-gnome-shell and epiphany doesn't load any website (I don't if I am only one).

[ 33% 187/546] cc -Ipanels/background/libbackground.a.p -Ipanels/background -I../panels/background -I. -I.. -I/usr/local/include -I/usr/local/include/glib-2.0 -I/usr/local/lib/glib-2.0/include -I/usr/local/include/gsettings-desktop-schemas -I/usr/local/include/libadwaita-1 -I/usr/local/include/gtk-4.0 -I/usr/local/include/pango-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/harfbuzz -I/usr/local/include/gdk-pixbuf-2.0 -I/usr/local/include/cairo -I/usr/local/include/freetype2 -I/usr/local/include/libpng16 -I/usr/local/include/pixman-1 -I/usr/local/include/graphene-1.0 -I/usr/local/lib/graphene-1.0/include -I/usr/local/include/fribidi -I/usr/local/include/appstream -I/usr/local/include/libxmlb-2 -I/usr/local/include/libxml2 -I/usr/local/include/gio-unix-2.0 -I/usr/local/include/gnome-desktop-4.0 -fdiagnostics-color=never -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -Wall -Winvalid-pch -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -Wno-deprecated-declarations -O2 -pipe -fstack-protector-strong -isystem /usr/local/include -fno-strict-aliasing -isystem /usr/local/include -fPIC -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 -pthread -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 -D_THREAD_SAFE -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 '-DG_LOG_DOMAIN="cc-background-panel"' '-DPANEL_ID="background"' '-DDATADIR="/usr/local/share"' -DGNOME_DESKTOP_USE_UNSTABLE_API -MD -MQ panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o -MF panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o.d -o panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o -c panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c
FAILED: panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o
cc -Ipanels/background/libbackground.a.p -Ipanels/background -I../panels/background -I. -I.. -I/usr/local/include -I/usr/local/include/glib-2.0 -I/usr/local/lib/glib-2.0/include -I/usr/local/include/gsettings-desktop-schemas -I/usr/local/include/libadwaita-1 -I/usr/local/include/gtk-4.0 -I/usr/local/include/pango-1.0 -I/usr/local/include/harfbuzz -I/usr/local/include/gdk-pixbuf-2.0 -I/usr/local/include/cairo -I/usr/local/include/freetype2 -I/usr/local/include/libpng16 -I/usr/local/include/pixman-1 -I/usr/local/include/graphene-1.0 -I/usr/local/lib/graphene-1.0/include -I/usr/local/include/fribidi -I/usr/local/include/appstream -I/usr/local/include/libxmlb-2 -I/usr/local/include/libxml2 -I/usr/local/include/gio-unix-2.0 -I/usr/local/include/gnome-desktop-4.0 -fdiagnostics-color=never -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -Wall -Winvalid-pch -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -Wno-deprecated-declarations -O2 -pipe -fstack-protector-strong -isystem /usr/local/include -fno-strict-aliasing -isystem /usr/local/include -fPIC -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 -pthread -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 -D_THREAD_SAFE -mfpmath=sse -msse -msse2 '-DG_LOG_DOMAIN="cc-background-panel"' '-DPANEL_ID="background"' '-DDATADIR="/usr/local/share"' -DGNOME_DESKTOP_USE_UNSTABLE_API -MD -MQ panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o -MF panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o.d -o panels/background/libbackground.a.p/meson-generated_.._gdesktop-enums-types.c.o -c panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:445:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_STYLUS_BUTTON_ACTION_SWITCH_MONITOR'
445 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_STYLUS_BUTTON_ACTION_SWITCH_MONITOR), "G_DESKTOP_STYLUS_BUTTON_ACTION_SWITCH_MONITOR", "switch-monitor" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:446:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_STYLUS_BUTTON_ACTION_KEYBINDING'
446 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_STYLUS_BUTTON_ACTION_KEYBINDING), "G_DESKTOP_STYLUS_BUTTON_ACTION_KEYBINDING", "keybinding" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:582:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_FONT_RENDERING_AUTOMATIC'
582 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_FONT_RENDERING_AUTOMATIC), "G_DESKTOP_FONT_RENDERING_AUTOMATIC", "automatic" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:583:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_FONT_RENDERING_MANUAL'
583 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_FONT_RENDERING_MANUAL), "G_DESKTOP_FONT_RENDERING_MANUAL", "manual" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:598:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_BLUE'
598 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_BLUE), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_BLUE", "blue" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:599:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_TEAL'
599 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_TEAL), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_TEAL", "teal" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:600:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_GREEN'
600 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_GREEN), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_GREEN", "green" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:601:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_YELLOW'
601 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_YELLOW), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_YELLOW", "yellow" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:602:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_ORANGE'
602 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_ORANGE), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_ORANGE", "orange" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:603:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_RED'
603 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_RED), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_RED", "red" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:604:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_PINK'
604 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_PINK), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_PINK", "pink" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:605:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_PURPLE'
605 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_PURPLE), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_PURPLE", "purple" },
| ^
panels/background/gdesktop-enums-types.c:606:19: error: use of undeclared identifier 'G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_SLATE'
606 | { C_ENUM (G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_SLATE), "G_DESKTOP_ACCENT_COLOR_SLATE", "slate" },
| ^
13 errors generated.

olivierd · Jun 7, 2025

All patches in x11/gnome-shell are needed!

I have no problem with gnome-control-center, I removed one patch otherwise application was too unstable.

chrome-gnome-shell is not maintained and not compatible with gnome-shell >= 45. You need gnome-browser-extension.

Tested today, epiphany works fine, I can load any website.

fmc000 · Jun 24, 2025

olivierd - for some reason gdm throws errors at me and then hangs. Is it possible to start a gnome wayland session via commandf line under FreeBSD 14.3 ?

olivierd · Jun 24, 2025

fmc000 said:
olivierd - for some reason gdm throws errors at me and then hangs. Is it possible to start a gnome wayland session via commandf line under FreeBSD 14.3 ?

What's error message? I have a warning, but gdm is working fine.

The wayland session is not yet functional, only X11.

pkg-message in x11/gnome-shell, x11/gnome-flashback or x11/gnome-shell-extensions explains how to launch a session.

In order to have Wayland with GNOME, we need to write our own backend for x11-wm/mutter and rewrite patches in x11/gdm.

fmc000 · Jun 24, 2025

olivierd said:
What's error message? I have a warning, but gdm is working fine.

The wayland session is not yet functional, only X11.

pkg-message in x11/gnome-shell, x11/gnome-flashback or x11/gnome-shell-extensions explains how to launch a session.

Yeah, it's probably a warning as gdm actually starts after around 15-20 seconds. However, after logging in gdm just freezes. It's not a big deal as I don't plan using it as I usually autologin and start my DE automtacally.

In order to have Wayland with GNOME, we need to write our own backend for x11-wm/mutter and rewrite patches in x11/gdm.

Understood.

nxjoseph · Jun 24, 2025

If I remember correctly, on KDE, if i try to enter to wayland session instead of X11, it would get black and threw me to the sddm greeter again. That was long ago, btw.

astyle · Jun 24, 2025

nxjoseph said:
If I remember correctly, on KDE, if i try to enter to wayland session instead of X11, it would get black and threw me to the sddm greeter again. That was long ago, btw.

Now THAT is actually fixed these days, see here:
#546

SDDM can start a KDE Wayland session no problem right now. Well, I got that result by compiling everything from ground up.

fmc000 · Jun 25, 2025

astyle said:
Now THAT is actually fixed these days, see here:
#546

SDDM can start a KDE Wayland session no problem right now. Well, I got that result by compiling everything from ground up.

I can confirm this even without compiling anything. However, as soon as I right-click on the desktop I get a black screen that can be recovered only restarting sddm. This doesn't happen under Xorg.

fmc000 · Jun 25, 2025

olivierd said:
In order to have Wayland with GNOME, we need to write our own backend for x11-wm/mutter and rewrite patches in x11/gdm.

fmc000 said:
Understood.

I though I understood the issue but it turns out I do not. olivierd - would you mind explaining the "we need to write our own backend" issue, please?

astyle · Jun 25, 2025

fmc000 said:
I can confirm this even without compiling anything. However, as soon as I right-click on the desktop I get a black screen that can be recovered only restarting sddm. This doesn't happen under Xorg.

That's exactly why you should compile - there's a compilation flag that still needs to be set so that this doesn't happen. If that flag is set, even Wayland will become reliable and not have that right-click bug. For further details, just look back at the thread that mentions that flag.

twllnbrck · Jun 29, 2025

fmc000 said:
I though I understood the issue but it turns out I do not. olivierd - would you mind explaining the "we need to write our own backend" issue, please?

I'm rather unfamiliar with the GNOME porting mechnism but I think for a wayland session we need somthing like elogind or turnstile.

BTW, I had the same issue with x11/gdm. It freezes when I submit my password. But I wasnt able to figure it out so I used
.xinitrc with .xprofile from the gnome-shell example files.

fmc000 · Jul 22, 2025

olivierd - Would you mind taking a look at https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=279669#c20 ?

gqgunhed · Aug 10, 2025

fmc000 said:
olivierd - Would you mind taking a look at https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=279669#c20 ?

Ok, looks like I've got the same behavior here. GDM freezes after entering the password. Version: gnome-keyring-48.0.
Error on the console is:

Code:

gdm-password: gkr-pam: unable to locate daemon control file.

I already checked /usr/local/etc/pam.d/gdm-password - and both pam_gnome_keyring.so entries are present and active.