[R420] system freezes when starting openoffice writer

Does moving/removing ~/.openoffice.org* resolve the problem? This is almost certainly an OOo bug since it can't really do anything that should be able to freeze the system, so it is probably some sort of an issue with the kernel or xorg. I'm not sure what though.

I meant to say above "This is almost certainly _NOT_ an OOo bug..."

Thanks for the response. Yes i tried that. Also did remove & install :
  sudo apt-get remove openoffice.org*
  sudo apt-get update
  sudo apt-get autoremove
  mv ~/.openoffice.org* ~/remove_openoffice.org
  sudo apt-get install openoffice.org
  oowriter

Then i see the same thing. I think it is an X Windows related problem, no response pressing any terminal keys (CTRL+ALT+Fn) and can't restart X Windows with (ALT+SYSRQ+K) however, doing that i see it picks up the keypress (normally the background color changes a bit when i restart X) the screen stays and the mouse is frozen as well.

Tried with Compiz disabled - same result. Maybe i can add some logfile? Please let me know.

Hi wilbertvolkers,

Thanks for including the attached files. Could you also include your /var/log/Xorg.0.log (or Xorg.0.log.old) from after reproducing the issue?

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@Wilbert Volkers, can you also attach the output of "dpkg -l" please.

I tried to open "openoffice calc -> Tools -> Options -> OpenOffice.org -> Java-> properties" as suggested above but I could not repro any xorg issue. Also I assume you meant the "Parameters" in that dialog and not "Properties", right?

No it really says Parameters (screenshot). I'm not completely convinced this is an xorg issue but it seems to hang.

Thanks for the help so far, to test your classification "xserver-xorg-video-ati" i edited xorg.conf:
Section "Device"
  Driver "vesa" # changed from value "ati" to "vesa"
  ...

After this change restarted x windows and open office writer worked perfectly. There are no related problems in any of the other tools i use, but all of the openoffice.org tools seem to freeze x windows at some point. That makes me wonder what is different in openoffice in relation to the ati driver.

Martin Olsson, i meant to say YES, you are right. It should be parameters, i updated the description - my mistake.

Can you also attach you /etc/X11/xorg.conf and also the output of "lspci -vvnn" please?

What happens if you use the -ati driver normally but you turn off compiz (i.e. if you select "None" in the dialog "System::Preferences::Appearence::Visual Effects"). Does OOo trigger the bug using that config?

What happens if you use the -ati driver but you add:
Option "NoAccel" "true"
inside the "Device" section of your xorg.conf? Does OOo trigger the bug using that config?

Hi thanks for the try. I tried compiz off previously - no difference, xorg.conf is already there (2009-05-05), device section looks now like:

  Section "Device"
    Identifier "Configured Video Device"
    Driver "ati"
    BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
    Option "NoAccel" "true"
  EndSection

oowriter works with this setting. We know a bit more now. I added lspci-vvnn.log

I have the same issue after upgrading kernel to 2.6.29.3 (amd64). I don't have the issue using the standard 2.6.28-11 kernel.

@Jerome, do you see the bug using the karmic 2.6.30 kernel? You can install it (even in jaunty) here:
http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/l/linux/linux-image-2.6.30-5-generic_2.6.30-5.6_amd64.deb

I already tried 2.6.30 RC2 and RC3 and had the same issue. I will try this one and provide feedback.

kernel 2.6.30-5 solves the problem but running 3d games gives a system crash now. Same as kernel 2.6.28-11.

i added Option "NoAccel" "true" to the Device section in xorg.conf and use the attached script to toggle it when i need oowriter.

/etc/X11/Xorg.conf :
  ...
  Section "Device"
    ...
    Option "NoAccel" "true"
    ...
  EndSection
  ...

Is there a way to prevent openoffice using video hardware acceleration?

I have no really good solution for this but let me at least give you some more information, maybe you can use that to debug the issue further.

I think, when compiz is running all windows are rendered as 3D textures. In additional, I think compiz also flips itself into INDIRECT rendering mode (which means 3D accel is used but all drawing commands are sent using AIGLX from the app to the X server and then the X server is the process that calls the kernel 3D API). Compiz needs the openGL texture_from_pixmap to be available.

In general, when DIRECT rendering is used (you can tell by running "glxinfo" and grepping the out for "direct"), then you can force a 3D app to use software rendering by making sure that the LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=1 environment variable is set for that process. For example:

    LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=1 glxgears

...will usually give you much lower FPS etc.

You can also control whether DIRECT/INDIRECT rendering should be used with the env var:

    LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT=1 ./some_app

...however note that if you do this, then the 3D rendering will be done in the X server so if you want to combine that with SOFTWARE rendering then that LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=1 needs to be set inside the X server afaik.

Finally, there is also:

    LIBGL_DEBUG=verbose glxgears

...which allows you to analyze 3D operations in detail.

---

I don't think these environment variables will help you much for OpenOffice though. Basically OO should just work, I hope we can get the bug fixed instead.

Oh and one more thing. The driver option "NoAccel" is like a sledge hammer that turns of _everything_. You might be able to keep some of the 3D accelerated operations and still don't get crashes. Understand which part of the 3D acceleration that is causing the bug might prove useful in narrowing down the bug location.

To test with partial 3D accel enabled for the radeon driver, see the manual page "man radeon". I would in particular recommend that you try using the radeon driver without noaccel but _with_ exactly one of these options at a time:

 Option "EXANoComposite"
 Option "EXANoDownloadFromScreen"
 Option "EXANoUploadToScreen"

If you can repro the bug with DownloadFromScreen then we know that the bug is likely to be hiding in that part of the radeon driver. Also trying different, more recent versions of the driver is useful. For example, if you boot the karmic alpha live CD and the bug is not present, then it's likely that it got fixed somewhere between these versions and then we might be able to search the source diff between these versions for relevant clues.

Thank you for the tips, these did not work for me unfortunately. However, for now it seems to work when i add the following in xorg.conf :

Section "Device"
    Option "AGPMode" "4"
    ...

I followed tips mentioned on this page:
   https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Quirks

You can try values like 8 4 and 2, I have this problem when i use 8. Lower values should result in lower performance but using glxgears i dont see much difference.

Let us know if this works for you.

This bug was fixed in the package xserver-xorg-video-ati - 1:6.12.99+git20090629.f39cafc5-0ubuntu4

---------------
xserver-xorg-video-ati (1:6.12.99+git20090629.f39cafc5-0ubuntu4) karmic; urgency=low

  * Add 110_quirk_agpmode_r420_sis.patch: AGPMode quirk. Fixes freeze
    when starting or using openoffice tools with R420 on a SiS host bridge 655.
    (LP: #371296)

 -- Bryce Harrington <email address hidden> Fri, 31 Jul 2009 19:13:46 -0700

Thanks for the info! Now i was trying to get TV-out working with my ATI X800 videocard, this was another bad idea. It also has a TV tuner which i might try to get to work in an optimistic mood. So i decided to get me an old Gforce 6200 (NVIDIA) for a few bucks. That fixes most problems.

Could this please be backported to Jaunty?

Good to know it is fixed in 9.10. In the meanwhile, i'm using abiword. Impressed by the speed I've been missing in o-o