Your message dated Sat, 29 Aug 2026 14:02:01 +0200
with message-id <[email protected]>
and subject line Re: Bug#404876: investigate why libvisual's AltiVec detection
is broken and enable it again
has caused the Debian Bug report #404876,
regarding investigate on why libvisual's altivec detection is broken or breaks
with some kernels and enable it again
to be marked as done.
This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with.
If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the
Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith.
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--
404876: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=404876
Debian Bug Tracking System
Contact [email protected] with problems
--- Begin Message ---
Package: gnome-desktop
I really don't know what package to file this bug report under. If I
make it to "installation-reports", FJP will just say, "The installer
did everything right, so I'm closing this report." which seems a
little like the surgeon who said, "The operation was as success. Too
bad, the patient died. But that's not my problem!"
I'm picking "gnome-desktop" out of thin air, if only because I don't
get this problem with KDE desktop manager. Will somebody who knows,
please redirect it to the correct place!
So here's my problem:
The computer in question is an OldWorld PowerMac Apple Macintosh,
"Beige G3" tower. This problem only happens on this machine. It
does not occur on my G4 test box.
I'd very much appreciate it if somebody else with a beige G3 would
try it and let me know if they see the same problem.
I installed using the etch daily netinst CD from December 25th at
04:40 UTC.
The installation process was entirely nominal (modulo the usual
magical things I have to do to get it to load using BootX).
However, after rebooting following the install, and logging in to
gnome, it seems to be repeatedly trying to start/re-start something
having to do with the appearance of the desktop. Things are very
slow (as if a process in continually crashing and restarting) and the
appearance of the desktop cycles thru a series of subtle but
disturbing changes that I'll call "wiggling" for want of a better word.
Finally, after 30 seconds or a minute, I get a pop-up that says
Question
The pannel encountered a problem while loading
"OAFIID:GNOME_MixerApplet".
Do you want to delete the applet from your configuration?
[Don't delete] [Delete]
If I click [Don't Delete] it goes back to wiggling, and about 30
seconds later, I get the same popup.
If I click [Delete] it goes back to wiggling, but the popup doesn't
reappear.
After a couple of minutes of wiggling, I get a popup that says
There was an error starting the GNOME Settings Daemon
Some things such as themes, sounds, or background settings, may not
work correctly.
The Settings Daemon restarted too many times
The last error message was:
System Exception:IDL:Bonobo/GeneralError:1.0:
Child process did not give an error message,
unknown failure occurred.
Gnome will try to restart the Settings Daemon next time you login.
[close]
When I click [close] the wiggling stops and everything is (as far as
I can tell) normal until I log out
and try to login again.
Anybody got a clue?
Thanks!
Rick
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Version: 0.4.2-1
Hello,
I am closing Debian bug #404876 as fixed in libvisual 0.4.2-1.
The issue was fixed by upstream libvisual 0.4.2.
The original crash on PowerPC processors without AltiVec was worked
around in Debian 0.4.0-1.1 by disabling AltiVec detection. The report
was then kept open to track a safe implementation and re-enable detection.
Upstream pull request #268 replaced the Linux/PowerPC instruction probe
with an AT_HWCAP check:
https://github.com/Libvisual/libvisual/pull/268
The change is listed in the 0.4.2 NEWS file as "Improve AltiVec
detection for PPC/PPC64 Linux" and entered Debian with 0.4.2-1.
I also tested Debian's 0.4.2-6 powerpc binary under QEMU user mode. With
an emulated PowerPC 750 (G3, without AltiVec), initialization completes
without SIGILL and reports AltiVec as unavailable. With an emulated
PowerPC 7400, it
reports AltiVec as available.
The safe detection requested by this report is therefore enabled.
Version 0.4.2-1 is the first Debian version that imported the upstream fix.
Regards,
Federico Molara
--- End Message ---
