The symptoms suggest that gnome-settings-daemon is crashing. Perhaps you could run it with strace to see what causes it to exit, if it's not a crash.
Something like this: # somehow kill the current gnome-settings-daemon instance # then run a new one with strace: strace gnome-settings-daemon 2>/tmp/gsd.strace & # once you repro the symptoms, the end of the strace file should show what gsd did # just before it quit If you cannot interpret the file yourself, feel free to attach it here. ** Changed in: gnome-settings-daemon (Ubuntu) Status: Invalid => Incomplete -- gnome-display-properties changes desktop theme https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/324115 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs