[mythtv-users] mythfrontend startup freezes

[Peter Bennett]

On 04/17/2018 05:13 PM, David A. De Graaf wrote:
> I cannot start mythfrontend on an ACER laptop;  instead it spews some
> lines into the startup terminal window, then freezes the current Xfce
> Workspace.  Keyboard and touchpad are inoperative, except that
> CTL-LARROW will switch to the adjacent Workspace, which is still
> functional.  Then I can  'pkill -9 mythfrontend'  and recover.
> mythbackend is running happily on another machine and several other
> frontends around the house play TV from it without issue.
>
> I have noticed a similar annoying freeze-up when starting mythfrontend on
> other client machines.  But after a few seconds, the window opens and
> activity resumes.
>
> mythtv-setup behaves the same.  It freezes the Workspace;  it can be
> killed from a different Workspace.  Neither mythfrontend nor
> mythtv-setup manage to open their characteristic X display.
>
> Now here's the crazy part:   If I create a new user, dumtest, with a
> pristine HOME directory, log off, log on as dumtest, and start Xfce,
> mythfrontend works perfectly.
>
> My HOME directory has been carried along through many Fedora
> generations, currently at Fedora 27, so there's likely something
> lurking there that's blocking the mythfrontend startup sequence.
> But what???  Mythtv has many secret configurations and hides them
> well.  Obviously, I have compared the various hidden files in
> /home/dad and /home/dumtest, but not found the culprit.
>
> Suspecting .config, .cache, and .mythtv, I renamed them (NOT.config,
> etc.) and tried again.  No luck.  Some of the displaced directories were
> recreated, but mythfrontend still locked up.
>
> I have some large log files, created by
>     mythfrontend | tee mfe.out.1
> both for dumtest which worked, and for dad which failed, but haven't
> found them to be helpful in deciphering my problem.
>
> Google hasn't helped either.
> I'm hoping some of the geniuses on this list will.
>

I suspect that OpenGL is not working for some reason. Try running with 
parameter -O ThemePainter=qt:
mythfrontend -O ThemePainter=qt

This may not be the best solution because OpenGL playback will not work 
this way and you will have to use one of the Xvideo playback profiles 
such as Slim or Normal. However it may point you towards the root cause 
of the problem.

I always start with a fresh home directory when upgrading the operating 
system, then copy or move what I need from the old home directory.

I am running mythfrontend perfectly on an Acer laptop, with Ubuntu 16.04 
using VAAPI and OpenGL.

Peter