Bug 492826 - Enabling/disabling Night Color will sometimes lead to a hard crash of the system
Summary: Enabling/disabling Night Color will sometimes lead to a hard crash of the system
Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME
Alias: None
Product: plasmashell
Classification: Plasma
Component: Brightness and Color widget (show other bugs)
Version: 6.1.4
Platform: Arch Linux Linux
: NOR crash
Target Milestone: 1.0
Assignee: Plasma Bugs List
URL:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2024-09-08 16:56 UTC by Paul Meier
Modified: 2024-12-20 03:47 UTC (History)
4 users (show)

See Also:
Latest Commit:
Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:


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Description Paul Meier 2024-09-08 16:56:21 UTC
SUMMARY
Enabling or disabling Plasma's night color feature may lead to the system crashing during the transition in a way, that no logs are recorded.
This happens no matter if an activation/deactivation time is set in the settings or a manual action is performed via the taskbar.
It also sometimes crashes while night color is disabled, but NEVER if it is enabled.
It especially happens if interacting with programs during the transition.

STEPS TO REPRODUCE
1. Enable or disable night color
2. Interact with programs or games during the transition

OBSERVED RESULT
The system will hard crash, not even SysRQ will be able to reboot the system.

EXPECTED RESULT
The transition should finish without crashing the system.

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS
Operating System: EndeavourOS 
KDE Plasma Version: 6.1.4
KDE Frameworks Version: 6.5.0
Qt Version: 6.7.2
Kernel Version: 6.10.8-zen1-1-zen (64-bit)
Graphics Platform: Wayland
Processors: 32 × AMD Ryzen 9 7950X 16-Core Processor
Memory: 62.5 GiB of RAM
Graphics Processor: AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
I am not sure how to go about logging this crash since the system crashes immediately without any further information.
I would be glad to assist in any way to provide logs for fixing this issue, since it has been plaguing me for months.
Comment 1 TraceyC 2024-09-12 14:53:00 UTC
If something crashed, we need a backtrace of it so we can figure out what's going on. Can you please attach a backtrace of the crash using the coredumpctl command-line program, as detailed in https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Debugging/How_to_create_useful_crash_reports#Retrieving_a_backtrace_using_coredumpctl?
Thanks!
Comment 2 Paul Meier 2024-09-13 10:28:11 UTC
(In reply to TraceyC from comment #1)
> If something crashed, we need a backtrace of it so we can figure out what's
> going on. Can you please attach a backtrace of the crash using the
> coredumpctl command-line program, as detailed in
> https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Debugging/
> How_to_create_useful_crash_reports#Retrieving_a_backtrace_using_coredumpctl?
> Thanks!

There is no coredump I can provide because the system crashes in a way, that absolutely nothing is logged.
I assume I would need to run the entirety of Plasma in a way that everything is logged immediately.
I don't know how to achieve such logging however.
Comment 3 cwo 2024-09-13 16:14:39 UTC
> There is no coredump I can provide because the system crashes in a way, that
> absolutely nothing is logged.
> I assume I would need to run the entirety of Plasma in a way that everything
> is logged immediately.
> I don't know how to achieve such logging however.

Can you try the steps outlined in https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Debugging/How_to_create_useful_crash_reports#Retrieving_a_backtrace_with_GDB? Basically installing gdb, then running plasmashell inside gdb until the crash occurs. Sometimes this will help if no crash report/coredump is automatically generated.

If the system is actually hard-crashing, it might well be a graphics card or kernel bug. Just to make sure, you see nothing relevant in "journalctl -S today" after the crash happens (and rebooting)?
Comment 4 Paul Meier 2024-09-15 11:09:20 UTC
(In reply to cwo from comment #3)
> > There is no coredump I can provide because the system crashes in a way, that
> > absolutely nothing is logged.
> > I assume I would need to run the entirety of Plasma in a way that everything
> > is logged immediately.
> > I don't know how to achieve such logging however.
> 
> Can you try the steps outlined in
> https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Debugging/
> How_to_create_useful_crash_reports#Retrieving_a_backtrace_with_GDB?
> Basically installing gdb, then running plasmashell inside gdb until the
> crash occurs. Sometimes this will help if no crash report/coredump is
> automatically generated.

I will do this when I have time, thanks.

> If the system is actually hard-crashing, it might well be a graphics card or
> kernel bug. Just to make sure, you see nothing relevant in "journalctl -S
> today" after the crash happens (and rebooting)?

It is actualkly hard-crashing. I assume that nightcolor triggers some crash of amdgpu, but this crash really only happens in Plasma.
journalctl shows absolutely nothing, the time of the crash is never even in it, because the system crashes so abruptly.
Comment 5 Nate Graham 2024-09-16 20:00:03 UTC
If it's crashing, then there's a coredump and you can get a backtrace. If there's no coredump, there's actually no crash. This could be a sign that something is not crashing, but rather exiting, perhaps with a Wayland protocol error.

Can you be specific about what exactly is happening? When you say "The system will hard crash", please be very specific about what's happening that leads you to this conclusion.
Comment 6 Paul Meier 2024-09-19 22:51:15 UTC
(In reply to Nate Graham from comment #5)
> If it's crashing, then there's a coredump and you can get a backtrace. If
> there's no coredump, there's actually no crash. This could be a sign that
> something is not crashing, but rather exiting, perhaps with a Wayland
> protocol error.
> 
> Can you be specific about what exactly is happening? When you say "The
> system will hard crash", please be very specific about what's happening that
> leads you to this conclusion.

I am currently not able to work on my system as I am not home, but let elaborate on the crash as expected.
I can replicate this crash everytime, but it happens at different times. Sometimes I can switch night colour on and off many times and nothing happens.
If the crash occurs the system will stop entirely, meaning that any output from the system stops and it becomes completely unresponsive.
The monitors do display the last image that was shown while the crash occured.
SSH'ing into the system, switching to TTY or trying SysRQ to reboot the system all do not work, the system is indeed completely unresponsive.

I wrote in an earlier comment that I suspect amdgpu to be crashing, because those crashes looked and behaved similarly.
The issue is, that no other GUI I've tried (Gnome/Hyprland) were able to cause this crash in my testing. It only occurs in KDE Plasma.

I will attach the logs from running plasmashell with gdb when I am able, though this will have to wait a few days.
Comment 7 TraceyC 2024-11-20 18:35:10 UTC
.
Comment 8 Bug Janitor Service 2024-12-05 03:46:22 UTC
🐛🧹 ⚠️ This bug has been in NEEDSINFO status with no change for at least 15 days. Please provide the requested information, then set the bug status to REPORTED. If there is no change for at least 30 days, it will be automatically closed as RESOLVED WORKSFORME.

For more information about our bug triaging procedures, please read https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Bug_triaging.

Thank you for helping us make KDE software even better for everyone!
Comment 9 Bug Janitor Service 2024-12-20 03:47:06 UTC
🐛🧹 This bug has been in NEEDSINFO status with no change for at least 30 days. Closing as RESOLVED WORKSFORME.