Gnome apps will only launch from terminal

[SteveHodge]

This must be a Newbie question
Something is missing in my Gnome configuration
Only a couple of apps will launch from the Home screen. Firefox is OK, but,In particular, Synaptic asks for the root password and then both Synaptic and Nautilus/File Manager just seem to stall. If I launch them from a root terminal I get a screen full of error messages and then they start
What am I missing? It may be something to do with video drivers I suppose, but what?
Steve Hodge

[GarryRicketson]

I think you should at least tell us what the error messages say, I mean nobody here can possibly know what they say, and it might just be relevant.
Then , based on this other post, :
http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=140805

by SteveHodge » 2019-02-24 14:50
By some mischance I managed to accidentally move my system from Jessie to Buster/SID, via, I think, stretch
I really don't like the idea of running a non stable version
My question is: Can I rollback from buster/sid to stretch?
Buster/SID seems to run OK apart from a few niggles and I don't want to take a big risk with roll back
What is the risk in a roll back and how would I do it?

My apt/sources.list looks like this. I think the cause of the problem was the references to distros other than stretch.
Can I just comment them out and run apt-get update and update-distro?

Quote:
deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian/ stretch main
deb-src http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ stretch main


deb http://security.debian.org/ stretch/updates main
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ stretch/updates main

# wheezy-updates, previously known as 'volatile'
deb http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ stretch-updates main
deb-src http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ stretch-updates main

deb http://download.webmin.com/download/repository/ sarge contrib
deb http://webmin.mirror.somersettechsoluti ... epository/ sarge contrib
deb http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ sid main

deb-src http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ sid main
unquote

Quite the mixture, I am sure this has a lot to do with all your other problems, I don't understand why you didn't just include this in this post as well, it all is related. You are running a strange , bizarre distro, know as FRANKENDEBIAN:
https://wiki.debian.org/DontBreakDebian

Don't make a FrankenDebian

Debian Stable should not be combined with other releases. If you're trying to install software that isn't available in the current Debian Stable release, it's not a good idea to add repositories for other Debian releases. The problems might not happen right away, but the next time you install updates.

The reason things can break is because the software packaged for one Debian release is built to be compatible with the rest of the software for that release. For example, installing packages from buster on a stretch system could also install newer versions of core libraries including libc6. This results in a system that is not testing or stable but a broken mix of the two.

y SteveHodge >>It may be something to do with video drivers I suppose, but what?

I don't think it is video drivers, but I do think it has everything to do with your mixed up sources, ...if it was me, (thankfully it isn't), but if it was, I would start fresh with the current stable version of Debian, (Debian Stretch) , install a fresh, pure system, but if you have plenty of free time, and enjoy experiments, you might sort it all out, a advanced user would usually never have let their system get like this, but also some advanced users enjoy experimenting and playing with their Frankendebian, but usually keep it on a separate computer, and not their main PC,.. good luck and have a good day or night,

[SteveHodge]

Thanks.
However the situation was the same before I did the updates, and has been for at least a year
Still I will sort out the distros and see what happens

[Head_on_a_Stick]

I think you should at least tell us what the error messages say

+1

Check ~/.xsession-errors