Hello,

I booted up my computer this morning intending to go in and delete a few files. I was greeted by XFCE, but there was no taskbar. Without the taskbar, xfce is practicably unusable. The desktop was gone as well. I finally got to my open terminal (after getting an actual tty by hitting Cntrl+Alt+F1) and logged in as root and started killing whatever was currently open, until I finally saw the taskbar. The window-switcher applet was greyed out. At one time, I knew how to fix this particular problem, but sadly, that was about ten years ago and I don't remember how to fix it. I don't even know what to search /var/log/messages for. Please help!

I ran
and reinstalled everything. I tried it again. It didn't work. I really hate using KDE, but I guess for the moment I have to.

I don't know anything about Slackware, but if XFCE4 is configured the same as in Fedora you will find all config files under ~/.config/xfce4 . If you CTRL-ALT-F1 and log in as root and delete this whole directory (~/.config/xfce4 On Fedora anyway) you will find that XFCE4 will start from scratch and you will have to recreate all of your panels etc again. Also have a look in ~/.local/share/xfce4* for xfce4 panel profiles etc.

Another thing you could try is to create a new user, login as that user and see if XFCE4 behaves as expected. If not you have a more serious problem. If it does behave then deleting the aforementioned directory should do the trick.

2 members found this post helpful.

On my Slackware Current install, I was able to fix xfce3 by adding a windows manager to the startup.

Settings -> Session and Startup -> Application Autostart
I added an entry for compiz

--> Comannd: compiz --replace

Here's the dialog

Oh, yeah: I used <CTRL><ESC> to open a menu, then used the arrow keys to get to the settings.

These directions are not great, but I do hope this helps!

After the big Xfce update on current I'm running into several issues; which are probably related. I have two monitors 144hz viewsonice and 75hz asus. When I turn them off and back on; sometimes, but not always xorg crashes or 1 or more panels/taskbars go invisible. I'm able to click on them and access any icons/options, but invisible. Logging out of X and coming back fixes them.

What happens when you run xfwm4? Also the panel can be launched using xfce4-panel.

That compiz --replace thing worked! Thank you! But I still have no desktop. I hit Cntrl+Alt+D to go the desktop, but instead of my desktop being there, nothing is there. The screen is black. And maybe an artifact or two from the window previously displayed. Can anyone help with this one?

I think that was the command that my wife USED to use whenever she was experiencing this problem that I'm now experiencing...

Nope. My desktop is STILL gone. All I see is a muted green screen that I can't interact with...

xfwm4 is the window manager itself, and xfce4-panel is the panel. It may be that your session config somehow got corrupted and the thing stopped launching the window manager and panel at login.

Meanwhile, my desktop is STILL missing! Now it's a dull green background with nothing on it.

Try "xfdesktop". That manages the background.

Well start desktop in runlevel 3 with startx command - on the same virtual console you should see some messages - error message or warnings. If it does not help run xfce with twm as window manager - run xwmconfig and choose twm. Run startx - you should have now two xterm terminals - run xfce-session - xfce desktop and panels will be now separate windows - now you should have access to desktop and panels - eg. to disable compositor or to do some other settings - try to reset all to defaults - disable screensaver and xlock. You will see that xfce desktop is just a window - which you can even iconify. Of course I am not telling to run xfce that way - although it is really funny - but it can be helpful for diagnostic.

This solved it for me. Thank you.

You're welcome.