Super opens Start menu, search box accepting text, but no incremental search

[jeffkowalski]

Cinnamon 4.6.7 Not using daily builds PPA Linux Mint 20 Ulyana, Cinnamon edition Linux carbon 5.4.0-54-generic #60-Ubuntu SMP Fri Nov 6 10:37:59 UTC 2020 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux Please see full system report here: https://termbin.com/xp74h xsession-errors.txt

Issue

Start menu search box does not react properly to input text, and does not perform incremental search.

Steps to reproduce

Press and release <Super> key. (Some other condition is also required, because error condition is not fully reproducible, although I can reproduce on three different machines, and the error has been in effect for several Mint versions).

Expected behaviour

Search box at top of menu should be cleared, focused, and have active cursor. See screenshot . Typing will then be echoed in search box and an incremental search/filter of applications will result on each keypress.

Observed behavior

Search box at top of menu is not cleared, but the cursor is active. Typing in the box does not clear the existing default text. Characters are echoed in the text box but no other action is apparent. In particular, the incremental search/filtering of applications does not occur. See screenshot .

[dandv]

I've seen that as well, but reproduction was weird.

[icarter09]

@jeffkowalski any luck on figuring on the steps to reproduce this issue?

[jeffkowalski]

I have finally found steps to reproduce the issue. In my setup, I have Tilda 1.5.2 installed. It is a drop-down quake-style terminal. I have the key [F12] set to activate/deactivate it. If I follow these simple steps, I get the "inactive" Start menu search box:

1. Activate Tilda by pressing [F12]
2. Mouse click anywhere in the tilda window that appears
3. Press [Super] to open Start menu
4. Notice that the search box doesn't work, as described earlier in the thread. Hope someone else can verify the issue, or perhaps find even other steps to reproduce.

[icarter09]

I've installed Tilda, but still not able to reproduce the issue. Have you noticed the issue when not using Tilda?

[jeffkowalski]

I've been able to now reliably reproduce the issue using the steps above on two different machines, each with the same Linux Mint / Cinnamon and Tilda versions. I'm including my tilda configuration config_0 in case it's helpful in re-creating the test environment. Kill tilda, move this file to ~/.config/tilda/config_0 and restart tilda. I'll continue to search for other ways to trigger the problem.

[dfrein]

Exactly the same issue occurs with "guake" terminal (and linux mint 20.2):

• guake setting "hide on lose focus" is set
• guake is open (and has keyboard focus)
• press "Super" / Windows-Key or via clicking on its icon: app launcher opens and guake will hide at the same time
• app launcher shows help text in search widget, which does not disappear and therefore instant search while typing is not possible This behaviour occurs every time when guake is active. There is also an old bug report here Guake issue 969. Deleting help text or clicking with the mouse in the widget does not help, the search widget will only work if the app menu is closed and opened again.

However, there are further strange things going on if the search entry field gets keyboard focus (that means directly after opening the app starter):

• as long as the app starter is open, Guake is not reacting to its shortcut F12
• the help text in the app starter search widget is normally only visible a fraction of a second and than disappears ("Suchbegriff eingeben..." in german language) and therefore this help text does not provides any help to the user, as there is simply not enough time to read the text (this behaviour is not connected to Guake, e.g. guake is not running or not active).

Therefore the help text in the search widget is either only visible very short or the opposite, it does not disappear. As I'm using both guake and the search in the app starter menu quite often, that is a very annoying issue for me.

[dfrein]

After testing linuxmint 20.3 "una" the issue seems to be solved (only tested with guake). The reason might be that the help text is no longer visible at all ("type to search..."), not even flashing shortly. However, I do not see any reason that the help text should be displayed (for me its obvious, as the text cursor is flashing), therefore for me the issue is solved now.

[jeffkowalski]

I see the same new (improved) behavior that @dfrein mentions using Mint 20.2, Cinnamon 5.0.7 using Tilda 1.5.2. Looks to be resolved now.

On Wed, Dec 15, 2021 at 12:59 AM dfrein @.***> wrote:

After testing linuxmint 20.3 "una" the issue seems to be solved (only tested with guake). The reason might be that the help text is no longer visible at all ("type to search..."), not even flashing shortly. However, I do not see any reason that the help text should be displayed (for me its obvious, as the text cursor is flashing), therefore for me the issue is solved now.

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