[Bug] The application overview is completely broken

[Kartonrealista]

How did you upgrade to 21.10? (Upgrade) Upgraded from Pop!_OS 21.04

Related Application and/or Package Version (run apt policy $PACKAGE NAME): Applications overview

Issue/Bug Description:

Numerous issues, ranging from graphical bugs (this + overlapping icons) to problems with folder creation or placing things into existing folders. Duplicated icons within and outside of folders (here musicbrainz picard). It's not just graphical either, it actually is duplicated and clickable.

[juanejot]

I'm having a similar issue with the list of applications simply not loading (see screenshot) whether I click "Show Applications" at the bottom, or "Applications" at the top of the screen. This is on a machine with a 9700K & an RX580 (so, no Nvidia). Luckily Super still lets me search for & start the apps I know I want.

This behavior does not affect a separate machine running an old Core2Duo & Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT & 9400M (with manually installed PPA for legacy version of nvidia-340 that works with 5.11 & up kernels; this particular cosmetic/usability issue of the lack of application icons also doesn't happen on that older machine when running nouveau; but other things do). That machine has separate, non-cosmetic issues I've emailed the ux team separately about.

Some more diagnostic procedure: the lack of application icons on the 9700K/RX580 machine in this view is persistent across logouts, reboots & installing a new app (cuz I needed it, but I also chose now as the time to install to see whether its icon and/or those of its friends might be revealed; nope).

EDIT: The behavior seems to be intermittent; after writing the above, I happened to check again and there were my app icons! I rebooted to test if they were persistent, and they were gone again.

[x2ws]

I am having the same issue on a Dell XPS 15 9500. Performed an upgrade following instructions. No themes or 3rd party extensions installed. It is not random for me. It is not displaying any applications at all, even after restart.

Edit: Switching between NVIDIA GPU and iGPU did not make a difference.

[Kartonrealista]

@juanejot @x2ws you're experiencing https://github.com/pop-os/pop/issues/1894. On the other hand, that solution didn't work for me permanently. A better temporary solution is to just restart the gnome shell. You have to do this every restart until they fix that issue

[juanejot]

@juanejot @x2ws you're experiencing pop-os/pop#1894. On the other hand, that solution didn't work for me permanently. A better temporary solution is to just restart the gnome shell. You have to do this every restart until they fix that issue

Thanks you for the insight, and yes it presents as a similar problem, but: A) Being posted in the pop-is/pop repo, that issue, also listed by their comments about version, is about hirsute (21.04, I assume final), not impish (the 21.10 beta we’re testing). Though it’s a good thought, as other issues I’ve seen on the other machine indeed carried over from and/or became exacerbated enough to affect UX, between 21.04 to 21.10. B) I’ve never installed Dash-to-Dock or any other non-Pop!_OS GNOME extensions to this installation (in fact, I have the Firefox extension that otherwise would be able to access them for install, turned off). I acknowledge that perhaps retaining the Firefox extension at all might carry over settings of completely separate (even non-Pop!_OS) installations, and therefore may have some bearing; happy to test when next I’m in front of the computer, likely tomorrow; and C) The workaround of typing in an app name into “Search Applications…” is not a successful one for me with this installation; I tried it in fact when I first noticed this behavior, and while app icons that might match the user’s search come up directly under that search bar, along with various menu headings from Settings, etc. that you might mean; neither during that search, nor before or after it while the “Applications” screen is up, do apps you did not search for but might want to choose amongst, ever populate below.

The only “solution” for now is simply to leave the system running for some time scale on the order of hours, and check back on it, upon which time it seems to be able to populate app icons when invoked. Total speculation makes me wonder whether that UI component/library (whichever it is) has very slow access under 21.10 beta currently, to an icon cache it needs; potentially a cache to which other interface items (including the search bar) have quicker access?

[Kartonrealista]

@juanejot It may be because the cosmic dock is just a modified dash to dock. That's the same reason why Pop shop process shows up in the system monitor as elementary appcenter. There's no need to reinvent the wheel in a FOSS project.

[mmstick]

The application overview will be replaced soon with a better interface for the release, so please don't mind the current placeholder.

[x2ws]

@mmstick Thank you. Looking forward to the final product.

[juanejot]

Thank you indeed. Testing to completely remove the GNOME Additions extension from Firefox (which, only on a non-Pop!_OS system, I've ever used to install Dash-to-Dock) & then reboot resulted in the same behavior as above, including after updating via command line to (Pop!_Shop interestingly made no mention of the availability of) generic kernel 5.31.0-20 and the gnome-shell-extension-cosmic-workspaces of today.

Thank you too, @mmstick, for the info on the upcoming updates to the application overview. Looks like it's all coming together well!

[jabbermacy]

turn off/on cosmic dock fixes issue 100% of the time

[juanejot]

@jabbermacy I concur that seems to work. Dunno whether COSMIC or any of its particular extensions being loaded at boot/login is the kind of thing that can be re-enabled by systemctl enable, but yours is a good workaround until a new Application Picker closer to final. Thanks!

[jabbermacy]

ALSO, this bug does not exist on Wayland, only X11, 100% confirmed, 3 times

[juanejot]

The latest update of the following packages seems to have removed this issue, my only personal outstanding one with Pop!_OS 21.10 beta on my 9700K/RX580 rig.* Looks in Settings>About like I'm still using X11 (haven't researched how/why/whether to switch to Wayland manually).

libpop-theme-switcher:amd64 (0.1.1~1634585152~21.10~426a5e4, 0.1.1~1636044688~21.10~abd8796), pop-cosmic:amd64 (0.1.0~1635889473~21.10~fbcaa2c, 0.1.0~1636070375~21.10~7730f99), gnome-shell-extension-cosmic-dock:amd64 (70~ubuntu1pop0~1635889396~21.10~acb33c1, 70~ubuntu1pop0~1636405927~21.10~92ae103), pop-shell:amd64 (1.1.0~1635267414~21.10~1fddaa8, 1.1.0~1636390326~21.10~b3595b2)

Since this issue's already closed, I'll hope others benefit from the update. Coming together nicely!

*(Still having totally separate boot issues with the latest kernel on separate T9900/GeForce 9400M/9600M GT system as in issue #273.)

[leviport]

New applications picker should be released soon: https://github.com/pop-os/cosmic/pull/218

I'm going to close this since it pertains to the old applications view.