Super-productivity: App doesn't start after installation (snap)

[herman-yulau]

Environment

• Version: 5.0.7 - 5.0.8;
• Operating System and version: Ubuntu 18.04;
• Desktop Environment: Gnome.

Current Behavior

New fresh system Ubuntu 18.04. I just reinstalled whole my system on new SSD disk. Before I used that app in Ubuntu 18.04 as well and had no problems.
Just installed app from edge channel 5.0.8 version and it didn't start. Okay, run sudo snap remove --purge superproductivity and installed stable version as sudo snap install superproductivity, but result was the same... I uninstalled it again and installed from 'Ubuntu software' app - nothing changed.
Am I missing some dependencies?
Please, help! I need tracking! :)

Steps to Reproduce

1. Fresh Ubuntu 18.04.
2. sudo snap install superproductivity
3. superproductivity from command line...
4. App doesn't start and there is no hanging in command line, a new line appears immediately. So it looks like app starts and exits, or crashes :)

Console Output

There are no console output or any logs files in dirs:
~/.config/superProductivity/log.log
~/snap/superproductivity/current/.config/superProductivity/log.log

[johannesjo]

Hey there! Thanks for reporting (and using the edge channel, which is I appreciate a lot :)). On my machine I have no issues, but I will test it on a virtual machine.

[johannesjo]

All works there as well. Another thing you can do is to try to starting the app from the command line. That should at least provide you with some output...

[herman-yulau]

All works there as well. Another thing you can do is to try to starting the app from the command line. That should at least provide you with some output...

I've edited my original report (see p. 4). There is no information in the command line... =(
I also rebooted my system and nothing...
Is there any required additional packages?

[johannesjo]

Is there any required additional packages?

Not that I am aware of.

Are you able to start other apps installed via snap?

That there is no output at all is strange.
What's the output of:

which superproductivity

and what's inside that path printed out (if any?). Does it look like a proper binary?

[herman-yulau]

What's the output of:

which superproductivity

The output is:
/snap/bin/superproductivity.

/snap/bin$ ls -laF
total 8
drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Apr  4 16:10 ./
drwxr-xr-x 17 root root 4096 Apr  4 16:10 ../
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 28 19:51 canonical-livepatch -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 31 21:04 code -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 31 21:04 code.url-handler -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 30 11:04 gimp -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 29 19:52 gnome-calculator -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 29 19:52 gnome-characters -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 29 19:52 gnome-logs -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 29 19:52 gnome-system-monitor -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 30 10:44 skype -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Apr  4 16:10 superproductivity -> /usr/bin/snap*
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   13 Mar 31 16:45 telegram-desktop -> /usr/bin/snap*

Yes, skype, telegram and others work fine.

[herman-yulau]

I'm able to run binary from path:
/snap/superproductivity/567/superproductivity.

And it works just fine!
But from the direct command in the command line and from the apps list it doesn't start.

[johannesjo]

What about the other snap apps located in the bin folder? Are you able to start them just fine? To me it seems like that something was messed up with binary links during upgrading your system.

[herman-yulau]

Yes, other apps start with no problems. Trying to figure out where this broken piece hides.
I did not upgrade my system. I installed new system on the new SSD.

[herman-yulau]

I haven't managed to fix this problem with snap. I am not familiar with snap very much and I've already spent enough time on it, so I uninstalled app and installed it again from .deb package downloaded from release page. And now it works fine. So the issue can be closed, if it is just my system problem. And thanks for quick help with this problem! And big thanks for this great app!

[johannesjo]

Alright then I close the issue.

[jessexoc]

I am seeing a very similar issue.

$ snap --version
snap    2.44.1
snapd   2.44.1
series  16
ubuntu  19.10
kernel  5.3.0-42-generic

$ which superproductivity
/snap/bin/superproductivity

No issue with other snap apps in /snap/bin/

I installed the current candidate version (5.0.11)

On first run after a fresh install, app opens.
After closing, on all subsequent runs, the app crashes on startup.

Running superproductivity crashes.
Running /snap/superproductivity/current/superproductivity directly works.

Let me know what other debugging steps would be helpful.

[johannesjo]

@jessexoc thanks for the additional info. I just tried to reproduce the issue in a fresh Ubuntu VM. No luck.

Maybe you could provide your desktop environment? Also the logs when starting from the command line would be helpful. And maybe the info provided by journalctl -fwhile reproducing the issue could also help.

[jessexoc]

Maybe you could provide your desktop environment?

Stock Ubuntu install.
DE: GNOME 3.34.1
WM: GNOME Shell

No logs to syslog / journalctl output when starting/crashing.

I thought strace might be helpful. So using strace on the snap install (using https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/stracing-snap-commands/1433)

$ sudo strace -u <username> -e '!select,pselect6,_newselect,clock_gettime,sigaltstack,gettid,gettimeofday,nanosleep' -f -D -vv -o ./output.trace /snap/bin/superproductivity

It looks like the crash happens from an illegal seek.

strace output (redacted username / file names)

28592 lstat("/home/<username>/Documents/<file1>.xlsx", {st_dev=makedev(0xfd, 0x1), st_ino=28445620, st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_nlink=1, st_uid=1000, st_gid=1000, st_blksize=4096, st_blocks=32, st_size=14173, st_atime=1580267850 /* 2020-01-29T14:17:30.127395888+1100 */, st_atime_nsec=127395888, st_mtime=1580267849 /* 2020-01-29T14:17:29.239394380+1100 */, st_mtime_nsec=239394380, st_ctime=1580267850 /* 2020-01-29T14:17:30.087395819+1100 */, st_ctime_nsec=87395819}) = 0
28592 lstat("/home/<username>/Documents/<file1>.xlsx", {st_dev=makedev(0xfd, 0x1), st_ino=28445620, st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_nlink=1, st_uid=1000, st_gid=1000, st_blksize=4096, st_blocks=32, st_size=14173, st_atime=1580267850 /* 2020-01-29T14:17:30.127395888+1100 */, st_atime_nsec=127395888, st_mtime=1580267849 /* 2020-01-29T14:17:29.239394380+1100 */, st_mtime_nsec=239394380, st_ctime=1580267850 /* 2020-01-29T14:17:30.087395819+1100 */, st_ctime_nsec=87395819}) = 0
28592 write(2, "mv: ", 4)               = 4
28592 write(2, "'/home/<username>/Documents/<file1>"..., 121) = 121
28592 write(2, "\n", 1)                 = 1
28592 lstat("/home/<username>/Documents/<file2>.ods", {st_dev=makedev(0xfd, 0x1), st_ino=28323169, st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_nlink=1, st_uid=1000, st_gid=1000, st_blksize=4096, st_blocks=56, st_size=24012, st_atime=1565672859 /* 2019-08-13T15:07:39.487180252+1000 */, st_atime_nsec=487180252, st_mtime=1551765751 /* 2019-03-05T17:02:31+1100 */, st_mtime_nsec=0, st_ctime=1558315771 /* 2019-05-20T11:29:31.103632085+1000 */, st_ctime_nsec=103632085}) = 0
28592 lstat("/home/<username>/Documents/<file2>.ods", {st_dev=makedev(0xfd, 0x1), st_ino=28323169, st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_nlink=1, st_uid=1000, st_gid=1000, st_blksize=4096, st_blocks=56, st_size=24012, st_atime=1565672859 /* 2019-08-13T15:07:39.487180252+1000 */, st_atime_nsec=487180252, st_mtime=1551765751 /* 2019-03-05T17:02:31+1100 */, st_mtime_nsec=0, st_ctime=1558315771 /* 2019-05-20T11:29:31.103632085+1000 */, st_ctime_nsec=103632085}) = 0
28592 write(2, "mv: ", 4)               = 4
28592 write(2, "'/home/<username>/Documents/<file2>"..., 103) = 103
28592 write(2, "\n", 1)                 = 1
28592 lseek(0, 0, SEEK_CUR)             = -1 ESPIPE (Illegal seek)
28592 close(0)                          = 0
28592 close(1)                          = 0
28592 close(2)                          = 0
28592 exit_group(1)                     = ?
28592 +++ exited with 1 +++
28512 <... wait4 resumed> [{WIFEXITED(s) && WEXITSTATUS(s) == 1}], 0, NULL) = 28592
28512 rt_sigaction(SIGINT, {sa_handler=SIG_DFL, sa_mask=[], sa_flags=SA_RESTORER, sa_restorer=0x7f2d2e3e4f20}, {sa_handler=0x55c5b607f160, sa_mask=[], sa_flags=SA_RESTORER, sa_restorer=0x7f2d2e3e4f20}, 8) = 0
28512 rt_sigprocmask(SIG_SETMASK, [], NULL, 8) = 0
28512 --- SIGCHLD {si_signo=SIGCHLD, si_code=CLD_EXITED, si_pid=28592, si_uid=1000, si_status=1, si_utime=0, si_stime=1} ---
28512 wait4(-1, 0x7ffee9ddbc50, WNOHANG, NULL) = -1 ECHILD (No child processes)
28512 rt_sigreturn({mask=[]})           = 0
28512 rt_sigprocmask(SIG_BLOCK, [CHLD], [], 8) = 0
28512 rt_sigprocmask(SIG_SETMASK, [], NULL, 8) = 0
28512 exit_group(1)                     = ?
28512 +++ exited with 1 +++

I don't know if that's helpful or not.

[johannesjo]

@jessexoc thank you. I did some googleling and my first conclusion was that this is some kind of permission error (as lseek seems to be responsible for accessing files ), when the app writes to the file system, but this shouldn't happen until it has launched as far as I know at least.

There also was an electron builder bug with the snap some time ago for systems using wayland, but it's supposed to be fixed for some time...

I'll give updating electron and electron-builder a shot. There was a (seemingly unrelated) snap bug recently. Hopefully that does something for us....

[herman-yulau]

Hi!
Here is a little update from me.
Installed new clean Ubuntu 20.04.
10 minutes ago I installed app from 'Ubuntu Software' center from stable channel and right after installation it started just fine!
Closed app, rebooted system by reboot cmd in terminal.
And now app doesn't start...
The behavior is the same as was before.

[johannesjo]

@herman-yulau thank you. And there is no error output? That's super weird.

The update I made should be available in the edge channel now, but not yet in the published store version btw.

[herman-yulau]

Nope. No errors, no any output at all, no log files.

But I removed app with sudo snap remove --purge superproductivity and installed it again, but from edge channel with:

sudo snap install --edge  superproductivity
superproductivity (edge) 5.0.13 from johannesjo installed

I launched app from command line and it started with output:

superproductivity
Saving backups to /home/herman/snap/superproductivity/594/.config/superProductivity/backups
{ enabled: null, showDevTools: false, mode: 'bottom' }
(node:9456) DeprecationWarning: Passing functions, DOM objects and other non-cloneable JavaScript objects to IPC methods is deprecated and will throw an exception beginning with Electron 9.
(node:9456) DeprecationWarning: Passing functions, DOM objects and other non-cloneable JavaScript objects to IPC methods is deprecated and will throw an exception beginning with Electron 9.

Then I closed app by mouse clicking on the window cross. Started it again from terminal and nothing: no start, no output, no errors. So this time without reboot.
The only logs files I've found are:
~/snap/superproductivity/594/.config/superProductivity/Local Storage/leveldb/000003.log
~/snap/superproductivity/594/.config/superProductivity/IndexedDB/file__0.indexeddb.leveldb/000003.log
~/snap/superproductivity/594/.config/superProductivity/Session Storage/000003.log

Are you interested in them?

[johannesjo]

@herman-yulau no thank you. I will try to reproduce this once more, but this time with a completely fresh VM instance of vanilla Ubuntu 20.04.

[johannesjo]

No luck to reproduce it with a fresh VM neither. It works absolutely fine when installing it from the software center even after several restarts. I have absolutely no idea what could cause this :-(