Configuration file "/root/.config/y2controlcenterrc" not writable.
Please contact your system administrator.
Got this error when I tried to open Yast. Can anyone tell me why this might be happening? I got a similar message when I tried to open Dolphin. I checked permissiions on the rc files but they look correct.
When you do not post that, you make it impossible that others here check them. Thus, as root:
ls -la /root/.config
total 132
drwxr-xr-x 9 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:37 .
drwx------ 11 root root 4096 Feb 15 12:00 …
-rw-r–r-- 1 root root 23 Feb 2 19:26 Trolltech.conf
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Feb 15 00:04 YaST2
-rw------- 1 root root 66 Feb 2 19:26 akregatorrc
drwx------ 2 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:26 dconf
-rw------- 1 root root 653 Feb 2 19:37 dolphinrc
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:26 gtk-3.0
-rw------- 1 root root 154 Feb 2 19:26 gwenviewrc
-rw------- 1 root root 119 Feb 2 19:25 kactivitymanagerdrc
-rw------- 1 root root 405 Feb 2 19:27 katemetainfos
-rw------- 1 root root 2462 Feb 2 19:27 katerc
-rw------- 1 root root 56 Feb 2 19:26 kateschemarc
-rw------- 1 root root 419 Feb 2 19:27 katevirc
-rw------- 1 root root 85 Feb 2 19:26 kcminputrc
-rw------- 1 root root 3486 Feb 2 19:26 kconf_updaterc
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:27 kde.org
-rw------- 1 root root 3215 Feb 2 19:26 kdeglobals
-rw------- 1 root root 973 Feb 2 19:26 kglobalshortcutsrc
-rw------- 1 root root 75 Feb 2 19:26 khotkeysrc
-rw------- 1 root root 149 Feb 2 19:26 kmail2rc
-rw------- 1 root root 122 Feb 2 19:26 kmixrc
-rw------- 1 root root 35 Feb 2 19:25 knfsshare
-rw------- 1 root root 54 Feb 2 19:26 kscreenlockerrc
-rw------- 1 root root 106 Feb 2 19:26 ksmserverrc
-rw------- 1 root root 258 Feb 2 19:26 kwinrc
-rw------- 1 root root 70 Feb 2 19:26 kwinrulesrc
-rw------- 1 root root 84 Feb 2 19:26 okularpartrc
drwx------ 2 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:33 pulse
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:37 session
-rw------- 1 root root 68 Feb 2 19:26 spectaclerc
-rw------- 1 root root 103 Feb 2 19:26 webengineurlinterceptoradblockrc
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Feb 2 19:26 xsettingsd
Just before I go to interpret this:
There is an important, but not easy to find feature on the forums.
Please in the future use CODE tags around copied/pasted computer text in a post. It is the # button in the tool bar of the post editor. When applicable copy/paste complete, that is including the prompt, the command, the output and the next prompt.
An example is here: Using CODE tags Around your paste.
This is very strange. It looks as if you have loged in as root in the GUI (KDE).
OK will do in future … I’m old and recovering from an illness. My memory is not great either.
Anyway, I did not log into the GUI as root. I would never have a reason to do that. I did not use dolphin super user either. It’s a recent clean install of tumbleweed. Everything was working fine when I went to bed last night. Booted up this morning and all this was happening. WHat could I do to resolve this?
Was that installation done on Feb 2 2021? Because that is the date of all those KDE and a lot of applications files.
Very, very strange.
BTW, I see no permission problems there.
Back to your start of YaST. You did not tell how you tried to start it. Was that from a normal user KDE session from the KDE starter menu by clicking the YaST icon?
Yes, Henk. Around that time for sure
That is only an answer to my first question.
The second is about a more detailed description on how you start YaST.
Yes, around that time. I was trying from a normal KDE session, but also when I logged in through a terminal with yast2 … it showed me the first screen but when I selected software management it crashed.
You running Tumbleweed, are you sure you are up-to-date? To be sure, maybe do a
zypper dup
and try again.
Right, will do! 
I did and it said
zypper dup
Loading repository data...
Reading installed packages...
Warning: You are about to do a distribution upgrade with all enabled repositories. Make sure these repositories are compatible befor
e you continue. See 'man zypper' for more information about this command.
Computing distribution upgrade...
Nothing to do.
Looks OK then and please always post from the terminal including the full prompt/command line (now we have only the command) and the new prompt line (then we know it is complete and that is all there was). Less talking, more information.
Well, maybe we also should check your repos (I assume they are OK, but we have to find this):
zypper lr -d
=============================
Maybe I should add as some additional information that I do not have this file y2controlcenterrc either in /root/.config, nor in ~/.config of the user henk (that I you to start the YaST GUI from).
Open a terminal and execute “dmesg”, you can paste the results here for inspection. It can tell if there’s some going on in your system.
Also, can you create any file at all? As your user and/or as root.
**localhost:~ #** zypper lr -d
# | Alias | Name | Enabled | GPG Check | Refresh | Priority | Type | URI
| Service
---+----------------------------------------+-----------------------------+---------+-----------+---------+----------+--------+-----
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+--------
1 | download.nvidia.com-tumbleweed | nVidia Graphics Drivers | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 99 | rpm-md | http
s://download.nvidia.com/opensuse/tumbleweed |
2 | https-download.opensuse.org-20394c6d | home:oleg_antonyan | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 100 | rpm-md | http
s://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/oleg_antonyan/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ |
3 | https-download.opensuse.org-ad2bacf9 | openSUSE:Factory | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 110 | rpm-md | http
s://download.opensuse.org/repositories/openSUSE:/Factory/snapshot/ |
4 | openSUSE-20210128-0 | openSUSE-20210128-0 | No | ---- | ---- | 99 | rpm-md | hd:/
?device=/dev/disk/by-id/usb-Kingston_DataTraveler_111_001CC0C60E20BCC0600001B4-0:0-part2 |
5 | openSUSE_Tumbleweed | home:Sauerland:hardware | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 100 | rpm-md | http
s://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/Sauerland:/hardware/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ |
6 | openSUSE_Tumbleweed_1 | Fonts | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 99 | rpm-md | http
://download.opensuse.org/repositories/M17N:/fonts/openSUSE_Tumbleweed |
7 | opensuse-guide.org-openSUSE_Tumbleweed | libdvdcss repository | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 99 | rpm-md | http
://opensuse-guide.org/repo/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ |
8 | packman | Packman | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 90 | rpm-md | http
://packman.inode.at/suse/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ |
9 | repo-debug | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Debug | No | ---- | ---- | 99 | NONE | http
://download.opensuse.org/debug/tumbleweed/repo/oss/ |
10 | repo-non-oss | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Non-Oss | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 99 | rpm-md | http
://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/repo/non-oss/ |
11 | repo-oss | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Oss | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 99 | rpm-md | http
://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/repo/oss/ |
12 | repo-source | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Source | No | ---- | ---- | 99 | NONE | http
://download.opensuse.org/source/tumbleweed/repo/oss/ |
13 | repo-update | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Update | Yes | (r ) Yes | Yes | 99 | rpm-md | http
://download.opensuse.org/update/tumbleweed/
Everything is working now without a problem, strangely enough. I can create files, open dolphin and yast and no more error messages. I’ll post the dmesg output shortly.
I could not go back further. Here’s everything from my terminal:
Oh, there’s a problem … the output is 470,000 characters or more. It won’t let me post it; 15,000 characters is the limit.
May have been an one-off error, but next case it happens, run dmesg and send here with susepaste.
OK, not much to do then now but waiting until it happens again.
BTW, I am still convinced that root logged in in the KDE on 2021-02-02 19:26 and littered root’s home directory with the files it normally creates when started for the first time by a user.