KDE effect blur: not working !

Hi all, I’m back (not my fault this time I hope…)

So after my issue with Yast Software manager refusing to connect to the Web, I completely deleted the OpenSUSE 12.1 install and installed over.
KDE 4.7.2 works fine, temperature is around 50°C… Alright.
fglrx install… OK
you (yast online update)…OK
reboot.
Customize everything (get qtCurve, my favourite icon theme, mouse skin…) OK
Set the kwin effects… ouch.
Kwin crashed, got to non compositing interface (KDE with disabled effects)… uh ? It’s the first time this happens when I modify the effects…
Got to the advanced settings, took a look:
OpenGL 2 renderer
keep miniatures only for displayed windows
scaling method :

  • Precise → makes Kwin & Plasma crash when looking at the grid desktop.
  • With smoothing —> seems to work fine (but blur does not work on the windows: konsole transparency that is not part of QtCureve’s settings is not blurred and - for example - Kwrite window is not blured)
  • Direct —> makes kwin sometime crash when ticking or unticking effects (blur does not work on the windows)
    Effects are not disabled for full screen windows. THe next 3 boxes are checked.

I saved the home directory of the last 12.1 install in which blur worked all right but it had dual screen, which I don’t have anymore. (remember, dual screen caused KDE to behave strange when only one monitor was plugged in…)

Blur is one of the effects I love and find it also usefull since my QtCurve settings use Opacity and my Konsole is translucent too.

Well, I’ll try to make Kwin crash again and post the crash log. By then, thanks to the ones who will help !

Your signature says you have Intel i3 graphics, so have I and the blur effect works fine.
Not much help, I know, but rules out one of the more obvious potential issues.

Sorry, but no. I don’t use the Intel Chip but the ATI Radeon HD 5850 card… :-/ On the old install of Opensuse (both 12.1 & 11.4), blur worked great…

Oops, didn’t read you signature properly (unless you edited it since). Well, that may be your problem (the ATI video card I mean)! One quick and dirty way of testing it is to disable the ATI card and use the Intel video. If the blur effect works, you know what the culprit is…

I edited signature since :wink:

How do I disable ATI card ? - and enable it later ?

It seems that Kwin from KDE 4.7.x have some issues. For me in order to activate them i must relogin in to my OS after enabling desktop effects; i have an nvidia card.

Well, logging out and back in after/before dis/enabling effects won’t change anything… :’(

Here am I so far:

New user can’t have blur.
On an other OpenSUSE 12.1 with KDE 4.7.4, blur does not work neither.

Could someone with KDE 4.7.2 on OpenSUSE 12.1 have a look at his/her desktop with this QtCurve theme ?

[InactiveShadows]
Size=35

[KWin]
BorderSize=3
CustomShadows=true
Grouping=false
InnerBorder=0
OpaqueBorder=false
OuterBorder=2

[Settings]
activeTabAppearance=soft
animatedProgress=true
appearance=customgradient5
bgndAppearance=darkinverted
bgndGrad=horiz
bgndImage=none
bgndOpacity=60
boldProgress=true
borderInactiveTab=false
borderMenuitems=false
borderProgress=true
borderSbarGroove=true
borderSelection=false
borderTab=true
buttonEffect=shadow
centerTabText=true
colorMenubarMouseOver=true
colorSelTab=0
colorSliderMouseOver=false
coloredMouseOver=glow
coloredTbarMo=false
comboBtn=none
comboSplitter=false
crButton=true
crColor=none
crHighlight=0
crSize=15
customAlphas=0
customMenuNormTextColor=#000000
customMenuSelTextColor=#000000
customMenuTextColor=false
customShades=1.16,1.07,0.9,0.78,0.84,0.75
customgradient1=3d,0,1.2,0.5,1,1,1
customgradient2=3d,0,0.9,0.5,1,1,1
customgradient3=none,0,1.12,1,1.15
customgradient4=shine,0,1.05,1,0.92
customgradient5=light,0,1.04,1,0.92
darkerBorders=false
defBtnIndicator=glow
dlgOpacity=60
doubleGtkComboArrow=false
drawStatusBarFrames=false
dwtAppearance=agua
dwtSettings=0
embolden=false
etchEntry=false
expanderHighlight=3
fadeLines=true
fillProgress=true
fillSlider=false
flatSbarButtons=true
focus=glow
forceAlternateLvCols=false
gbFactor=-3
gbLabel=9
glowProgress=end
grooveAppearance=harsh
groupBox=faded
gtkButtonOrder=false
gtkComboMenus=false
gtkScrollViews=true
handles=sunken
hideShortcutUnderline=false
highlightFactor=3
highlightScrollViews=true
highlightTab=true
inactiveTitlebarAppearance=flat
invertBotTab=true
lighterPopupMenuBgnd=0
lvAppearance=agua
lvButton=false
lvLines=true
mapKdeIcons=true
menuBgndAppearance=harsh
menuBgndGrad=horiz
menuBgndImage=none
menuBgndOpacity=60
menuDelay=225
menuIcons=true
menuStripe=none
menuStripeAppearance=darkinverted
menubarAppearance=flat
menubarApps=VirtualBox,smplayer,amarok,arora,kcalc,kaffeine
menubarHiding=0
menubarMouseOver=true
menuitemAppearance=fade
noBgndGradientApps=
noBgndImageApps=
noBgndOpacityApps=dragon,smplayer,inkscape,totem,kaffeine,kscreenlocker,sonata
noMenuBgndOpacityApps=inkscape,gtk,totem,sonata
noMenuStripeApps=soffice.bin,gtk
passwordChar=8263
popupBorder=true
progressAppearance=agua
progressColor=origselected
progressGrooveAppearance=gradient
progressGrooveColor=dark
reorderGtkButtons=false
round=extra
roundAllTabs=true
roundMbTopOnly=false
sbarBgndAppearance=flat
scrollbarType=none
selectionAppearance=agua
shadeCheckRadio=none
shadeMenubarOnlyWhenActive=false
shadeMenubars=none
shadePopupMenu=false
shadeSliders=none
shading=hsl
sliderAppearance=agua
sliderFill=true
sliderStyle=r-plain
sliderThumbs=none
sliderWidth=11
smallRadio=true
sortedLv=none
splitterHighlight=0
splitters=none
square=0
statusbarApps=kde
statusbarHiding=0
stdBtnSizes=false
stdSidebarButtons=false
stripedProgress=diagonal
stripedSbar=false
sunkenAppearance=customgradient3
tabAppearance=agua
tabBgnd=3
tabMouseOver=glow
tbarBtnAppearance=none
tbarBtnEffect=none
tbarBtns=standard
thin=0
thinSbarGroove=false
titlebarAlignment=center-full
titlebarAppearance=flat
titlebarButtonAppearance=gradient
titlebarButtons=2117
titlebarEffect=shadow
titlebarIcon=title
toolbarAppearance=flat
toolbarBorders=none
toolbarSeparators=sunken
toolbarTabs=false
tooltipAppearance=gradient
unifyCombo=true
unifySpin=true
unifySpinBtns=false
useHighlightForMenu=false
useQtFileDialogApps=googleearth-bin
vArrows=true
version=1.8.8
windowBorder=33
windowDrag=3
xCheck=false
xbar=false

If it works and blur is functional, plz tell me the size of your kwin effects libraries, thanks.

Kwin just crashed after enabling Blur again :

Application: KWin (kwin), signal: Segmentation fault
[Current thread is 1 (Thread 0x7f411ad0a760 (LWP 5105))]

Thread 2 (Thread 0x7f4101704700 (LWP 5112)):
#0  0x00007f4116544e6c in pthread_cond_wait@@GLIBC_2.3.2 () from /lib64/libpthread.so.0
#1  0x00007f411936e852 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libQtScript.so.4
#2  0x00007f411936e889 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libQtScript.so.4
#3  0x00007f4116540f05 in start_thread () from /lib64/libpthread.so.0
#4  0x00007f411a54a53d in clone () from /lib64/libc.so.6

Thread 1 (Thread 0x7f411ad0a760 (LWP 5105)):
[KCrash Handler]
#6  0x00007f411a599c13 in __memcpy_ssse3_back () from /lib64/libc.so.6
#7  0x00007f4117d8bd05 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libGL.so.1
#8  0x00007f4101b4edbf in ?? () from /usr/lib64/kde4/kwin4_effect_builtins.so
#9  0x00007f4101b4bc05 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/kde4/kwin4_effect_builtins.so
#10 0x00007f4101b4bd9c in ?? () from /usr/lib64/kde4/kwin4_effect_builtins.so
#11 0x00007f4101b4be86 in effect_create_kwin4_effect_blur () from /usr/lib64/kde4/kwin4_effect_builtins.so
#12 0x00007f411a8e9752 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libkdeinit4_kwin.so
#13 0x00007f411a8eaaaa in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libkdeinit4_kwin.so
#14 0x00007f411a83eb3e in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libkdeinit4_kwin.so
#15 0x00007f411a8407e2 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libkdeinit4_kwin.so
#16 0x00007f41168ca59a in QMetaObject::activate(QObject*, QMetaObject const*, int, void**) () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#17 0x00007f41168cde79 in QObject::event(QEvent*) () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#18 0x00007f4115a69c34 in QApplicationPrivate::notify_helper(QObject*, QEvent*) () from /usr/lib64/libQtGui.so.4
#19 0x00007f4115a6eac1 in QApplication::notify(QObject*, QEvent*) () from /usr/lib64/libQtGui.so.4
#20 0x00007f411a03ee36 in KApplication::notify(QObject*, QEvent*) () from /usr/lib64/libkdeui.so.5
#21 0x00007f41168b781c in QCoreApplication::notifyInternal(QObject*, QEvent*) () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#22 0x00007f41168e4398 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#23 0x00007f41168e5454 in QEventDispatcherUNIX::processEvents(QFlags<QEventLoop::ProcessEventsFlag>) () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#24 0x00007f4115b0dde8 in ?? () from /usr/lib64/libQtGui.so.4
#25 0x00007f41168b6a22 in QEventLoop::processEvents(QFlags<QEventLoop::ProcessEventsFlag>) () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#26 0x00007f41168b6c1f in QEventLoop::exec(QFlags<QEventLoop::ProcessEventsFlag>) () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#27 0x00007f41168bade7 in QCoreApplication::exec() () from /usr/lib64/libQtCore.so.4
#28 0x00007f411a85e5f6 in kdemain () from /usr/lib64/libkdeinit4_kwin.so
#29 0x00007f411a49223d in __libc_start_main () from /lib64/libc.so.6
#30 0x0000000000400681 in _start ()

Does this help…?

You blacklist the card using modprobe - sorry, can’t remember the exact syntax as I haven’t done it for a while but google (and probably the forum search) will be your friend… You’ll obviously also need the Intel driver to confirm that the Kwin blur effect works fine with the i3 graphics.