This is Missing-Dock-after-Reboot in view mode; [Up]
Date: Sun 23-Dec-1991 20:39:47 From: john@nextdoor.com (John McCracken) Subject: Missing Dock after Reboot (was Re: Root problem) In article <1991Dec23.143436.12449@ms.uky.edu> justin@mik.uky.edu (Justin Sullivan) writes: > Dean Michael Johnson writes >> >> I just had a strange problem occur. I logged in as root last night to >> reboot (to get my swapfile down) and the root dock was empty and the >> browser shelf was totally blank. So I rebooted the system hoping that >> it would solve the.. It didn't. I logged in as user -dean, but then >> "su" wouldn't work. >> Any of this sound familiar? I restocked my dock and shelf and left it >> alone for awhile and now it seems to work. I am curious to know if >> anybody has any ideas what the problem is though. > > Usually docks go blank and such IF one of two general things happen.. > You reboot with COMMAND-COMMAND-tilde instead of just COMMAND-tilde. > The former is the UNIX equivalent of a 'cold' boot, whereas the latter > attempts to save everything first, to include synicng the disks. I've lost my dock and browser shelf configuration several times after rebooting to shrink the swapfile. I use the "reboot" after becoming superuser. I've noticed that the dock and browser shelf are lost *only* when there is very little disk space left at the time I reboot ("No Space available on hard disk"). And only *my* dock is affected; other user's docks are not lost. Is there anything to this? Why would rebooting with a gargantuan swapfile hogging all the available disk space result in a lost dock for only the user who was logged-in at the time the machine was rebooted?
Date: Sun 23-Dec-1991 22:12:51 From: matthews@lewhoosh.umd.edu (Mike Matthews) Subject: Re: Missing Dock after Reboot (was Re: Root problem) In article <1991Dec23.203947.292@nextdoor!john@netcom.com> john@nextdoor.com >Is there anything to this? Why would rebooting with a gargantuan swapfile >hogging all the available disk space result in a lost dock for only the user >who was logged-in at the time the machine was rebooted? If the Workspace gets an error when it tries to write out the new dock etc. settings, it <and I'm not sure how this really works> will blank out the old without writing the new. Kinda ugly, eh? > John McCracken Mike
Date: Sun 24-Dec-1991 05:37:41 From: jiro@shaman.com (Jiro Nakamura) Subject: Re: Missing Dock after Reboot (was Re: Root problem) In article <1991Dec23.203947.292@nextdoor!john@netcom.com> john@nextdoor.com writes: >I've lost my dock and browser shelf configuration several times after >rebooting to shrink the swapfile. I use the "reboot" after becoming >superuser. I've noticed that the dock and browser shelf are lost *only* >when there is very little disk space left at the time I reboot ("No Space >available on hard disk"). And only *my* dock is affected; other user's >docks are not lost. This is because when you reboot, one of the things the Workspace Manager does is to save your dock preferences. Unfortunately, if there isn't any space, it can't and rather than checking and not doing anything, it trashes the file by attempting to write anyway. Here's a short script I wrote that checks if the swapfile disk is about to overflow and warns the user by logging something on the console and also by sndplaying a sound. You should configure it to play your favorite sound (I'm looking to record something off Pepsi trek, but haven't had the time): Run this before any session which you know consumes lots of virtual memory. I haven't daemonized it yet, sorry, too busy with Real Work (TM). #!/bin/csh -f # Disk space checker # Command: dfCheck & # Requires appropriate sound alert set sleeptime = 120 set warnsound = /LocalLibrary/Sounds/DiskspaceWarning.snd while( 1 ) set result = (`/bin/df | /bin/awk '$1 ~ /\/dev\/sd/ && $5 > 95 {printf "%s is nearly full (%s%% full)\n", $1, $5} ' `) # echo ${result} if ( $#result != 0) then /usr/ucb/logger -t "Shutdown alert" -p local1.alert ${result} /usr/bin/sndplay ${warnsound} endif /usr/bin/sleep ${sleeptime} end
Date: Sun 24-Dec-1991 17:13:35 From: bee@valve.heart.rri.uwo.ca (Bill E. Eickmeier) Subject: Re: Missing Dock after Reboot (was Re: Root problem) In article <1991Dec23.203947.292@nextdoor!john@netcom.com> john@nextdoor.com writes: >I've lost my dock and browser shelf configuration several times after >rebooting to shrink the swapfile. I use the "reboot" after becoming >superuser. I've noticed that the dock and browser shelf are lost *only* >when there is very little disk space left at the time I reboot ("No Space >available on hard disk"). And only *my* dock is affected; other user's >docks are not lost. > When you reboot while logged in, Workspace will try to save your dock, but if the disk is full, it won't be able to and your ~/.NeXT directory will be clobbered. OK, all together now, everyone do this: mkdir ~/Backup cp -r ~/.NeXT ~/Backup so that you can quickly and easily restore a resonable copy of your ~/.NeXT directory next time this happens... Bill Bill "Mr. Backup" Eickmeier, The John P. Robarts Research Institute P.O. Box 5015, 100 Perth Drive, Room 4-01.1, London, Ontario, N6A 5K8 519-663-5777 ext. 4406 fax:519-663-3789 bee@valve.heart.rri.uwo.ca
These are the contents of the former NiCE NeXT User Group NeXTSTEP/OpenStep software archive, currently hosted by Marcel Waldvogel and Netfuture.ch.