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**yodamin** · Dec 19, 2022, 07:20 PM

Here are some screenshots showing the issue.

the first one I upload is taken before leaving for the day/work
the second one is returning from work
the 3rd one is just after I woke up..Monday morning I think it was...
the 4th is a couple days latter with no reboots/lock screens - middle monitor, my primary, has no taskbar, icons, the only thing the way I left it is the background color - I do not use wallpaper. So, like usual I rebooted, then fixed everything.
--I just stood up and left the PC copying files with all power saving features turned off. That was last night around 10PM.
The 2nd last one is today arriving home from work.
The last one is this morning: 2.5 days no reboot, no lock screen, monitors go black after some time (monitor sleep I guess - it is not the OS doing this) and the monitor with all the capture and desktsuff folders?There is only two folders - the rest are duplicates.
This morning I am rebooting and crossing fingers that everything is going to be OK afterwards. The middle monitor has no icons (it should have some) and the right click menu on the desktop does not appear when I try to activate it - the taskbar was missing from this monitor and I re-added it yesterday - it seems ot be working fine after I re-added it.

Attached Files

**yodamin** · Dec 20, 2022, 05:19 AM

Funny thing is : this has been happening on KDE since 2014 AFAIK - during my web searches I found posts from people who experienced this issue since 2014 right on up through to today.
I posted almost this same post in the KDE and Plasma forums and got exactly the same response - nothing, no one even commented that it was an ongoing bug for the past 9 years and everyone seems to clam up whenever someone mentions it.

I mean..WTF?

**claydoh** · Dec 20, 2022, 07:05 AM

It is somewhat rare-ish and random, and depends on the user base having a wider adoption of multi-monitor systems.
Look on Reddit with its much larger user base than the tiny one here or KDE's small user forum, and you will see more instances quite recently, and relevant and recent bug reports on at least some aspects of your problems.
https://www.reddit.com/r/kde/
I haven't seen anyone have a universal workaround sort of fix.

Plus:
https://pointieststick.com/2022/12/1...-multi-screen/
and
https://notmart.org/blog/2022/12/multi-screen/

All I can say is they are working on it.

But instead of recreating the setup from scratch, you could just back up the relevant configs and restore them, a simple script
You might also just need to restart plasmashell to get your panels back, Just use krunner (alt-f2 or alt-space) and enter plasmashell --replace

**yodamin** · Dec 20, 2022, 04:05 PM

Claydoh - tyvm. This is golden to me "(alt-f2 or alt-space) and enter plasmashell --replace"

I AM a newbie to Linux no matter how much experience i have with old distributions and Windows so thank you from the bottom of my heart - it has been added to my "list of things to do to fix various Linux issues" notes and printed - for those times I can't remember dpkg --configure or fsck /path/to/device

**yodamin** · Dec 20, 2022, 04:08 PM

Just as another example - my days long copying process finally finished late last night so this morning I rebooted and everything was fixed again...I locked my PC and went to work.9 hours later I come home and the desktop looks like it does in the screenshot below - I only have five icons on the left monitor and two on the right monitor - oddly enough this NEVER happens to the primary monitor - the primary monitor randomly gets enabled unchecked and loses panels instead :-)

Attached Files

**claydoh** · Dec 20, 2022, 05:07 PM

Are the two screens, left and right, displaying the contents of a directory (you have files and folders there), or just application icons/widgets you have placed there? I can't tell.

First you might try disabling Kscreen2 via System Settings, in Background Services, at least to keep screen assignments from changing.
Delete ~/.local/share/kscreen/ for good measure, especially if you want to experiment and re-enable this.

What you might be able to do to quicken the 'repair' process is to make a copy of ~/.config/plasma-org.kde.plasma.desktop-appletsrc when your screens and panels are set as you like them.

Then, when you have a no-panel, messed-up icon situatiion, you can use krunner a bit more:
use it to open dolphin
then use it to make sure plasmashell is not running:kquitapp5 plasmashell
replace that config file you copied, and start plasmashell , either with --replace or kstart5 plasmashell

You may notice krunner has a memory, so once you start typing in this command initially, it should pop up as a suggestion as you type it out next time

This can be easily scripted top make it a double-click quickie

I think this config file has not only your panel setup, but also your icons, which I believe are the widget type, as opposed to the physical file-in-a-folder type. if they are physical files and folders, I think disabling Kscreen may help keep screen assignments from changing, as well as the config file keepiong specific files in specific locations. Another option there would be to assign each screen to point to a different, unique folder in your home dir, if they are all set to the default -- your /Desktop dir.

**yodamin** · Apr 20, 2023, 05:05 AM

My apologies for not noticing this reply MUCH earlier and ty to Claydoh for it!
I believe I received the notification email for it but I had just got laid off from work and was much busier with the Xmas season and getting my resumes back out there.

NOT widgets - folder display - unless the TRASH icon is a widget (I dragged and dropped it from Dolphin) the rest is folder display. IN Desktop Folder settings it is "Folder View" that is selected and not "Desktop"

This issue resolved itself with updates/upgrades by the system.
However, since then there have been about 6 upgrades and it has reared it's ugly head once in a while.

I will take the steps you outlined above and implement them tonight.
I have been using ChatGPT to write bash scripts for me as I am NOT a programmer nor do I know any scripting languages.
With the help of Chatgpt I am starting to become more familiar but I am also older and not really interested in learning it now so it IS slow going.
The older I get the more I just want to make crap outta wood, care for my property and do fun stuff with my wife and out dog :-).
IT jobs are becoming a PITA and it is only for the money now.
IF I could retired today I would do it immediately.

Thanks again and cheers all!

**Schwarzer Kater** · Apr 20, 2023, 06:55 AM

You could give Kubuntu 23.04 a try (as you already use an interim release…) - it has been released today and ships with: kernel 6.2.x, Plasma 5.27.4, Frameworks 5.104 and Gear 22.12.3.
And in Plasma 5.27 several multi-monitor-issues should have been fixed.

PS: If you do a release-upgrade from your current installation - better erase the contents of $HOME/.cache/ afterwards and before working with the new Plasma version (from a tty cd && sudo rm -r .cache/* )

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Duplicate icons on desktop

Duplicate icons on desktop

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