41

My Google Chrome app freezes when I select a file from an HTML input tag of type "file".

This is a very simple code to reproduce the error:

https://jsfiddle.net/aL4e6n29/

After I select any file, and even if I click on cancel, the Chrome window becomes unresponsive. I cannot click on anything, change the tab or close the windows.

I tried to disable "Use hardware acceleration when available", but it doesn't solve the problem.

System:

  • Chrome Version 100.0.4896.127 (Official Build) (64-bit)
  • Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
  • HP HP ProBook 450 G8 Notebook PC*
  • Mesa Intel® Xe Graphics (TGL GT2)
0

7 Answers 7

61

Check the bug report here: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chromium-browser/+bug/1970148

As proposed by Olivier Tilloy in the bug report, the command

sudo apt install xdg-desktop-portal-gnome

solved my problem.

I am using Ubuntu 22.04 on Xorg with Nvidia card.

15
  • 6
    Thanks! it works
    – FabioDev
    Apr 27, 2022 at 12:52
  • 3
    I've tried this and didn't work here. Ubuntu 22.04 on Xorg as well. The error only occurs when I'm using Brave, Firefox and Chrome are fine. May 2, 2022 at 23:36
  • 5
    I already had xdg-desktop-portal-gnome installed and still faced this problem. Disabling hardware acceleration on Chrome fixed it for me.
    – kgx
    Jun 13, 2022 at 11:10
  • 1
    This didn't work for me and a also had hardware acceleration already disabled.
    – Rafael-WO
    Jun 21, 2022 at 10:58
  • 2
    fixed after reboot Jun 23, 2022 at 11:10
12

As I reported here in launchpad, and many user confirmed, the solution proposed do not always work. Probably this error can be caused by different setups and configurations.

In particular installing xdg-desktop-portal-gnome or disabling hardware acceleration didn't worked for me.

For those cases, I found a solution here:

Basically I used dconf-editor to turn to false org/gnome/desktop/sound/input-feedkback-sounds and this solved the problem.

Hope it helps.

2
  • +1, this worked instantly, whereas the xdg-desktop-portal-gnome was already installed and turning hw acceleration of is a no-go. Thanks!
    – Bachi
    Feb 6 at 17:45
  • This is one of the true "WTF" linux moments, that worked for me as well for 23.04. Worth to notice that I didn't had the input-feedkback-sounds conf in place, so writing the command created it and set it to false. I guess that is true by default. dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/sound/input-feedback-sounds false works as well without installing an extra unneccessary tool
    – MacK
    Jun 14 at 11:12
5

dconf-editor solved this problem for me after turning "org/gnome/desktop/sound/input-feedkback-sounds" to "false".

You can install the dconf-editor by using the following command:

sudo apt-get install dconf-editorand then type dconf-editor in the terminal a pop-up window will open for dconf-editor and the nyou can navigate to the appropriate path and the n turn off the required setting then the problem is solved.

3
  • Thank for the clear explaination. it was the good solution for me Mar 20 at 7:03
  • dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/sound/input-feedback-sounds false works as well without installing an extra unneccessary tool
    – MacK
    Jun 14 at 11:13
  • worked for me too
    – sureshvv
    Oct 29 at 5:11
2

Neither of the two suggestions (xdg-desktop-portal-gnome nor disable hardware acceleration) quite works for me. What I find is that I simply have to toggle disable hardware acceleration on and off at some point in my session. If I don't do that, the reported issue appears. The window completely freezes after a file upload dialog.

Version 104.0.5112.79 (Official Build) (64-bit) Ubuntu Description: Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS

I do not experience this issue if I use google-chrome-beta on the same platform.

I hope that proves helpful to someone.

1
  • I find if I wait it out, like 5 minutes, it unfreezes, so I am trying to see who is sucking down the CPU all that time, if top is updating. I just got multiple freezes using gnucash showing a report, plus lots of dialog popups not responding kill or wait. Chrome with acceleration disabled (weird that there is such a control!) was running but all 4 windows minimized, also minimized libreoffice first screen, boinc manager, pulseaudio, disks, nautilus, gnome-terminal. Aug 18, 2022 at 17:22
2

Disabling hardware acceleration and restarting Google Chrome (v104) solved it for me. I wish there would be a better solution.

2
  • Where you do disable hardware acceleration?
    – warmwhisky
    Oct 7, 2022 at 9:05
  • Click on the three dots on the right of your browser window, select "Settings" > "System" and you should see a Checkbox that you can disable: "Use hardware acceleration if possible". A Chrome-restart is required.
    – anty
    Oct 7, 2022 at 10:14
0

As someone mentioned in https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gtk+3.0/+bug/1970047/comments/9

Running gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.sound input-feedback-sounds false seems to be fixing the issue. It worked for me as well

0

Even with org.gnome.desktop.sound input-feedback-sounds = false, Chrome hangs (for me) when it calls the native file chooser.

This page gave me an idea: https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=716892

which refers to the GTK_MODULES env variable. I am using Linux MATE, and its system-wide GTK_MODULES var = canberra-gtk-module. So I edited the /opt/google/chrome/google-chrome shell script (as root) and added this line:

unset GTK_MODULES

near the top. Now run Chrome normally and the hang after file chooser problem is gone.

Based on what I read, canberra-gtk-module connects GTK apps like Chrome to event sounds. Apparently the file chooser can call an event sound which will or may work if GTK_MODULES var = canberra-gtk-module. Unsetting that env. var apparently should mean no event sounds when using Chrome. I never heard such sounds before with the file chooser, but there are still event sounds with when adjusting volume, and video sound still works fine. So I don't really understand why the freeze happens; I'm guessing it's not a Chrome problem.

The above is not a great solution though, since that shell script can get replaced by an update.

Note: I didn't try installing xdg-desktop-portal-gnome because MATE doesn't use Gnome-shell and it would have installed a bunch of packages I didn't want in MATE.

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