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I'm trying to open System Settings but it won't open in any way.
Using GUI, Settings are trying to load for a moment and then they are gone.
Using Terminal (gnome-control-center), I get:

(gnome-control-center:8823): GLib-ERROR **: 14:44:15.433: ../../../glib/gmem.c:138: failed to allocate 13477064712 bytes
Trap Trace/breakpoint (core dumped)

I tried:

sudo apt-get remove gnome-control-center
sudo apt autoremove
sudo apt-get install gnome-control-center

With multiple reboots, but I had no result.

UPDATE!: Same errors persist BUT, when I type:

sudo gnome-control-center

(instead of just "gnome-control-center") suddenly System Settings appear! Is it a user permissions issue? Any suggestions?

UPDATE#2: After some system updates, sudo gnome-control-center now spawns "Segmentation fault".
pomsky
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Zerthimon
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9 Answers9

14

Finally I found a solution!
The cause of this problem was pop-theme, that I installed once, plus its repository entry, that provided me the broken System settings (gnome-control-center). In order to solve this:

  1. I installed Ubuntu desktop PPA.

    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-desktop/ppa

  2. I removed all System76/pop (and other trush) entries, with update-manager, leaving Ubuntu desktop the only one active. update-manager

  3. Now that I have the proper repository entry added, I re-install gnome-control-center.

    sudo apt install --reinstall gnome-control-center

  4. Enjoy Gnome System settings!

Zerthimon
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9

I had the same issue. I was able to fix by removing the GNOME extension/theme which caused the issue and then running:

sudo apt install --reinstall gnome-control-center
Eliah Kagan
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Aranganathan
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5
sudo apt install ppa-purge

For the next step the PPA has to be active.

sudo ppa-purge ppa:system76/pop

This removes packages from this PPA if they are not available from Ubuntu repositories, or reverts to Ubuntu package versions.

Zanna
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nobody
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4

Hmm... a variant of this:

  • Ubuntu 20.04.1 LTS
  • No Pop!_OS' PPA - present.
  • sudo gnome-control-center # worked, from a terminal/shell,
    but not so without 'sudo', no GLib-ERROR, with no output at all.
  • "Ubuntu software" - also affected, didn't try 'sudo' there though.
  • dconf reset -f /org/gnome/control-center/ didn't appear to help.
  • Neither did the apt --reinstall below.

Remedy:

  • Reboot into "recovery console"
    hit ESC ONCE after the BIOS displays to get to the boot menu)

  • run the "dpkg" option to install / fix packages
    this brought in a gcc1 -thingie, didn't pay attention to exactly what*

  • also run fsck option

  • enable networking

  • drop to root prompt,
    press ENTER one extra time at the extra prompt

  • run:

$ apt-get install -f --reinstall gnome-control-center gnome-control-center-data
$ reboot

Note:
Remedy worked only as it was run in recovery mode.

Hannu
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3

What worked for me was resetting all configurations of the control-center with the following command:

dconf reset -f /org/gnome/control-center/

This works until I click on "Display" in "System Settings". Then it stops working and I need to run the command again.

This was tested on Ubuntu 20.04.1 LTS (x86_64).

Nmath
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Chaman Narved
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2

I faced the same issue on 20.04. I clearly remember at the time of Ubuntu installation system settings was working perfectly, but out of nowhere this problem arose. What i did:

  1. Reset the gnome-control-center by sudo dconf reset -f /org/gnome-control-center (but the problem didn’t go away).
  2. Then I tried to access settings through the terminal by typing gnome-control-center, but it said I don’t have this installed.
  3. After installing gnome-control-center by sudo apt install gnome-control-center I rebooted and it fixed my problem.
karel
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m.h.sun
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1

I had the same problem and looking at the question and answers here, I checked gnome-control-center in the terminal and it was not installed. Installing it solved the problem. I have no idea what happened.

moddayjob
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1

Gnome-control-center is not able to load if any of key is not found. kindly run below commands.

sudo rm -rfv /home/kali/.config/dconf
sudo apt install gnome-control-center --reinstall

Now check the same.

Mr. Linux
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1

If you find yourself coming back here every now and then, you can always make a shell script to make your life easier:

nano ~/Desktop/settings-fix

Ctrl+C this:

echo "You again  !?";
echo "Alright, lemme fix that for you  !";
sudo apt install --reinstall gnome-control-center;
echo "You're good to go ";
echo "More here  https://askubuntu.com/questions/1245159/system-settings-wont-open-on-ubuntu-20-04-lts-after-adding-system76-pop-ppa";

Ctrl+Shift + V it in the text editor

Ctrl+Shift + O to save

Ctrl+Shift + X to close the editor

In your terminal:

chmod 744 ./Desktop/settings-fix

sudo cp ~/Desktop/settings-fix /usr/bin

Now whenever you run to this again, you can simply run from your terminal:

settings-fix
Omar Trkzi
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