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I just updated to the 22.04 point release from 20.04, and noticed that my Google account in GNOME control center was not logged in (Geary wasn't able to connect to my email account).

When I try to add my Google account in GNOME Control Center, the pop-up window that should contain the Google sign-in screen instead shows a brief progress bar, but is eventually stuck on a blank screen. How might I resolve this?

blank pop-up window where the Google sign-in screen should be

I attempted the solution posted here (https://askubuntu.com/a/1385370), which suggested that it was a composting error. When running WEBKIT_DISABLE_COMPOSITING_MODE=1 gnome-control-center and then attempting to add the Google account, the Google sign-in screen does appear but is unresponsive to keyboard or mouse input, and quickly reverts back to the blank screen. I'm not sure what it means, but the output of the terminal window while doing this was:

EGLDisplay Initialization failed: EGL_NOT_INITIALIZED
Cannot create EGL context: invalid display (last error: EGL_SUCCESS)
sonocculturist
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3 Answers3

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After a little more digging, I finally solved my own problem with the help of the comment posted in this thread. I will add it here for others to find, since it seems to be a somewhat common problem that is only partly answered online in language that might be inaccessible to non-expert users.

It seems to be a problem with the Mesa graphics driver (possibly related to specific Intel GPUs). The solution is to try one of three driver overrides (iris, zink, or i965) when opening Online Accounts in the Control Center.

iris

$ MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=iris yelp

zink

$ MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=zink yelp

i965

$ MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=i965 yelp

I tested each of the above until the command returned a functioning Ubuntu Desktop Guide (yelp uses webview, making it a useful test case).

In the end, using the zink driver worked for me. In order to open Online Accounts and add your Google account (and other accounts using the webview function), run WEBKIT_DISABLE_COMPOSITING_MODE=1 MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=zink gnome-control-center online-accounts in Terminal and login to your account as normal.

If iris or i965 worked for you in opening Ubuntu Desktop Guide, simply add those to the driver override section of the code (WEBKIT_DISABLE_COMPOSITING_MODE=1 MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=iris gnome-control-center online-accounts or WEBKIT_DISABLE_COMPOSITING_MODE=1 MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=i965 gnome-control-center online-accounts, respectively).

Keep in mind that this is a temporary override to use the webview function. It would be great if someone who better understands the underlying issue was able to find a more permanent solution to this problem.

sonocculturist
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I have the same issue, and running online-accounts using the terminal give me some clues:

gnome-control-center online-accounts

When trying to add a google account, I get:

bwrap: Can't find source path /home/user/.local/share/webkitgtk/mediakeys: Permission denied

And in fact, webkitdtk and all its subfolders has the ownership set to root. I have changed to my user, and now is working fine. No clue why this folder is restricted to root on my ubuntu 22 installation, but seems that is affecting the online-accounts. Now I can use it correctly

King Midas
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Thank you. This worked on Debian 12 bookworm, on old Dell T5600 dependent on nouveau driver, and all the current openGL 3d, mesa, vulcan packages installed, and appear to work. Just as well because lack of NVIDIA support suggests I trash my card, when it isn't worth looking to pay for hardware upgrade, even if a supported card still exists for this old box.

And of course google online accounts shows a blank window. No doubt testing on old hardware like mine is never done nowadays.

The suggested OVERRIDE=zink command line, allowed login, verification, and after that the window is left hanging, and terminal posts lots of commandline error messages. Just closed the settings window. But evolution email login worked fine next try. I wonder how for how much longer google will try to kill the use of old PCs with changes towards using ever more incompatible graphics driver code.

Michael Rynn
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