Flatpaks are randomly not launching

Randomly, my Flatpak apps will not open. If I restart my computer multiple times, after an arbitrary number of restarts, Flatpaks will open again.

I’m newer to Fedora / Linux desktop so I’m not really sure where to start diagnosing this issue.

I’m using Fedora 40 KDE.

When I try to launch the Flatpak app, it shows up in the task bar and the icon shows jumping next to the cursor, and then both disappear and the app never actually opens. If I go to system monitor, it shows running as an application but using almost no resources.

I have tried:

  • Completely uninstalling and reinstalling Flatpak.
  • Running sudo flatpak repair
  • Uninstalling and reinstalling specific applications
  • Installing a completely new flatpak app not previously installed

None of the above seem to help.

Flatpak version: Flatpak 1.15.8
Kernel version: 6.8.11-300.fc40.x86_64

If anyone could provide some assistance I’d greatly appreciate it.

1 Like

Make sure the app isn’t running (flatpak ps). If it is, kill it with flatpak kill APP_ID.

Then run flatpak run -vv APP_ID and share the output if it fails to open.

For some reason that does not kill any app.

REDACTED@fedora:~$ flatpak ps
Instance   PID Application               Runtime
1845784000 0   io.github.shiftey.Desktop org.freedesktop.Platform
3529819353 0   io.github.shiftey.Desktop org.freedesktop.Platform
REDACTED@fedora:~$ flatpak kill io.github.shiftey.Desktop 
Killed
REDACTED@fedora:~$ flatpak ps
Instance   PID Application               Runtime
1845784000 0   io.github.shiftey.Desktop org.freedesktop.Platform
3529819353 0   io.github.shiftey.Desktop org.freedesktop.Platform
REDACTED@fedora:~$

I was able to kill it using the system monitor to send a kill signal.

Here is the output when trying to run the app:

REDACTED@fedora:~$ flatpak ps
REDACTED@fedora:~$ flatpak run -vv io.github.shiftey.Desktop 
F: No installations directory in /etc/flatpak/installations.d. Skipping
F: Opening system flatpak installation at path /var/lib/flatpak
F: Opening user flatpak installation at path /home/REDACTED/.local/share/flatpak
F: Opening user flatpak installation at path /home/REDACTED/.local/share/flatpak
F: Opening system flatpak installation at path /var/lib/flatpak
F: Skipping parental controls check for app/io.github.shiftey.Desktop/x86_64/stable since parental controls are disabled globally
F: Opening user flatpak installation at path /home/REDACTED/.local/share/flatpak
F: Opening system flatpak installation at path /var/lib/flatpak
F: /var/lib/flatpak/runtime/org.freedesktop.Platform/x86_64/23.08/5c42c3852c2efc6a4aae64cb878acee8c9f3ef0810a228438ceadd3e93ec657f/files/lib32 does not exist
F: Allocated instance id 1751234664
F: Add defaults in dir /io/github/shiftey/Desktop/
F: Add locks in dir /io/github/shiftey/Desktop/
F: Allowing host-fs access
F: Trying to export read/write: /home
F: /home is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /home
F: Trying to export read/write: /afs
F: /afs is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /afs
F: Trying to export read/write: /lost+found
F: /lost+found is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /lost+found
F: Trying to export read/write: /media
F: /media is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /media
F: Trying to export read/write: /mnt
F: /mnt is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /mnt
F: Trying to export read/write: /opt
F: /opt is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /opt
F: Trying to export read/write: /srv
F: /srv is not a symlink
F: Will export read/write: /srv
F: Trying to export read/write: /keybase

So I noticed it hung up at keybase. I uninstalled keybase and it seems to be launching flatpaks now. I guess I need to look into something else for file sync.

This is:

2 Likes

You can run Keybase without KBFS. I added KEYBASE_NO_KBFS to my autostart file at ~/.config/autostart/keybase_autostart.desktop as follows …

Exec=env KEYBASE_NO_KBFS=1 KEYBASE_AUTOSTART=1 run_keybase