#!/bin/bash
for i in {9..1}; do
    if [[ -f /home/$USER/.xsession-errors.${i} ]]; then
        mv -f /home/$USER/.xsession-errors.${i} /home/svensson/.xsession-errors.$((i+1))
    fi
done

And in Xfce autostart run it as script at shutdown. At boot doesn't work since the file won't be written to. For some reason.

*sigh* It should not need to be a post-install hack!

The package manager should know which locale(s) are relevant and not even waste bandwidth on those files to begin with.

Of course, we each have our own opinion, undeniable, since it is subjective.

Regards.

Logs should be disabled by default, and the user should be able to enable a specific one when setting up.

I disagree, logs are extremely useful and shouldn't use much disk space... So long as they're not full of almost-always-irrelevant warning and debug spam, which release builds of well written software shouldn't be generating to begin with.

IME most of that comes from GUI toolkits and DE related components, because for some reason leaving debug messages on and not actually fixing warnings that appear on pretty much every system is what you do when writing GUI applications. Out of sight, out of mind.

The session manager / .xsession-errors is really just doing what it's supposed to do, catching stdout/stderr that would otherwise go into the void. Not X's fault if your apps won't STFU.
Imagine if CLI apps barfed all over stderr like that, you'd never get anything done.

You don't, which is why localepurge has been a thing for decades.

FWIW, kdebugsettings still exists in current KDE/Plasma, and has a bunch of new features to boot (custom rules & groups, load/save settings etc.).
IIRC there's no obvious menu entry for it though, so you need to call it from a terminal or krunner.

This is Trinity's log management tool, a legacy of KDE.
https://i.postimg.cc/T1M4mvKf/14.jpg

Very nice tool.

#!/bin/sh

### BEGIN INIT INFO
# Provides: /home/$USER/bin/logrotator for .xsession-errors
# Required-Start: $syslog
# Required-Stop:  $syslog
# Default-Start:  0 6
# Default-Stop:   3 4 5
# Description: Rotate .xsession-errors as user $USER, creates backups. Should run at shutdown only without X
### END INIT INFO

#. /lib/lsb/init-functions

case "$1" in
  start)
	touch /run/logrotator.pid
	chmod 600 /run/logrotator.pid
	chown $USER:65534 /run/logrotator.pid
	sudo -u $USER /home/$USER/bin/logrotator
	;;
 stop)
	killall logrotator
        ;;
  *)
        echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME start" >&2
        exit 3
        ;;
esac

Actual script (home/$USER/bin/logrotator):

#!/bin/bash
for i in {9..1}; do
    if [[ -f /home/$USER/.xsession-errors.${i} ]]; then
        mv -f /home/$USER/.xsession-errors.${i} /home/$USER/.xsession-errors.$((i+1))
    fi
done
mv -f /home/$USER/.xsession-errors /home/$USER/.xsession-errors.1
touch /home/$USER/.xsession-errors
##Might not be needed:
chown $USER:$GROUP /home/$USER/.xsession-errors

Edit $USER and $GROUP to taste.

PS. As you can see, I do not know what I'm doing, so don't try this at home.

Hello:

In my opinion, there's no need to keep .xsession.errors files.

They are generated every time the xserver is started and the last one is appended to the previous one, which is why it can grow to huge sizes.

....
That said, even with that setup, much if not all of the information shown is of no value to the average desktop user.
ie: not a maintainer/developer.

In my case, practically all of it is made up of (endessly repeating) Gtk-WARNING entries for which the only solution would seem to be some fix in a future version of Gtk (?).

Agree, but scripting is fun for an amateur. And once in a while the xsession-errors might be a saviuor. (every Blue Moon maybe)

...much if not all of the information shown is of no value to the average desktop user...

Who would convey this idea to the developers!
All these logs that are useless to users waste hardware resources and, ultimately, electricity.
Logs should be disabled by default, and the user should be able to enable a specific one when setting up.
In my experience, a correctly assembled distribution works out of the box without any fuss.

Linux is full of such things.
Try to look at the size occupied on your computer by the word “copyright” or a bunch of identical license files.
Or another example, why do I need the default "man" pages in 37 languages?

In my opinion, there's no need to keep .xsession.errors files.

They are generated every time the xserver is started and the last one is appended to the previous one, which is why it can grow to huge sizes.

Limiting the .xsession-errors file to any size you deem suitable while keeping the last NNN lines will get you all the information you may need/want to see if you are up to doing some serious debugging.

That said, even with that setup, much if not all of the information shown is of no value to the average desktop user.
ie: not a maintainer/developer.

In my case, practically all of it is made up of (endessly repeating) Gtk-WARNING entries for which the only solution would seem to be some fix in a future version of Gtk (?).

eg:

(wrapper-2.0:2996): Gtk-WARNING **: 06:29:35.182: Theme parsing error: <data>:1:49: The style property GtkWidget:focus-padding is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version
--- snip ---
(volumeicon:2859): Gtk-WARNING **: 06:29:34.463: Theme parsing error: gtk-widgets.css:1344:25: The style property GtkRange:slider-width is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version
--- snip ---
(Firefox-esr:3339): Gtk-WARNING **: 06:30:12.326: Theme parsing error: gtk-widgets.css:1347:28: The style property GtkRange:stepper-spacing is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version

In the five or so years I have dealt with the .xsession-errors file, I've only found one warning I was able to fix.
It was related to a double-buffer setting in the conky.conf file, a mistake on my part when editing/adding some modifications.

As always, YMMV.

Best,

A.

... By the way, I've noticed that when using lightdm, it automatically clears .xsession-errors after a session ends, a new file is created when a new session is started, and the old one is renamed to ..xsession-errors.old

KDE3 and Trinity previously also left one old file. Now with Trinity there is only one .xsession-errors in the home folder.

Create a file like this in /etc/logrotate.d/my-xsession-errors

$HOME/.xsession-errors {
missingok 
notifempty 
copytruncate
compress  
weekly  
rotate 5
}

This will rotate the file weekly and keep 5 old files. Edit to your needs.

EDIT: added copytruncate because sometimes when the .xsession-errors file get renewed, it is not written to anymore (in that session).

OTOH, if you don't want anything written to it, why not just 'chattr +i .xsession-errors'? That's kind of what the immutable attribute is for.

Thanks for the advice. By the way, I've noticed that when using lightdm, it automatically clears .xsession-errors after a session ends, a new file is created when a new session is started, and the old one is renamed to ..xsession-errors.old

I chose ralph.ronnquist's no 2 script and running it manually for now.

[FIXME] UNCLASSIFIED DEVICE name: wakeup11 type: (null) subsystem: wakeup driver:...

Advice from the admin of the Pclinuxos forum -"is information for developers, ignore it."