[SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

Duke Nukem · 2025-05-27 09:46:18

Trawling though my hard drives to delete old installations and files, I found a colossal (22Gb) file named .xsession-errors in my Daedalus home directory. Some research told me this was an accumulation log of X window session errors, and that some applications are chattering to it all the time.

This https://www.daniloaz.com/en/how-to-prev … huge-size/ website explains it, although it says the file is emptied each time the GUI starts up, of which I am doubtful about because I have been rebooting in and out of Daedalus frequently lately while in the process of installing Peppermint OS (Devuan derivative) - unless this file grows at light speed.

Normally I suspend the PC between use and don't reboot, which the above link says can be the problem. It also says it can crash the PC when the partition fills, in which case it is a bit like the old WIndows 95 bug which we used to laugh about because it crashed Win95 after 49.7 days when some counter filled up - but no-one noticed because it invariably crashed for some other reason first.

Anyway, not being interested in reports about real or imaginary errors that I don't notice, I have followed a suggestion in that website by editing the /etc/X11/Xsession file, replacing the line

ERRFILE=$HOME/.xsession-errors

by

ERRFILE=/dev/null

This sends the error log into a black hole.

fsmithred · 2025-05-27 10:08:54

...until you ARE interested in the error log.

You could change the log daily and keep yesterday's log in case you need it. Make a user cron job that runs 'mv .xsession-errors .xsession-errors.old' once a day. (use the full path to the file)

MLEvD · 2025-05-27 12:47:24

You could temporarily send it to a tmpfs in ram, that way you can read your logs until you choose to power off, and if you run out of ram, you can visit them and delete as many GB of logram as you need.
This will keep unused ram locations warm and be more responsive than hdd logs.

greenjeans · 2025-05-27 15:07:06

To be clear:

Every time you boot up OR logout/logbackin, the system will do 3 things:

1. Create a brand new .xsession-erros for that session
2. Take the old file and and re-name it .xsession-errors.old
3. Delete the old .xsession-errors.old

You can delete any of the files manually and they won't be recreated for that session. Bleachbit is alo set up to delete both files.

@fsmithred is right, that file is aggravating at times, but can be very helpful when trying to diagnose errors while in session.

Do a fresh boot up, and then before doing anything else, check that file, it will tell you if there's errors during the process of setting up your session.

swanson · 2025-05-27 15:34:16

Or take a look at this crude script I use at boot:

#!/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

You'll always have the last ten boot-up logs available. I had a problem too with xsession-errors, but it was the Xfce weather applet gone crazy (bug).

golinux · 2025-05-27 15:43:07

After I update or (rarely) reboot, first thing I do is take a quick look a xsession-errors then delete it.

greenjeans · 2025-05-27 16:06:52

@golinux, I knew you'd chime in, you dislike that damn file as much as I do, lol. But unfortunately i've had to embrace it.

If it were not for that file, I wouldn't have found a nasty bug in the excalibur version of Mate/Caja that caused it to grow exponentially, causing me to file a bug report, that was actually acted upon immediately by upstream folks and subsequently fixed.

FYI though, I think Mate just likes to complain, even in stable daedalus it writes errors to that file constantly. Openbox is the only set-up so far i've been able to clear completely of errors. Openbox in a lot of ways is better than every DE out there.

For others reading, the name is a misnomer, yes errors get dropped there, but in normal use it simply catalogs events related to login, and then some subsequent operations also get cataloged in that file, if you don't have errors in operation then none get written.

pearmypie · 2025-05-28 14:57:38

A few days ago I replaced GNOME with KDE and I couldn't figure out why the X11 session wouldn't start. Without the xsession-errors file I would have never figured out what was wrong. (I deleted some packages used by autostart scripts)

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#1 2025-05-27 09:46:18

[SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#2 2025-05-27 10:08:54

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#3 2025-05-27 12:47:24

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#4 2025-05-27 15:07:06

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#5 2025-05-27 15:34:16

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#6 2025-05-27 15:43:07

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#7 2025-05-27 16:06:52

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

#8 2025-05-28 14:57:38

Re: [SOLVED] .xsession-errors file

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