Ridiculous tray icon bug

[defa1]

Hi,

I installed Core a month ago on Linux Mint 19.3 Cinnamon, downloaded the blockchain and pruned it. For a while everything worked fine until suddenly the tray icon disappeared. I went to Options -> Windows only to see that 'Hide tray icon' is selected and greyed out and that 'Minimize to the tray instead of task bar ' is also greyed out (but not selected). So know I have to keep it minimized in the taskbar where it only takes up unnecessary space.

It seems the problem started when I tried to set up an Electrum Personal Server, because before I could minimize to the tray instead of the task bar...

I've since deleted the files in usr/local/bin (which were all bitcoin core related) and also deleted ~/.bitcoin

I've reinstalled Bitcoin Core and the problem hasn't gone away. I checked right after I running it the first time and yes, it's greyed out again.

Obviously I'm relatively new to Linux and there is probably a simply and obvious solution that I'm missing.

I would be very grateful if somebody would be able to help me.

[Pmalek]

It might be a Cinnamon-related bug as I have seen some posts mentioning that elsewhere. Take a look at this, it is quite a long read but hopefully you might find what you are looking for there. The issue was resolved and closed.

https://github.com/linuxmint/cinnamon/issues/8771

[HCP]

Have you checked your bitcoin.conf file? You can set some of the User Interface Options in there, like minimizetotray... and if it's set there as minimizetotray=0, it might set the ones in the GUI to be greyed out so that it can't be changed.

But I'm kinda grasping at straws on this one tbh. A very strange issue indeed!

[Abdussamad]

Have you checked your bitcoin.conf file? You can set some of the User Interface Options in there, like minimizetotray... and if it's set there as minimizetotray=0, it might set the ones in the GUI to be greyed out so that it can't be changed.

But I'm kinda grasping at straws on this one tbh. A very strange issue indeed!

he deleted his data dir so the conf file went with it

[HCP]

Assuming it was just using the default ".bitcoin" datadir and not a custom location, that he then "reinstalled" into...

[defa1]

@pmalek I'll take a look thanks! if it's a problem with cinnamon it's very strange that the option is greyed out in Core however. I've noticed that the Zoom tray icon has also disappeared, but the Microsoft Teams icon has not. I've literally deleted every bitcoin related file on my computer and reinstalled and it's still greyed out. wtf

@Abdussamad bitcoin.conf is empty, I assume you mean bitcoin-qt.conf? I have indeed checked and this is the result (bold by me):

[General]
MainWindowGeometry=@ByteArray(\x1\xd9\xd0\xcb\0\x2\0\0\0\0\x3\xc0\0\0\x1\xa1\0\0\x6\xaf\0\0\x3\xd2\0\0\x3\xc0\0\0\x1\xba\0\0\x6\xaf\0\0\x3\xd2\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\n\0)
RPCConsoleWindowGeometry=@ByteArray(\x1\xd9\xd0\xcb\0\x2\0\0\0\0\x3\x8e\0\0\x1\xec\0\0\x6q\0\0\x3\x99\0\0\x3\x8e\0\0\x1\xec\0\0\x6q\0\0\x3\x99\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\n\0)
addrProxy=127.0.0.1:9050
addrSeparateProxyTor=127.0.0.1:9050
bPrune=false
bSpendZeroConfChange=true
fCoinControlFeatures=false
fFeeSectionMinimized=true
fHideTrayIcon=false
fListen=false
fMinimizeOnClose=false
fMinimizeToTray=false
fReset=false
fRestartRequired=false
fUseProxy=false
fUseSeparateProxyTor=false
fUseUPnP=false
language=
nConfTarget=6
nDatabaseCache=450
nDisplayUnit=0
nFeeRadio=0
nPruneSize=2
nSettingsVersion=190100
nSmartFeeSliderPosition=0
nThreadsScriptVerif=0
nTransactionFee=1000
strDataDir=/home/user/.bitcoin
strThirdPartyTxUrls=

As you can see, fHideTrayIcon=false despite the fact that the option is checked in the GUI!? I've tried setting it to true and restarted Core but it doesn't change anything. If set fMinimizeToTray=false to true it does minimize to tray but there isn't a tray icon so I have to kill it using the command line.

EDIT: I'm considering pressing 'Reset options'. Just to be sure, this won't delete any blockchain data I've downloaded right?

[HCP]

No... I was talking about bitcoin.conf... there is an option in that that allows you to specify the "minimise to tray" option... I think bitcoin-qt.conf is some sort of OS specific configuration file, because on Windows... all those "f" and "n" values are all located in the Registry... there is no bitcoin-qt.conf.

It seems more and more like this is an OS/Desktop environment problem, and not a Bitcoin Core issue, per se.

Is there anything in the OS settings/control panel that deals with tray icons etc?

[defa1]

The bitcoin.conf file is empty, I guess on Linux this is done through the bitcoin-qt.conf file... I've tried adding fHideTrayIcon=false to bitcoin.conf but it didn't do anything. I'm inclined to agree it's a problem with Cinnamon, but why are the options then greyed out in Bitcoin Core? You would think that if it was purely an issue with Cinnamon it wouldn't reflect in Bitcoin Core... I've checked the tray/panel settings but there doesn't seem to be anything there that I can do about it. I've restarted Cinnamon also.

It's not a major problem, I moved Core to a different Workspace, but it just makes me think that if this isn't working as it should then maybe something else that's way more important isn't working as it should either.

I'm not using Core as a wallet so I can live with the Workspace solution I guess. If Core held any funds it would be a different story.

Thanks everyone for the replies

[HCP]

The bitcoin.conf file is empty, I guess on Linux this is done through the bitcoin-qt.conf file... I've tried adding fHideTrayIcon=false to bitcoin.conf but it didn't do anything.

No, by default, bitcoin.conf is empty, you'd need to add the option yourself. Note that bitcoin-qt.conf is a completely different and separate file and used for different things!

It's not a major problem, I moved Core to a different Workspace, but it just makes me think that if this isn't working as it should then maybe something else that's way more important isn't working as it should either.

So, it works OK when it's in a different Workspace? or are you just using the other workspace to hide the icon?

It's somewhat common problem if you use linux, even though usually it's annoying UI bug/glitch. Developer don't test their software across different linux distro or different DE.

I don't think it's a Bitcoin Core bug tho... as I fired up a Linux Mint Cinnamon VM and installed Bitcoin Core v0.19.1 on it... and it works fine. I can see the the minimise to tray options, they're "clickable" and function as they should:



There must be something about defa1's setup that has changed the options for the notification tray.

[defa1]

@HCP I'm using a different workspace to hide the icon.