Pixinsight wont start on Ubuntu 20.10

Halli

New member
Hi

I have been using Pixinsight for a while on Ubuntu and also Windows. However, after a recent install of the latest Ubuntu release 20.10 it wouldn't launch. The download process from the software distribution centre appeared to work ok and also the extraction and install process worked ok. A Pixinsight icon also appeared in the Ubuntu applications area as normal. However on trying to launch it from the icon it wouldnt launch. I also tried from the terminal with the same result with the following error message


This application failed to start because no Qt platform plugin could be initialized. Reinstalling the application may fix this problem.

Available platform plugins are: eglfs (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), linuxfb (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), minimal (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), minimalegl (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), offscreen (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), vnc (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), wayland-egl (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), wayland (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), wayland-xcomposite-egl (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), wayland-xcomposite-glx (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), webgl (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), xcb (from /opt/PixInsight/bin/lib/qt-plugins/platforms), eglfs, linuxfb, minimal, minimalegl, offscreen, vnc, wayland-egl, wayland, wayland-xcomposite-egl, wayland-xcomposite-glx, webgl, xcb.


I tried a re-installation but the same thing happened.

I have used Pixinsight on many versions of ubuntu the last one being Kubuntu with a KDE plasma desktop and also 20.04 but it has always worked and I find the performance is better than on Windows

Has anyone else experienced this ? Can anyone help with a solution please? as I am completely stuck !

Thanks in anticipation
 
This is a well-known problem caused by a lacking dependency on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS.

To solve this issue, execute this command:

sudo apt install libxcb-xinerama0

Now PixInsight should run perfectly on your Linux box. Remember that PixInsight is incompatible with the nouveau graphics driver, so if your machine is still using nouveau, you'll have to remove it to use the proprietary NVIDIA driver.
 
Thank you very much Juan that has worked and Pixinsight now launches ok on Ubuntu. However when I try and update the application it fails - I also found that this happened on the previous version of Ubuntu I was using.

The updates download successfully but then when you close Pixinsight down and request the updates to be installed the update system starts and eventually restarts Pixinsight after a minute or so and an error message appears which states the update process has failed. The details are as follows:-

2020-11-09 20:44:14] Begin updater1

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] *******************************************************************************

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] This is PixInsight Updater stage one program version 01.00.12

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] Core application PID : 29254

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] Target application directory : /opt/PixInsight

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] Source update directory : /tmp/PixInsight64-update/contents

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] *******************************************************************************

[2020-11-09 20:44:14] Waiting for the PixInsight Core application to terminate...

[2020-11-09 20:45:14] *** Error: Maximum wait time elapsed (60 seconds) - aborting.

[2020-11-09 20:45:14] End updater1: ERROR


Any ideas on how to solve this please ?

Thanks
 
This cannot be reproduced. In fact, all of our workstations are now using Ubuntu 18.04 and 20.04, and everything works without problems. Are you sure you are not using the nouveau graphics driver?
 
Hi Juan

I checked my drivers and yes I was using thee nouveau graphics driver ! I have now installed the NVIDIA drivers and it looks as if the update has worked - fingers crossed.......

Thanks for your advice
 
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