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I installed MATE on my Antergos Desktop and right clicked on the panel → reset panel. Since then it has disappeared completely.

I have tried pretty much every mate-panel command combinations such as

  • --layout default.layout
  • --reset
  • --replace

and also tried pacman -Rn mate mate-extra and then reinstalling.

Now when I run mate-panel I get this warning :

** (mate-panel:2502): WARNING **: 11:14:32.089: Cant find the layout file!

Where should this layout file be for mate-panel to find it?

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  • While I don't know the answer to this, it's possible to install mate-tweak, open it and use the GUI way :/
    – Albin
    Dec 11, 2018 at 23:52

3 Answers 3

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Unsolved: how it happened. Solution: Open a terminal (right click on the desktop background). Enter user command: mate-panel --replace

Tests icons and mate panel menu bar. If you get the menu bar back, then open another terminal. Enter user command: mate-session-properties

This GUI edits the startup programs. Click the icon ADD. Enter this text: mate-panel --replace

Save the edit. Close the GUI. Reboot. The result: The session will start with mate-panel populated.

The Dec 18, 2018 suggestion to install mate-tweak might help. Start mate-tweak and select Windows ==> Display Manager ==> Marco.  This is the default on a fresh install of Linux Mint 19.1.

2

The MATE panel is stored in two files, and is glitchy. The disappearance or misloading of the panel at reset is classic, in my experience.

The two files can be found in /usr/share/mate-panel/layouts by default, with extensions .layout and .panel for a single panel. These two files are created, with the names user-tweak.layout and user-tweak.panel, by saving a panel out using mate-tweak.

These can be edited by hand as text files to alter the panel, though the structure is odd, particularly the positioning counts.

Note also that if you want a panel to hide when not selected, mate-tweak mis-saves the files with the hide option unspecified in one of the files: it must be specified in both.

Below is a sample of typical general entries, rather than for panel objects; objects and positions are listed in opening entries for .panel, and are then listed with details in both files and must match:

/usr/share/mate-panel/layouts/user-tweak.layout:

[Toplevel bottom]
orientation=bottom
expand=true
size=19
auto-hide=true

/usr/share/mate-panel/layouts/user-tweak.panel:

[general]
default-layout='panel1'
object-id-list=['menu', 'launcher', 'windowlistapplet', 'showdesktopapplet', 'notificationarea', 'clockapplet', 'object-0', 'object-2', 'object-1', 'object-3']
toplevel-id-list=['bottom']

[menubar]
show-places=false
show-desktop=false

[toplevels/bottom]
expand=true
orientation='bottom'
screen=0
y-bottom=0
auto-hide=true
size=19
y=748

The only solution I have found for misloading panels in MATE is to set a panel at live build and stick with it, and never attempt to change, and/or rebuild the panel files from mate-tweak.

The command to set the current panel layout is also in gsettings:

$ gsettings list-schemas | grep panel

org.mate.panel.menubar
org.mate.caja.sidebar-panels.tree
org.mate.panel
org.mate.caja.sidebar-panels

$ gsettings list-keys org.mate.panel
confirm-panel-remove
locked-down
default-layout
object-id-list
toplevel-id-list
disable-force-quit
drawer-autoclose
enable-program-list
enable-autocompletion
enable-animations
tooltips-enabled
disabled-applets
history-mate-run
show-program-list
highlight-launchers-on-mouseover
0

I had the same problem: the Linux Mint 19.3 Mate panel / menu / "taskbar" did not load at startup / login / reboot / boot. I could tell the panel was not even running because the shortcut keys to the panel windows did not respond: "Alt + F2", "Alt + F1". Also, I could tell mate-panel worked fine because I created a launcher shortcut to "mate-panel" on my desktop that opened the panel and it functioned just fine.

I tried all of the solutions on the web for "missing mate / mint panel". I found no working solutions online, but tried lots of proposed solutions to this problem: I reset my menus times mate-menu --reset, deleted the /.config/menus/ folder, reverted menus, etc.

I randomly stumbled onto the cause and solution while browsing around in the $HOME/.config/autostart/ folders.

For some reason, (something) had (somehow) disabled the autostart of mate-panel during login for my user. The parameter to not start the mate-panel had been set in the $HOME/.config/autostart/mate-panel.desktop file. This directory has links to programs and the contents of it tells Mint what programs to run on startup after my user logs in. The file had a parameter added to it that effectively disables it during autostart procedures after logon:

X-MATE-Autostart-enabled=false

I opened the text file in Text Editor, changed the parameter value to:

X-MATE-Autostart-enabled=true

Next, I rebooted and the Mate panel was back where it should be after login! More details on how Mate / Gnome / KDE / XFCE autostart programs are configured / work:

https://askubuntu.com/questions/63407/where-are-startup-commands-stored

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