fast-user-switch-applet serious slowness problem

[Greg Reagle]

I am running 5 Edubuntu computer labs, all with version 8.04 Hardy Heron LTSP.  At one of these labs the fast-user-switch-applet (version 2.22.0-0ubuntu2) was taking up almost all of the CPU cycles (according to top).  At another lab with the same version of fast-user-switch-applet there is no such problem.  I don't know about the other 3 labs.

At the lab with the problem, lsb-release -a shows Ubuntu 8.04.2.  There is also a problem logging off, in that clicking System > Quit does nothing.  I found a few bug reports that look maybe related:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/fast-user-switch-applet/+bug/84944
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/intrepid/+source/fast-user-switch-applet/+bug/203217
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/fast-user-switch-applet/+bug/84226

What I ultimately did was "apt-get remove fast-user-switch-applet".  This solves the slowness problem, but logging off doesn't work (again, the menu item does not do anything).  I told the users to use Ctrl-Alt-Backspace, but that doesn't do a complete log off, i.e. it leaves processes running (some of them "defunct"), and the thin clients don't react well to it.

Does anyone know how to solve this problem?  Thank you.

-- 
greg reagle | computer technician, system administrator | community it innovators - CITI | 202-234-1600 ext. 353