[Bug 60448] Re: .xsession-errors file grows out of control & saturates disk space

[Jonathan]

I'm also affected by this issue some 2315 days after it was originally
reported. My home server is running Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, and contains a
500GB system partition that was entirely filled by .xsession-errors in
under 48 hours.

In my case, the file is full of the message "Authentication deferred -
ignoring client message" which seems to indicate some issue with vino-
server, but that's a separate point altogether.

If a file is growing at a rate of 8GB/h, there is surely something
seriously wrong with the host system! I only managed to find this issue
because my disk space kept evaporating and I'm an advanced enough user
to find a massive hidden file and then go looking for more information
about said file. As of this moment, I'm still not even sure what to do
to solve the actual issue that is causing the file to grow.

The real purpose of this post is to attempt to chastise somebody into
fixing this stupid bug once and for all. I understand the problem that
this log file is attempting to solve, but there must be a better way of
going about it.

Why not rotate the file out after a reasonable size has been reached...
say 100MB or so? If the file is already being cleared on every session
restart, then the developers have demonstrated that they don't care too
much about what's in it, as most folks restart their machines daily. If
a file contains more than 1MB of the same log message over and over and
over again, then as much information has been reported to the user as is
available about that particular error. Another 450-some-odd gigs isn't
going to help the situation, and may cause stability and security
problems to boot.

Better yet, if the file is getting this much traffic, why not inform the
user that there may be a problem with his/her system? Again, I wouldn't
be complaining on this very forum if I weren't an advanced user. I've
installed Ubuntu on my mother in law's machine, and I can assure you
that she wouldn't have any idea what to do if her laptop started
complaining that it was low on disk space. If the gods are smiling, she
might think to empty the recycle bin.

Honestly guys, let's try and fix this one. It's getting ridiculous at
this point.

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Title:
  .xsession-errors file grows out of control & saturates disk space

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