Restart and Shutdown buttons do not work

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Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 Service Pack 2
SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 Service Pack 1

Situation

When attempting to either restart or shutdown a machine using the Computer | Restart or Computer | Shutdown icons nothing happens.

This issue is commonly accompanied by errors similar to the following when attempting to run graphical applications:

"DCOP communication error (appl name). An communication error between KDE processes occured. The system message was: Could not read network connection list /home/mici/.DCOPserver_lmf5n__0 Please check if program "dcopserver is running"

Resolution

This issue is caused by a bug where running applications as root from a terminal (ie sudo k3b, kdesu -c 'konqueror', etc.) changes the ownership of the /home/<user>/.ICEauthority file to root:root (where <user> is the user actually logged into the desktop). Changing the ownership back to the appropriate user will resolve the problem (ie su to login as root, chown <user>:users /home/<user>/.ICEauthority).

A bug has been entered for the .ICAauthority ownership problem.

Disclaimer

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