Issues and Troubleshooting

What should I do?

So you're having a problem with Cinnamon, or you've uncovered some nasty bug. What should you do about it?

Check existing issues:

Have a look at Cinnamon Issues. You can search by keywords, and maybe find someone who has already encountered the same problem as you. If so, there could already be some resolution or answer for it. You can click the "subscribe" button on the issue page to get email notifications if any progress or updates are made to the issue - note, you will need to open a Github account to do this.

If you can't find anything there...

###Try out the latest version:

Cinnamon has a very rapid development pace. Many bugs are created, discovered, and fixed before half of us know what happened. It could be the problem you're having has already been resolved in the latest build of Cinnamon. If you're running Mint or Ubuntu and want to try out the latest (updated daily,) check out Installing Cinnamon nightlies. Many other distros also have up-to-the-minute builds and packages (Arch users check out the AUR, for instance.) See if your issue still exists after updated to the latest and greatest Cinnamon. If it does, then...

Open a new issue:

Go back to Cinnamon Issues. Go ahead and create a new issue. Try to be as descriptive as possible, and if possible,

• Tell us what Linux distro you're running (Mint 13, Ubuntu 12.04, etc...)
• Provide the version of Cinnamon you're running (cinnamon --version from the terminal, or if you followed the previous instructions, say 'running nightlies')
• Provide exact steps to reproduce the error
• Tell us what you expected to happen
• Tell us what actually happened

Note that you don't have to include all these information all the time. Eg if your issue is about Cinnamon crashing under certain circumstances, you don't have to say "I expect Cinnamon to not crash" - we all know that and it sounds stupid.

By opening a new issue, you will be automatically subscribed to that issue, and receive notifications of any updates to it by the development team or other users. Don't hesitate to add more information if you discover something else - every little bit can help towards solving a problem.

Now what?

So you've created a new issue. Hopefully, very shortly, your issue will be confirmed as a bug. Do not open more issues on it! All we can ask is that you remain patient while the issue is sorted out. Some issues may only take a few minutes to fix, while others can vex us for days or even weeks before finding a solution.

I've got a suggestion to improve Cinnamon

By all means, file an issue for it - again, being as descriptive as possible, and if one exists, provide examples of similar functionality. Please understand that not every suggestion will make it into Cinnamon. If you feel like trying your hand at implementing it yourself, by all means, check out this page if you're on Mint or Ubuntu. Also be sure to check out the Cinnamon official website for applets, themes and extensions that others have made.

Other resources

Feel free to connect to irc.spotchat.org with your favorite IRC client, and join us on #linuxmint if you have other questions for which you might need immediate assistance.

You can also go to the forums and ask questions there.