(I haven't chimed-in here at bugs.debian before but I would like to help out with this bug) I tried workaround in message #15 and then made sure my echo $XDG_RUNTIME_DIR variable was correctly set to /run/user/1000. I then proceeded to open my editing programmes with gksu. "gksu nautilus" resulted in this log: Jun 20 00:34:12 debiandog dbus[608]: [system] Activating via systemd: service name='org.freedesktop.hostname1' unit='dbus-org.freedesktop.hostname1.service' Jun 20 00:34:12 debiandog dbus[608]: [system] Successfully activated service 'org.freedesktop.hostname1'
"gksu gedit" resulted in this log: Jun 20 00:36:05 debiandog gnome-session[1699]: Window manager warning: Buggy client sent a _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW message with a timestamp of 0 for 0x2600f6a (Unsaved Do) sometimes followed by a block of 5 or 6 repetitive messages : Jun 20 00:13:11 debiandog org.gnome.Terminal[1743]: (gnome-terminal-server:3027): dconf-CRITICAL **: unable to create file '/run/user/1000/dconf/user': Permission denied. dconf will not work properly. Jun 20 00:13:11 debiandog org.gnome.Terminal[1743]: (gnome-terminal-server:3027): dconf-CRITICAL **: unable to create file '/run/user/1000/dconf/user': Permission denied. dconf will not work properly. Jun 20 00:13:11 debiandog org.gnome.Terminal[1743]: (gnome-terminal-server:3027): dconf-CRITICAL **: unable to create file '/run/user/1000/dconf/user': Permission denied. dconf will not work properly. Jun 20 00:13:11 debiandog org.gnome.Terminal[1743]: (gnome-terminal-server:3027): dconf-CRITICAL **: unable to create file '/run/user/1000/dconf/user': Permission denied. dconf will not work properly. Jun 20 00:13:11 debiandog org.gnome.Terminal[1743]: (gnome-terminal-server:3027): dconf-CRITICAL **: unable to create file '/run/user/1000/dconf/user': Permission denied. dconf will not work properly. (of course these are the problematic messages that, before I used the workaround, ran out of control and filled the syslog and resulted in a locked-up gnome. I hope this helps towards a fix..