White window when starting application v2.9.0

[PaulAtST]

Description

When starting the application no UI is loaded, all I get is a white window.

Version & OS

Version: GitHubDesktop-linux-2.9.0-linux1.deb
OS: Ubuntu 20.04 running on Parallels Desktop 16

Steps to reproduce the behavior

1. Open application
2. All white window with no UI opens

Expected behavior

Github desktop UI should load

Actual behavior

All white window with no UI opens

Screenshots

Additional context

I also tried opening the application from terminal, and from terminal with --disable-gpu with no luck. I see the exact same behavior each time.

[shiftkey]

Try setting the GITHUB_DESKTOP_DISABLE_HARDWARE_ACCELERATION environment variable to some value, which should trip this path and signal to the Electron runtime to disable hardware accelerated rendering:

desktop/app/src/main-process/main.ts

Lines 265 to 270 in 1823807

	if (process.env.GITHUB_DESKTOP_DISABLE_HARDWARE_ACCELERATION) {
	log.info(
	`GITHUB_DESKTOP_DISABLE_HARDWARE_ACCELERATION environment variable set, disabling hardware acceleration`
	)
	app.disableHardwareAcceleration()
	}

[PaulAtST]

@shiftkey That worked. Thank you!

I wonder if this should get added to the readme since gpu acceleration in electron and virtual machines don't usually play nice together. Also the --disable-gpu flag not working, makes it cryptic.

[shiftkey]

I've linked to the Known issues doc in the README to follow the pattern for other platforms, and this issue is now documented.

Also the --disable-gpu flag not working, makes it cryptic.

This hasn't been supported because we have plenty of usage that isn't launched from a terminal, and environment variables are available to all OSes, which is how we settled on this.

For reference, you can see the CLI arguments that Desktop supports by adding --help:

$ github --help
Commands:
  clone <url|slug>  Clone a repository                       
  help [command]    Show the help page for a command         
  open <path>       Open a git repository in GitHub Desktop  

Run github help <command> for details about each command

The main github-desktop program does support some Electron arguments, but is very much not recommended for most users.

[PaulAtST]

@shiftkey Makes sense, thanks again for the help!