Lion abruptly logs out multiple times per day

[Shpigford]

Since upgrading from Snow Leopard to Lion, I've had an increasingly frustrating problem of Lion abruptly logging out. And as luck would have it, it's when I'm right in the middle of doing a bunch of work.

When it does the logout, everything just freezes for a few seconds, I sometimes see a little spinner in the middle of the screen, then it just takes me back to the login screen. I'm then able to type in my password and log back in.

Yesterday alone I was abruptly logged out seven times throughout the day. It typically happens 1-3 times a day.

My hunch at first was that it was either Photoshop or Rdio that were causing it (as they were always open when the logout would happen), but the last couple of times it happened yesterday, neither were open.

I've also had a ton of font issues (mainly with Safari), but I do have tons of fonts and use a font management app to handle them (Fontcase). So I'm also wondering if some system font issues could be causing this too?

Here are apps that I've had open when the abrupt logout has happened:

• Photoshop
• Rdio
• Safari
• Transmit
• Textmate
• Terminal
• Base
• iChat
• Mail

I'm stumped (and thorougly annoyed) at this point. Not sure what else to do to try and narrow down the problem.

 

[Giaguara]

Look at Console. /Applications/Utilities, and inside Console all logs.
Check just after it has happened, i.e. you were logged out by the system's own initiative, and you logged yourself back in. Something should get in the logs to mark what happened, and what app or function called for the logout.