problem with bonobo-activation, gnome-session and nautilus

[Mike <mike redtux demon co uk>]

For about a week now I am getting errors on startup from (I think)
bonobo-activation.

On startup I get a message from gnome settings demon saying it has
restarted too many times as follows

The Settings Daemon restarted too many times.

The last error message was:

Failed to activate 'OAFIID:GNOME_SettingsDaemon'

GNOME will still try to restart the Settings Daemon next time you log
in.

Then the window list and workplace switcher applets fails initially as
follows

The panel encountered a problem while loading
"OAFIID:GNOME_WorkspaceSwitcherApplet"
Details: Unknown CORBA exception id:
'IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0'

If I reload the applets they work for that session

Also when I load ephany on startup I get

Ephy can't be used now. Running the command "bonobo-slay" from the
console may fix the problem. If not, you can try rebooting the computer
or installing Ephy again.

Bonobo couldn't locate the GNOME_Epiphany_Automation.server. and icons
view

Finally nautilus fails, and if I reload, eventually a nautilus window
opens after repeted error messages about list view 

** (nautilus:3663): WARNING **: Throbber activation exception 'Unknown
CORBA exception id: 'IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0''
 
** (nautilus:3663): WARNING **: activation failed: System exception:
IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0
 
** (nautilus:3663): WARNING **: A view failed. The UI will handle this
with a dialog but this should be debugged.
 
** (nautilus:3663): WARNING **: activation failed: System exception:
IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0
 
** (nautilus:3663): WARNING **: Throbber activation exception 'Unknown
CORBA exception id: 'IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0''
 
** (nautilus:3663): WARNING **: A view failed. The UI will handle this
with a dialog but this should be debugged.
 

eventually a window opens, but no desktop is drawn.

I have deleted my gnome and done a clean install, but the problems are
unchanged.

Anyone any ideas on this?