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Date:      Thu, 12 Jul 2001 23:41:31 -0400
From:      "Robert John Hall" <rjhalljr@starpower.net>
To:        freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: Xwindows has stopped working
Message-ID:  <20010712234131.A809@staunton.bodd-der.net>
In-Reply-To: <01071123344000.00559@i8k.babbleon.org>; from bts@babbleon.org on Wed, Jul 11, 2001 at 11:34:40PM -0400
References:  <20010711222513.A275@staunton.bodd-der.net> <01071123344000.00559@i8k.babbleon.org>

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On Wed, Jul 11, 2001 at 11:34:40PM -0400, Brian T . Schellenberger wrote:
> though: I thought that was one.  In any case, to look up errnos, just do
> 
> man errno

Thanks. It hadn't occured to me that there would be a man page for error 
numbers. It's taking me a while to used the fact that there is a man
page for everything. My previous Unix experience doesn't extend much
past emacs and logging in to other people's mail servers to check if
they're being used to relay spam to me.
 
> I would remove the xdm/kdm setup, however you did that (most common approch 
> is to set the default run level form 3 to 5, so reverse it back to 3).  Then 

After digging in the man pages and Lehey's book, I think I've figured out
what xdm is. I don't use it. However, if I start it up at the command 
line, it brings up a twm window with some stuff I haven't seen in a twm
window before. Checkpoints and some other stuff. 

I prefer xinit and startx, but I can get by with starting xdm as root 
from the console while I learn to debug. All I need it for is
Netscape. I definitely want startx back, though.

> you can start up the server by hand and you'll get much more helpful 
> diagnostics where you can easily find them.
> 
> In general, walking (line-mode, bring up X by hand a few times) before 
> running is a good idea . . .

A little more background: Xwindows has been running fine for a couple
of weeks. We had a brief thunderstorm the night before I rebooted and
had no screen. I shut down the computer when I heard the storm, but
I restarted after it passed. I'm guessing that a line spike reset some
critical bit. I get the Xwindows screen (black and white pattern with
an X for the mouse cursor). When I run XF86Setup, it tells me that I 
have a working server. I found the -probeonly option on the
startx man page. That gave me the message
   xf86OpenConsole: Server must be running with root permissions.
   You should be using Xwrapper to start the server or xdm.
Xwrapper has been installed from the beginning. I'm guessing that
X has somehow lost the ability to use Xwrapper. I've tried looking 
this up in the archives and on freebsd.org, but nothing has come
up. If I enter 
   # Xwrapper
then I get the same screen I get with startx. So Xwrapper seems to 
work, but obviously doesn't read the configuration files that bring
up the good stuff. I think that's xinit's job. So the disconnect
seems to be between xinit and Xwrapper. 

I can start X with xinit, only as root, and get a single xterm. 
Nothing else. From the info in the xinit man page, this suggests 
X (or xinit) can't find the xinitrc file any longer. 
xinitrc is still where it's always been.

I think that starting X from the command line, which is what I've
been doing all along, is what you mean by "starting X by hand".
If not, please clue me in.

Thank you, and Chris Fedde, and Ian Patrick Thomas for your suggestions.
I'm a lot futher now than I would have been otherwise. But I'm 
stuck again. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to proceed
next? If my guess about xinit not being able to use Xwrapper is 
correct, can someone tell me how to trouble shoot this?

Bob Hall

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