From owner-freebsd-questions Sun Jan 11 22:38:05 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id WAA06028 for questions-outgoing; Sun, 11 Jan 1998 22:38:05 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-questions) Received: from jason03.u.washington.edu (root@jason03.u.washington.edu [140.142.77.10]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id WAA06023 for ; Sun, 11 Jan 1998 22:38:02 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from jcwells@u.washington.edu) Received: from saul10.u.washington.edu (root@saul10.u.washington.edu [140.142.13.73]) by jason03.u.washington.edu (8.8.4+UW97.07/8.8.4+UW97.05) with ESMTP id WAA20086; Sun, 11 Jan 1998 22:37:58 -0800 Received: from S8-37-26.student.washington.edu (S8-37-26.student.washington.edu [128.208.37.26]) by saul10.u.washington.edu (8.8.4+UW97.07/8.8.4+UW97.04) with SMTP id WAA08737; Sun, 11 Jan 1998 22:37:57 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <3.0.3.32.19980111223752.007c4220@jcwells.deskmail.washington.edu> X-Sender: jcwells@jcwells.deskmail.washington.edu X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.3 (32) Date: Sun, 11 Jan 1998 22:37:52 +0000 To: Brian Fischman From: Jason Wells Subject: Re: xdm Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: <34B9ADCF.AC74923F@interpath.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk At 00:44 1/12/98 -0500, you wrote: >I have a problem, when i run startx everything works fine, however when >i run xdm, after i login the screen gets messed up and 3 secs later i am >at the login screen again, this is a never ending cycle, any >suggestsions? >Brian When you start X by using 'startx', the file '~/.xinitrc' is read in order to set up your session. The analog of '.xinitrc' is '~/.xsession'. Xdm reads '/.xsession' to set up your session. I venture a guess that you do not have a '.xsession' file. If you do, then I might guess that it does not refer to a window manager. You must start a window manager in order to run a session. Read your existing '.xinitrc' for some ideas on what should be in your '.xsession'. I am not sure that this reply will fully answer your question. I hope that this gives you some ideas. Read man X carefully. This info about how startx and xdm are initialized is in there. But that man page is sooooo big sometimes it is easy to start skimming and miss important stuff. I was tripped up on xdm for a while but the man page got me started. I use xdm myself. I prefer it for the sole reason that I like the login widget. YMMV. Good luck, Jason Wells