[PLUG] Failed boot and no startx

[Sean Dixon]

This is the error message I get when I try to launch startx in user
account:

Error loading keymap /var/tmp/server-0.xkm
Couldn't load XKB keymap, falling back to pre-XKB keymap
Mkdtemp: private socket dir: No space left on device

-----Original Message-----
From: plug-admin at lists.pdxlinux.org
[mailto:plug-admin at lists.pdxlinux.org] On Behalf Of Sean Dixon
Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2003 9:49 AM
To: plug at lists.pdxlinux.org
Subject: RE: [PLUG] Failed boot and no startx


Actually what I did is ran Xfree -configure and created a new XF86Config
file.  I replaced the old one with this new one and startx worked in
root.  HOWEVER, when I tried to launch startx in my user account it
returned an error.

When I looked at the new file, I noticed it was very different that the
original and missing a lot of data, but it had more font info.  I edited
the new file to include the missing data of the original and it wouldn't
boot stating the screen info couldn't be found.

I have returned to the new file and trying to figure out why startx
won't work in the user account.  

The info you provided is awesome and I am going to check it out.  I
don't really mind breaking this and fixing it again.  My intention is to
learn and this is the fastest way I know how.  At least in this case I
am not messing around on someone else's network.

-----Original Message-----
From: plug-admin at lists.pdxlinux.org
[mailto:plug-admin at lists.pdxlinux.org] On Behalf Of Mark Martin
Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2003 6:12 AM
To: plug at lists.pdxlinux.org
Subject: Re: [PLUG] Failed boot and no startx


No reason to panic, Sean.  It just sounds like you accidentally modified
the 
"Files" section of your XF86Config file so that the X server can't find
your 
fonts.  Here is the corresponding section of XF86Config-4 from my system

(Mandrake 8.2)

Section "Files"

    RgbPath     "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"
    FontPath   "unix/:-1"

EndSection

The FontPath variable contains possible locations for fonts.  In my case
(and 
it sounds like this is your case too), the X server acquires fonts via a
font 
server xfs.  The number "-1" in my case and "700" in your case refers to
the 
port that the font server uses.  Since the default port for the font
server 
is 7100, my guess is that you accidentally deleted the 1 to end up with
700.  
If you were not using a font server, this variable would contain a list
of 
directories where the X server should look for fonts.

You can determine what port your font server is running on by looking at
the 
command line used to start the font server.  A quick and dirty way to do
this 
is to read it from the process table, which you can do using the command

ps wp `ps aux | grep xfs | grep -v grep | awk '{print $2}'`

On my system, this shows that the font server was started with the
command

xfs -port -1 -daemon -droppriv -user xfs

which indicates that the port that my font server is running on is -1.
If the 
command line does not contain the -port argument, then the font server
is 
running on the default port of 7100.

For more information about the font server, look at the man page for
xfs.  You 
could also look at the man page for XF86Config for more information
about the 
configuration file.

Good luck,

Mark

P.S. Problems with the X server are not usually related to problems with
a 
filesystem.  So, checking your filesystem wasn't really warranted.

On Wednesday 05 March 2003 18:06, Sean Dixon wrote:
> On a recent reboot my computer freaked out and refused to boot into
> xwindows.  I changed the inittab to login at console and tried to go 
> in trough startx and was greeted with a fatal error message.
>
> I was dinking around with the XF86config file trying to see if I could

> get my wheel mouse to work and think I might have screwed something
> up. I tried to run XFree86 from GUI but didn't see anything happen.
>
> Now I am unable to get to any GUI.
>
> What have I done?!
>
> I ran fsck /dev/hda1, but to no avail.
>
> The error messages that are returned on startx failure are:
>
> Fatal Server Error:
> Could not open default font 'fixed'
>
> Could not init font path element unix/:700, removing from list!
-- 
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark A. Martin, Ph.D.
Applied Mathematics -- Software Development -- Systems Administration
Currently available for employment. See
http://www.amath.washington.edu/~mmartin/resume/ for details.
---------------------------------------------------------------------


_______________________________________________
PLUG mailing list
PLUG at lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug


_______________________________________________
PLUG mailing list
PLUG at lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug