[PLUG] Lost window manager and Gnome panel (Debian testing)

[John Jason Jordan]

Debian testing amd64, fresh install, idiot newbie user.

I had everything pretty much working and configured except for my
bluetooth mouse. Finally I succeeded in getting it working, although I
cannot tell you how. I had installed Blueman, but it couldn't get the
mouse paired either. But then suddenly I had two bluetooth icons in my
Gnome panel. Using System Monitor I killed two bluetooth devices - that
is, killing the first one changed nothing but killing the second one
deleted one of the bluetooth icons. Afterward I was able to get a GUI
dialog box that found the mouse. And this time I had a Next and a Back
button. I was finally able to get the mouse working when I selected
"connect" but "without pairing."

However, the mouse was not working properly. The pointer moved around,
but left clicking did not work. I could select things only by
right-clicking on them. 

After poking around for a while and not finding a solution I decided to
reboot. After logging in I got a popup asking if I wanted to
grant permission to the bluetooth mouse. I responded Yes, and the mouse
then worked properly; that is, a left click worked as a left click. It
has been working fine ever since.

Unfortunately, the entire Gnome panel was gone. Also, windows had no
title bar or icons in the corner to minimize or maximize them The
keyboard worked, but I couldn't launch a terminal because I have
forgotten the secret keyboard shortcut to launch a terminal. The only
way I know how to do it is Applications > Accessories > Terminal, but
there was no panel so I couldn't click on Appplications. I did get to a
command line with Ctrl-Alt-F1, but I was unable to do anything
constructive for failure to know what the window manager is called or
how to restore it when not in X.

Eventually I found that by right-clicking anywhere on the desktop I got
a popup wiith various options, one of which was "create launcher." I
created a launcher for "gnome-terminal" and finally was able to get a
terminal up. Using the terminal I finally discovered that for some
reason metacity and gnome-panel were not started during the boot/login
process.

At this point I have a working desktop, but after every boot I must run 

nohup metacity &
nohup gnome-panel &

I know there are startup scripts, but I have never poked at them
before. I assume I can edit what I need with a text editor or nano. I
hope there is a Debian user here who can point me to the correct script
that needs editing. I am also hoping that looking at the startup script
will shed some light on how this bizarre mess happened.

In spite of the issues that I have had getting Debian testing working,
I am liking it so far. 

I also tried the live CD of Karmic. Just as with all previous versions
of Ubuntu on my Thinkpad, it does not shut down completely. And, while
I was able to get the bluetooth mouse working, it died randomly and had
to be restarted. Having worked with Debian for a few days, I am not very
impressed with Karmic.