gnome refusing to start ... ?

[Sven Luther <sven.luther@wanadoo.fr>]

Hello,

This morning i am having trouble starting gnome. It starts all right
(including the small pmud device permission problem window i have been seeing
since some weeks), but after the splash screen goes all the way no panel nor
nautilus are loaded. A small bit of looking around showed me :

AUDIT: Tue Aug 17 10:21:38 2004: 2895 X: client 2 rejected from local host
  Auth name: MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ID: -1
AUDIT: Tue Aug 17 10:21:38 2004: 2895 X: client 4 rejected from local host 
  Auth name: MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ID: -1
AUDIT: Tue Aug 17 10:21:38 2004: 2895 X: client 3 rejected from local host  
  Auth name: MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ID: -1

in /var/log/gdm/\:0.log. Also, starting gnome-session by hand gives me : 

  Gnome-Message: gnome_execute_async_with_env_fds: returning -1
  Gnome-Message: gnome_execute_async_with_env_fds: returning -1
  Gnome-Message: gnome_execute_async_with_env_fds: returning -1
  Gnome-Message: gnome_execute_async_with_env_fds: returning -1
  Gnome-Message: gnome_execute_async_with_env_fds: returning -1

but strace didn't help in finding more info. Also, gnome-panel was purged from
my system :

  pn  gnome-panel                                     <néant> (aucune description n'est disponible)

Which is probably the reason of the problem come to think of it. Any idea why
important gnome components like the panel was purged from my system ?

Friendly,

Sven Luther