Re: dead end

["C.M. Connelly" <c@eskimo.com>]

>>>>> "SB" == Sergio Brandano <sb@dcs.qmw.ac.uk> writes:

SB> I just finished updating the system on my Lombard.  At start up,
SB> gdm takes control of the system and does not let me in. The
SB> problem is simple: it does not let me type the login. The cursor
SB> works, but the keyboard does not. The other problem is that I do
SB> not manage to kill gdm (of course), and there is no way to remote
SB> login on the machine (all ports in use, so it says).

I reported a bug with Xscreensaver that turned out to be a bug in the
X server (xserver-fbdev) whose maintainer asked me to try the latest
version of the X server.  Despite reports of problems on the list, I
(after first copying working packages from CD-ROM to disk, just in
case) switched to single-user mode and installed the new packages
(xserver-common_3.3.5-1.1 and xserver-fbdev_3.3.5-1.1) with apt-get
install.

Once I was done, I switched back to runlevel 2, and found that I had
the exact problem you describe:  Not only would gdm not accept any
keyboard input, but it seemed like the keyboard didn't work at all --
I was unable to switch to virtual terminal.  The mouse worked fine,
though.

Unlike you, however, I was able to telnet into the machine from our
NeXTstation and stop gdm with '/etc/init.d/gdm' stop.  I could then use
virtual terminals.

Sadly, I'm not really sure exactly what I did to get things working
again.  I did run a shell script called 'xserver-configure' (in
/usr/sbin) which didn't *seem* to do anything (reading the man page, I
see that it actually checked to be sure that my XF86Config file was
valid.

I then tinkered with my XF86Config file by hand, discovering that it
had the wrong video RAM setting (4194 instead of 4096) and removing a
superfluous ViewPort and Virtual setting (since it had worked fine
with the older version of the X server, though, it's hard to really
pin the blame here).

In the process of doing these things, I also switched back and forth
from single-user to runlevel 2 a couple more times, and killed some
zombie processes.

One of those things worked for me, but I'm damned if I really know
which it was.

Hope this helps a bit -- you are not alone!

   C.

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 Behind the counter a boy with a shaven head stared vacantly into space, 
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   C.M. Connelly               c@eskimo.com                   SHC, DS
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