Re: X

[Dave Sherohman <esper@sherohman.org>]

On Mon, Mar 24, 2003 at 06:37:02AM +0000, Karsten M. Self wrote:
> on Sun, Mar 23, 2003 at 05:43:42PM -0700, Glenn English (ghe@slsware.com) wrote:
> > On Sun, 2003-03-23 at 14:54, Leo Spalteholz wrote:
> > 
> > > Sorry this won't help you but I've always wondered why debian does
> > > this.  You install xdm and the defualt is to boot straight into a
> > > graphical login.  Why??  At the very least it should ask you when
> > > installing if you want to start up into  X.  
> 
> Debian assumes you wouldn't have installed X if you didn't want it
> starting automatically.  And that you'd know how to disable it from
> doing so via update-rc.d.

Minor correction, there, Karsten:  Change "X" to xdm. (Used here in a
generic sense, meant to also include [gkw]dm.)

If you don't install X or xdm, X isn't there, so it doesn't start.

If you install X and don't install xdm, you can start X from the
command line, but it does not start automatically.

If you install both X and xdm, then xdm starts X automatically
because that's what xdm does.  If you don't want to use it, don't
install it.

If you install xdm and don't install X, then you're probably crazy,
but you are also likely to know what needs to be done to make this
setup behave in a sensible fashion, since you had to know enough to
override some dependencies and force dpkg/apt to ignore xdm's
dependencies.

-- 
The freedoms that we enjoy presently are the most important victories of the
White Hats over the past several millennia, and it is vitally important that
we don't give them up now, only because we are frightened.
  - Eolake Stobblehouse (http://stobblehouse.com/text/battle.html)