cure for error meaages: call to lnusertemp failed (temporary directories full?). check your installation.

[Lisi <lisi.reisz@gmail.com>]

I did a new installation on a friend's computer.  All went well until I tried 
to copy over his old data and config files from the old hard drive.  Since 
then I cannot log in as I end up getting the message:
<quote>
call to lnusertemp failed (temporary directories full?). check your 
installation.
</quote>

I can login at the command line as root, and can login in as a second user I 
created.  For now he is running as the second user without access to his old 
files.

I have thought about this and googled a lot.  I have tried/shall try all the 
reasonably likely applicable suggestions I found.  I have checked the /tmp 
directories and they are certainly not full.  I have not yet, but shall as 
soon as I get access again to his computer, check that there is a /root 
directory.

But the permissions may be wrong in that his ID may have changed.  It ought 
not to have done so, since the old installation was an updated Lenny, as is 
the present one, and he was in both  cases the first user.  Therefore the ID 
in both cases ought to be 1000.

I am intending to delete his user, then create his user again. 

I could then do

# chown -R user2 /old-HDD/home/user1

Then copy the data and configuration files into place.

I should be grateful for suggestions and comments - preferably constructive 
ones. ;-)

Lisi