Will Stephenson said the following on 10/05/2010 02:01 AM:
Sounds like the X server or KDE crashed on login rather than a password problem.
BTDT a couple of years ago. I can read logs, and /var/log/Xorg.0.log and the log for kdm and were relevant in that they identified X as crashing rather than my login being refused.
This could be due to mismatched KDE libraries, a full disk, or buggy video drivers.
It could, but in my case I had stupidly made a typo in one of the start-up scripts .... ~/.xinitrc ... that aborted the process. I realise that this may not be the case, that the OP may not have edited such, but its also easy enough to wolf-fence. I keep a 'virgin' account to try to log in to when such problems occur. If you can log in as root at the text/console, log in as another unprivileged user at the text/console, then its unlikely to be a PAM problem, and if no messages appear its very unlikely to be something in the regular shell scripts at the system level (/etc/profile.d/*). If you can log in via the GUI as root or the other unprivileged account then it is something specific to that one account. Once you have eliminated those you can proceed to other, less likely, more subtle matters since you have better defined the boundaries of the problem. And yes, you should eliminate the obvious problems first. Even the best of us are fallible, get tired and make typos and finger-slips or let the cat[1] at the keyboard while off making coffee. This may all seem trivial logic and I may seem to be repeating what others have said, but these logic steps, this checklist DOES need to be followed to isolate the problem. You have to be sure what is NOT the problem and not make "logical leap". Some people may find it odd that those of us with years of experience in some matters do not instantly see the problem. Its those years of experience that tell us to proceed step by step and and to the Sherlock Holmes thing: "How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible whatever remains, *however improbable*, must be the truth?" -- Sherlock Holmes, in "The Sign of the Four" But you have to systematically eliminate the "impossible". To do otherwise is a series of WAGs[2]. Such methods will not endear you to management since they are hard to document and unreliable. The methods, that is, not management. [1] Marcus Ranum, the inventor of the firewall and the security guru, has commented that he has seen corporate firewall setups which he thinks his cat could have done a better job on. [2] Wild Assed Guesses -- Quality is free, but only for those who are willing to pay heavily for it. - Tom Demarco, "Peopleware" -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org