Thanks, solved it meanwhile. Since any shell was disabled (they all seem to read /etc/profile), I think that only the rescue-CD could have solved it (otherwise I got to the point where I could enter the user-name, just command-line mode, but then on starting the shell it hang). Just for general information (now that I'm back to live :-)). Oliver On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 01:35:57PM -0400, Anton Aylward wrote:

Oliver Kullmann said the following on 09/21/2010 01:00 PM:

...

To add: no form of (purely) konsole login seems available: After "Have a lot of fun..." it just hangs.

Have you tried logging in as root instead?

Oh wait, do you mean this *is* root account you've been talking about? If that's the case, the Oliver, you have some very fundamental problems.

Hmm. Try "failsafe" boot.

When Grub comes up, you should have an option to get the Grub command line. You can add boot options on that line. Any editing done that way is not permanent: it's only for that session, so you can't screw anything up. Use the cursor to select the 'failsafe' boot, then edit the command line and add the word "single" to the end of that line to boot in single user mode or runlevel 1. Once you are in, you should be able to use the command 'init 3' to change into runlevel 3.

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On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 11:48 AM, Oliver Kullmann

Boot with resque system (root). Then just mount the root file system from the HDD, and edit the file:

# mount /dev/sdXY /mnt # cd /mnt/etc ....

Where sdX is the HDD (usually its sda), and Y is the partition nr of your root partition.

You can look at what partitions are on the disk(s) with: fdisk -l -Nick -- <<< Follow the white rabbit. >>> /`-_ Nick LeRoy { }/ http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~nleroy http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~nleroy \ / leroy.nick@gmail.com The University of Wisconsin |_*_| 920-568-0151 Department of Computer Sciences -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

thanks! puuuh, back to life! (The mounting was clear to me, but didn't remember the details.) So it seems that I should better make changes directly to /etc/profile (as I always did in the past)? Anyway, thanks again! Oliver On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 12:23:42PM -0500, Sunny wrote:

On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 11:48 AM, Oliver Kullmann wrote:

...

Hi,

the desktop is suddenly completely gone: It boots to the login-screen (no errors), but then upon login (normal user or root) simply the screen empties (that is, only the login-screen-background, nothing else), and nothing happens!

It was just a standard logout-login, to see whether things would be stable (apparently not).

The only system change was the addition of a file /etc/profile.local, which was a copy of /etc/profil, with the lines setting TEXINPUTS now activated.

If this addition (which is what is recommended in /etc/profile) is harmful, then I should remove that file. How to do this? I have the installation-dvd, and can activate "Rescue system": but then, how to get into the system and remove a file??

Hope somebody can help!

Boot with resque system (root). Then just mount the root file system from the HDD, and edit the file:

# mount /dev/sdXY /mnt # cd /mnt/etc ....

Where sdX is the HDD (usually its sda), and Y is the partition nr of your root partition.

-- Svetoslav Milenov (Sunny)

Artificial Intelligence is no match for natural stupidity. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-- Dr. Oliver Kullmann Computer Science Department Swansea University Faraday Building, Singleton Park Swansea SA2 8PP, UK http://cs.swan.ac.uk/~csoliver/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 07:01:23PM +0100, Tejas Guruswamy wrote:

On 21/09/10 18:47, Oliver Kullmann wrote:

...

thanks! puuuh, back to life!

(The mounting was clear to me, but didn't remember the details.)

So it seems that I should better make changes directly to /etc/profile (as I always did in the past)?

Anyway, thanks again!

Oliver

Editing /etc/profile.local is still the recommended way as it is not overwritten on updates/upgrades. But it should be created from scratch, not as a copy of /etc/profile. There is code in /etc/profile that loads /etc/profile.local - so if you copy everything, you end up with a recursive loop and who knows what might happen! This was probably the source of your crash. Create /etc/profile.local as an empty file and put in only the specific bits you want.

I see; works now. I assumed that profile.local would be used instead of profile (reading through the shell-script and finding out what happens can be done, but is not such a trivial matter; I would think explaining in profile, that profile.local should only contain the additional bits is a little thing, but can be quite useful). Thanks! Oliver -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 09/21/2010 03:30 PM, Oliver Kullmann wrote:

I see; works now. I assumed that profile.local would be used instead of profile (reading through the shell-script and finding out what happens can be done, but is not such a trivial matter; I would think explaining in profile, that profile.local should only contain the additional bits is a little thing, but can be quite useful).

Thanks!

Yep, unless you know some sh/bash that '.' = source, I can see how it would be quite confusing... The line in /etc/profile is: test -s /etc/profile.local && . /etc/profile.local where: test -s = test if FILE exists and has a size greater than zero && = if test -s completes successfully, then do . /etc/profile.local . /etc/profile.local = source (read) /etc/profile.local into /etc/profile. Glad you got it sorted. -- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E. Rankin Law Firm, PLLC 510 Ochiltree Street Nacogdoches, Texas 75961 Telephone: (936) 715-9333 Facsimile: (936) 715-9339 www.rankinlawfirm.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Oliver Kullmann said the following on 09/21/2010 01:47 PM:

thanks! puuuh, back to life!

(The mounting was clear to me, but didn't remember the details.)

So it seems that I should better make changes directly to /etc/profile (as I always did in the past)?

Probably not. In many decades of using UNIX and Linux I've never found a need to modify that GLOBAL profile. But then I never log in as root either :-) Yes, I've modified /home/anton/profile and various other profiles in ~anton. And if I need root I use sudo or kdesu. I think you're doing something wrong and that might be related to abuse of root and root level issues. Please tell us that I'm making the wrong suppositions about you and that you are not logging in as root and making global changes. It will make helping you so much easier if you haven't fiddled with the root-level fundamentals when a regular account should have sufficed. -- No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time. -- Churchill -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org