kde troubles....

[Michael Powell]

Gary Kline wrote:

[snip]
> 
> the err message is gone, but KDE creates an /rmpty kdm.pid and
> does nothing.

This is not good. The file should contain a number.
 
[snip]

It would also be helpful to know how you are trying to run KDE. There are
two ways, the first being to have a line like: 

ttyv8 "/usr/local/bin/kdm -nodaemon" xterm on secure

in /etc/ttys which starts kdm as a graphical login at boot. The other is to
boot and login as user, then do the "startx" command which needs "startkde"
to be in .xinitrc and/or .xsession in your Home directory.
  
> Nothing else; what else neeeds cleaning?

Not sure what got munged with your power glitch, but a couple of times in
the past when I've had trouble getting KDE to start I would login as root
(or su) without X running and delete some stuff. Look in your user home
directory for something like .DCOPserver_hostname_:0; there will be two -
one is a link to the other. Delete both of these and delete the
ksocket-yourusername folder in /tmp.

Also while in /tmp look for .X0-lock and delete. Look for the
folders .ICE-unix and .X11-unix and delete all the sockets you find in
these two folders. Make note both of these folders should have the sticky
bit set. Also delete the /var/run/kdm.pid again like before.

This is how I've gotten KDE to start in the past after an "uh-oh". It also
may not pertain to your particular situation. One thing you can do to
troubleshoot X if you are using "startx" (ie not starting kdm at login with
the ttys line above) is to have an empty .xinitrc and/or .xsession. Then
when you run X the twm window manager should come up, as it is the default
for X. This way you can drive a wedge between "Is it an X problem or a KDE
problem?"

Good luck and I hope you get it going.

-Mike