hi:

i've read quite a few postings on how to set KDE or GNOME as the default desktop, but for some reason, gnome keeps on coming up even though I've explicitly set kde everywhere. I'm running debian if that's relevant.

Here is my home directory's .xinitrc file:

############

#!/bin/sh
# $Xorg: xinitrc.cpp,v 1.3 2000/08/17 19:54:30 cpqbld Exp $

# /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc
#
# global xinitrc file, used by all X sessions started by xinit (startx)

# TESTING -- open some sample windows
#xterm -geometry 80x40+10+100 -fg black -bg white &

# invoke global X session script
. /etc/X11/Xsession

# start up the KDE window manager and desktop environment
startkde

############

I just switch to one of the text terminals with Ctrl-Alt-F1, kill the X server, and try "startx".

can anyone tell me where i'm going wrong here?

At your login screen is where you can set the default window manager, look for some kind of drop-down box.

DO you automatically boot into GUI? or does you system boot to command prompt?

If you boot into gui, try logging out and changing your log-in session mananger (e.g. KDE / Gnome).

Otherwise there are a number of ways to switch this depending on your distribution of linux?

my system normally boots into the GUI and starts Gnome automatically.

however, unlike fedora or some other distros i've used, this one doesn't have any advanced
options at all in the GUI login screen for changing your desktop environment.

Do you know of any distro-specific ways to change on Debian-based systems? although
i initially thought that the xinitrc file was sufficiently general.

thx

can you log out of gnome?

yup, i can log out, but then i get the generic debian login screen, with no options aside from entering my username and password :-(

i remember switching to GNOME from KDE using the xinitrc file before, but can't seem to pinpoint what the problem is now.

i figure that for GNOME to start as a default every time, somewhere in some configuration file, there's a call to "exec gnome-session", but aside from xinitrc, I don't see what file that might be.

OK so apparently, i was using xdm as my display manager (not sure where that fits in, but whatever),
and when using xdm, you need to edit the ~/.xsession file with the same changes that would normally
go in the .xinitrc.

THe following .xsession:

#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/startkde

did the trick.

Yeah, it's quite easy:

To get everything running propperly you should switch to a console (ALT+CTRL+F1), login as root or do 'su root', as you will have to restart the X stuff.

First get KDM installed, if apt complains get rid of GDM first. (I assume you already now apt-get).
Once KDM is installed you will be prompted to decide which Desktop Manager to use (XDM/KDM/GDM/WDM), choose KDM.
If KDM is already installed yu can reconfigure the desktopm manager preferences issuing:

A dialog will appear where you can choose which Desktop Manager to use.
If you don't get the KDM login you should start kdm explicitly: