so i was first using redhat 8.0. then one of my friends suggested i try debian because of its robust apt-get system. i must say, it is really nice. however, there are some things that i did on redhat 8 that i can't figure out how to in debian. oh, and i am running the 3.0rc1 unstable release with gnome 2.2 and sawfish. and yes, i've thoroughly researched these questions on the forum before posting.

1) how do i boot to the console instead of x? i edited /etc/inittab on redhat 8 and chose runlevel 3, but that same thing will not work on debian. that is, i want to login at the console rather than at the login screen as i am running a battlefield 1942 server from the console.

2) how do i get another window manager running? i am currently running sawfish, which i assume is the default wm for debian. in any case, i downloaded enlightenment and every suggestion i've read does nothing. let's see here, i've edited .xinitrc to include the line "exec /usr/bin/enlightenment", "export WINDOW_MANAGER=/usr/bin/enlightenment", "exec enlightenment &". i think that's all of them. i tried to just run enlightenment and it said i already had another wm running. it kindly offered to "edit the user startup files" for me. i decided to take a chance, but that did nothing either. some people said that i could just change my wm graphically with the gnome control center, but there is no option to do that.

3) when i press ctrl-alt-backspace to kill the x server, it shuts down my computer. i'm talking totally power down. when i boot again, debian has to check the filesystem. i don't understand it; everyone else's computers just kick them to the login screen. it's just weird.

thanks for reading this far; any suggestions/solutions/rants are welcome.

andrew

1) Except Redhat and some who change the default locations of files and default attributes, most distros follow the traditional structure. For Debian, I guess it's id:1:initdefault for text login.

You must take a look at the look of every conf file. You can't blindingly change things.

2) It's not on Gnome or KDE control center because it was installed there. Simple as that. You could look at their Website for answers.

In full circle: you could find out what starts your graphical login from /etc/inittab's "script to run going to other runlevels". Mine is:

Open that file up. It'll lead to another file. And another. And another. You'll find the right file eventually. It'd be good to know what graphical login you're using. gdm or kdm or xdm?

3) That's odd. Your BIOS may use the key combo for power down. Check it out. Disable it.