can't autoconfigure Xfree86 4.5.0

ditch* · 08-01-2005, 11:19 AM

Hi!

I've been trying to install the X window system (version 4.5.0) on my laptop. The distribution I am using is Debian Woody, with kernel version 2.4.18.

I followed the instructions I downloaded from Xfree's website, obtained the correct set of binaries, with the according md5 checksums. I installed everything, without any errors and now I need to configure everything.

The installation instructions from Xfree's website say that once I have Xfree installed, I should run the following command:

XFree86 -autoconfigure

and if this doesn't work, I could use some other commands instead.

erm... none of them worked.

for each command I issued, I was told that it was not found.

Does anyone know what could be the problem or how to resolve it.

Any help would be great!

Grisha.

Andrew Benton · 08-01-2005, 11:27 AM

The binaries you are trying to run are probably in /usr/X11R6/bin. Is /usr/X11R6/bin in roots $PATH ?

XavierP · 08-01-2005, 11:27 AM

Which account were you running it under? You should be root when you run it, you may need to switch to the directory that the commands are in.

ditch* · 08-02-2005, 04:15 AM

Hey!
Thanks for replying!
Doing everything as root, here's what happened.

I cd'd into the /usr/X11R6/bin directory and typed xf86config. It said the command wasn't found. So I typed the whole path /usr/X11R6/bin/xf86config. This time it did work. After I had configured everything, I rebooted.

Then I logged in as root, cd'd into the /usr/X11R6/bin directory and typed "startx". Once again, the command wasn't found. So I typed /usr/X11R6/bin/startx. And it gave me several error messages saying that neither "xauth" nor "xinit" were found. I checked the directory - both binaries were there. Lastly I tried typing "sh startx", but I got the same result.

Somehow I have a weird feeling that something is missing...

Maybe I should reinstall X ?

What do you say?

Andrew Benton · 08-02-2005, 06:54 AM

It sounds as though /usr/X11R6/bin is not in roots $PATH. You can add it to roots path with the command

Code:

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/X11R6/bin

To add it to roots $PATH everytime you open a shell edit /root/.bashrc and /root/.bash-profile and add that line

ditch* · 08-02-2005, 10:27 AM

Hi Andrew!

Thanks for the tip! It worked, but I ran into another problem. The new error message I got is:

error while loading shared libraries: libz.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

I tried searching for the libz.so.1 file, but I couldn't find it. So I decided to take a look at the installation log. This is what it said

Updating the fonts.dir file in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/local.../usr/X11R6/bin/mkfontdir: error while loading shared libraries: libz.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Updating the fonts.dir file in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc.../usr/X11R6/bin/mkfontdir: error while loading shared libraries: libz.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Do you know what this libz.so.1 file is? Should I download it from somewhere or is it part of some other program?

Thanks for the help!

Grisha.

Andrew Benton · 08-02-2005, 11:36 AM

I think the XFree86 installer puts a copy in /usr/X11R6/lib
You need to use a text editor (gedit, kate, vim) to put that directory on a line in the file /etc/ld.so.conf and then as root run /sbin/ldconfig

ditch* · 08-03-2005, 04:55 AM

I checked the /usr/X11R6/lib directory, but there was no file called "libz.so.1". It appears that this file wasn't created by the installer because in the installation log there is an error message saying that this file wasn't found. (it's in my previous post)

I tried reinstalling X, but it didn't help either. Any other ideas?

... One detail is that I am installing Debian almost from scratch. I just installed the basic OS from the first CD and I'm doing everything else myself. One of the things I still have to install is a proper c-compiler. Could this be the problem? But then again, shouldn't have this been been taken care of by the 'extract' utility which came along with XFree's tarballs?

Andrew Benton · 08-03-2005, 05:23 AM

Well you should have it on your system somewhere. Try

find / -name libz.so.1*

ditch* · 08-05-2005, 01:45 AM

bwaaaa this is annoying, but the file couldn't be found. The name of the XFree binaries I downloaded is Linux-ix86-glibc22. Is it feasible that the people with the same architecture post the file online and I just stick it into my directory?

Or could there be differences in the libz.so.1 file?

- one more thing is that I used XFree's method of determining which set of binaries to download, so I couldn't have screwed up and downloaded the wrong set.