Hi,

Another newcomer.

I have installed Slackware 13.37 on a tower and a laptop using three CD's downloaded and md5summed as correct.

Using slackpkg command I updated my installation on my laptop and installed kde and other software. I changed /etc/inittab from 3 to
4 and attempted to run kde after finding the correct path using the whereis command.

This failed.

I now have just a kde screen when I boot into my laptop and nothing else. It is stalled. Going into /etc/inittab using RIP Linux and changing the 4 back to a 3 hoping to get back a shell upon a reboot failed.

My /ect/inittab file is the same for my tower as it is for my laptop and that boots fine, but is not up to date.

I would like to see myself in the clear before trying to replicate my tower and laptop further and of course get on to fully appreciating Slackware.

Thank you for any help, kind words of encouragement that may be offered.

sevenjen

You can hit Ctrl+Alt+F1 to reach text console without need to change run level.
Can you post /etc/inittab?

Does that mean you have you have made a full Slackware install or did you omit some parts of the system? If you are new to Slackware it is recommended to make a full installation, keep in mind that Slackware has no dependency resolution. Omitting packages can easily lead to a non-functional system. Despite being warned I learned that the hard way.

The correct way on Slackware is to use the xwmconfig command to set up which DE/WM to start and then either to use startx or switching to runlevel 4 with init 4.
But anyways, that shouldn't lead to your problem. As ozanbaba already stated, you should be able to switch to a command line using Ctrl+Alt+F1. If that doesn't work for whatever reason you also can force to start the system in a different runlevel with adding the desired runlevel number to the bootloader command line in Lilo.
If your system is still booting to runlevel 4 even when you changed it back with a live CD I assume that there is either an error in your inittab file or that you accidentally have not saved the file (or edited the wrong file).

If you are using LILO as your bootloader, then at boot you can hit the TAB key to enter additional kernel parameters. If you add " init 3", then the system will boot to run level 3 despite the setting in /etc/inittab.

Hi,

Just a thank you for the replies to my post.

I now have Slackware and Kde up and running on my tower. The future is looking brighter thanks to slackpkg.

I removed Kde, reinstalled it properly, and now have to decide where to from here.

Cheers, sevenjen

FUD.

Edit /etc/inittab to make the default runlevel 4. That launches kdm, where you can select the desktop environment that you want.

You don't have to screw around with xwmconfig unless you insist upon booting into runlevel 3, logging in, and running startx by hand. You can do that if you wish, of course, but if you are *always* running X window then just set your damned environment to boot into runlevel 4 and be done with it.

If you have a burning desire to boot into runlevel 3 at a later time (and there are occasions when you might wish to do so), then you can set the runlevel on the lilo (or grub) command line.

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