Caught in the LOOP

Nimoy · 06-18-2003, 06:06 PM

Okay it happened my Linux crashed - Well more like X11 crashed, I had to perform an alt backspace on it as it had frozen up.

Yes I know leaving my system virtually zero disk space to work with is unsound, nevertheless it happened leading to a crash....

Then again it's not like I haven't experienced anything similar in "that other" OS :-) which was the reason 4 switching...

Hopefully I can get back to a more normal HDD usage ratio once I get my new computer, but until then I'm stuck with a system that can currently only be accessed via the linux rescue option in RH 9. and I need to get back on track.

There is about 70 Mb free on the system currently (there wasn't when the problem occurred) - but I've fixed that in the hope that the problem would evaporate in a puff of logic - but alas it was not to be...

My problem is that every time I'm trying start Linux - and I get to the login prompt the machine orbits. (The login sequence goes into a repeating loop).

Normally I'm booting directly into x so in theory the graphic log in screen should appear but instead the following happens...

login appears (the terminal version)

If I do nothing the screen goes blank a few seconds - then the login prompt appears again.

No matter if I act immediately or if I do it after a few loops if I'm really fast I can manage to type in the regular username but not the password - they're too long :-).

But before getting around to typing the password the screen goes blank and after a while the machine either re-asks for the login user name or the password.

To beat the machine speed wise I've also tried to add a user that has only a one digit/chr name and a one digit/chr password - so I can theoretically manage to type both usr and pwd and press ENTER before the machine loops but in every case it just loops and loops endlessly even though I have time to type both usr name and pwd.

How does one get out of such a predicament?

I have access to the system files etc. via the rescue option and can edit files etc. via the edit interface of the Midnight Commander.

When I attempt starting X from the rescue option the following takes place:

startx
hostname:localhost.localdomain;hostname lookup failure
using authority file //:Xauthority
writing file //Xauthority
Fatal server error
cannot open log file /var/log/XFree86.0.log

I was then asked to contact xfree86@xfree86.org - (however I'll try here as well)

Then I get the following error message

xinit: no such file or directory (errno2): unable to connect to x server

xinit: no sucg process (errno3) server error

I've also tried to type login at the prompt in rescue mode to see if I could force a log in as another user once the machine was up and running in rescue mode and got the following error message:

Kernel panic: VFS : unable to mount FS on 48:05

So no luck there.

I would prefer not having to remove everything X as I am not enough into the file structuring RPM installing / uninstalling etc. to be able to do so without having to worry about some of the data/programs still not backed properly up as I had no chance to do so before X crashed and about the process of finding and reintegrating external programs I have installed after X was originally installed. But that's perhaps not an issue???

Anybody got any suggestions to what I could do to get X up and running?

fancypiper · 06-18-2003, 07:12 PM

Have you been cleaning out the old, rotated log files in /var/log? The rotated logs have a number suffix

Code:

Wed Jun 18 08:09pm phil@uilleann /var/log $ su -
Password: 
Wed Jun 18 08:10pm root@uilleann ~ # cd /var/log
Wed Jun 18 08:10pm root@uilleann /var/log # ls
messages       ksyms.0	   rpmpkgs.1	  cron.2	    mysqld.log.2
cron	       rpmpkgs	   secure.1	  boot.log.2	    cups
wtmp	       sa	   boot.log.1	  messages.2	    netconf.log
maillog        ksyms.1	   ksyms.3	  maillog.2	    htmlaccess.log
XFree86.0.log  ksyms.2	   ksyms.4	  rpmpkgs.2	    vbox
lastlog        cron.1	   XFree86.2.log  secure.2	    fax
secure	       maillog.1   ksyms.5	  scrollkeeper.log  spooler.2
boot.log       mysqld.log  ksyms.6	  ..
.	       spooler	   mysqld.log.1   samba
dmesg	       messages.1  spooler.1	  pgsql
Wed Jun 18 08:10pm root@uilleann /var/log #

The ksyms.<N> I leave alone because I saw them when I first installed.

I see I haven't cleaned mine out in a couple of months.

Try booting rescue, mounting the partition that contains /var/log and clean out that directory.

Other places you might cleaning is any /tmp directory.

Nimoy · 06-19-2003, 02:43 PM

Didn't seem to do the trick - still caught in the loop... Thanks for the effort though!

acid_kewpie · 06-19-2003, 02:51 PM

well don't boot to runlevel 5 then, just choose level 3 instead (press escape at the lilo screen and run "linux init 3". this then won't try to start X and should then let you log in and try to start X via... "startx" The errors you've got there from startx i would assume tobe down to the fact that you booted to rescue rather than an X error itself, so report what happens that way.

fancypiper · 06-19-2003, 03:14 PM

# Configuring X
Linux Hardware Compatibility HOWTO - video cards
The Linux XFree86 HOWTO
Common X configuring tools:
Redhat 7.3 down - the setup utility leads to several config tools
Redhat 7.3 up - redhat-config-xfree86
You may have these tools:
XF86SetupTricks and hints
XFree86 -configure
Xconfigurator
xf86cfg
xf86config
xconf
ATI Linux drivers
If you need the nVidia driver, most likely, you want the Linux IA32 driver

Nimoy · 06-19-2003, 05:30 PM

He he just did that you guys are too late haven't even checked my e-mail yet just hopped in to post my little WOOOHHOOOOO :-)

Seriously thanks for the tips anyway - Now I don't have to type my experience into the thread you did all the hard work! And hopefully others can benefit as well.

(Yes I admit it - I am lazy... aren't Unix guys supposed to be )

However to anyone else who might experience this problem I had an additional error to deal with when trying to run startx from the terminal.

X complained that there was a problem with a specific fixed font....

Well I went into the directory

etc/X11

Opened the file XF86Config in a text editor

Rem'med i.e. put the # in front of the line referring to the font path at the beginning of the file. (next line)

# FontPath "UNIX/:7000"

It was a stab in the dark.... but BINGO I was back up again!

It is probably a dirty solution - but it got X running.

If anyone knows where the default fixed font is supposed to be hiding according to an untainted XF86Config I'm all ears....

fancypiper · 06-19-2003, 05:47 PM

redhat-config-xfree86

might have fixed it if you had run it. I found Redhat 9.0 buggy and didn't want to take the time to fix it, so I went back to 7.3.

I thought the newer X used the config file /etc/X11/XF86Config-4

I make sure that /etc/X11/fs/config and /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 are aware of the same paths for fonts. Sometimes I have found them conflicting and messing up the x font server.

After changes

/etc/rc.d/init.d/xfs restart

should show any errors in your configs.

whansard · 06-19-2003, 05:56 PM

that unix/:7000 is your fontserver.
you just lost your true type font ability.

Nimoy · 06-20-2003, 08:23 AM

K - the fontserver... Then I've got something to go on. Thanks for pointing that out!

whansard · 06-20-2003, 11:29 AM

thats what fancypiper's xfs restart stuff was about.
trying to restart your fontserver. if it looks like it starts
ok, you can un comment that linue in your XF86Config

monkette · 02-01-2004, 02:37 AM

I have the same loopy login problem but I don't know where a lilo login is. I am running grub and don't know what to do. All my services are running fine but the login to the startx is just in a continual loop. Can someone help me out here? I would like to run "linux init 3" somewhere, but where should I start? I am very new to linux and have just got everything running and up the last year and don't want to touch anything as long as everything is running...thanks for the help.
monkette@ix.netcom.com

monkette · 02-01-2004, 03:57 AM

Okay, I have found I have the same font problem, but I am a newbie. How do I get into linux redhat to edit the text? I seem to remember doing (editing text) before, but I want to go in here and edit the same text. Please someone tell me the command on how to do this....Thanks...

I am at:
Fatal server error: could not open default font 'fixed'

XIO: fatal IO error 104 (Connection reset by peer) on X server ":0.0" after 0 requests (0 known processed) with 0 events remaining.

#redhat-config-xfree86

Fatal IO error 2 (Connection reset by peer) on X server :17.0.

#