kde and gnome: how to run both in general without errors (but not simultaneously)
 

this seems to get me every time.

i'm trying to be able to have gnome and kde coexist in my FC4 environment. in other words, i want them to be able to run at different times without editing configuration files (see below for explanation).

all is usually well, until i go into startkde. i get the standard

that's until i change /etc/sysconfig/desktop to KDE instead of GNOME.

my question is: how do i get kde to run normally without having to go change this all the time? i want to be able to run gnome-session without getting

(this is when /etc/sysconfig/desktop shows GNOME instead of KDE!)

so how do i get these two X sessions to coexist without any problems and without having to continually have to configure some text file in order to run X? note that i don't have any specific preference for X... and i start up into text mode, not straight into the GUI. however, i want to be able to freely get from KDE to gnome without having these text errors that seem to cause me hours of work to no end :(

lastly, it seems my xorg.conf was created by pxyf86config. how do i recreate it using this file (for future reference)? i can't seem to find a binary -- only docs that are not very descriptive. maybe it has another name?

i hope my question is clear. thanks!

To start a new X session get to a terminal session (F1 - F6) and type "startx -- :1". A new X session starts up. Now to go back to the older X session, use Ctrl-Alt-F7. For the new X session use Ctrl-Alt-F8.

Note: You may have to switch into another virtual desktop that isn't being used and then open a terminal and run the command. (I did)

let me clarify. it's not that i want them to run together simultaneously. but in general, if i want to get into KDE or GNOME, i have to edit a config file first. i want to avoid this step altogether, so that i can go into KDE, do my own thing, then log out, and go into Gnome, do my own thing there, and then log out -- without error messages.

post edited... bump for help.

I'm not sure if this is what your looking for but when logged into any desktop go to a termial and type switchdesk kde or switchdesk gnome and then log out and back in and it should wiork fine.

i guess that's a feasible solution; thanks.

i'm actually trying just to get the standard startup scripts to work... startkde and gnome-session. that's where those errors occur. i wish i knew why...

Logging out of KDE or Gnome is simple. All you have to do is go to the command line and type "init 3" without the quotes. I don't know what the commands to start KDE or Gnome are. I know that typing startx will start your default window manager (that's the case for me anyway).

bryan: thanks, but that's not what i'm looking for. i'm looking for the startkde and gnome-session aliases to work without giving me the standard errors that seem to plague all users (e.g. if i google the errors in the code brackets i provided above, i'll be sifting through 28483843 nonpertinent issues). i don't have a default window manager -- that is to say sometimes i'd like to use kde, but other times, i prefer gnome. (i mostly SSH into my box anyway and never use X though.)

so far, the only viable solution presented is just using switchdesk kde/gnome and then running startx. this is workable, but in my opinion, it's basically the equivalent of not editing the /etc/sysconfig/desktop file. my goal here is just to figure out how to get both commands (startkde and gnome-session) to coexist in any linux environment, and i have yet to find any solution that works for me.