Ok, for some reason the search page on this site isn't working today, so here goes...

I recently installed a stage one Gentoo and everything was great. Then I emerged corefonts, freefonts, and xMule. At some point my GUI, I don't know if it was X server or KDE or something else, crashed. So I got out with the new 3-finger salute, Ctrl-Atl-Backspace. I was placed back in kdm as expected. I tried to log back on to KDE, and things just kind of got stuck blinking at the Starting Services place. I have since figured out that it's not that it actually gets stuck, KDE does eventually get going but things run so slowly it's pretty much crippled. Currently running AfterStep but I'm too lazy to configure it to my liking. Anyway, I want KDE to work again but I have no idea what's wrong.

This happens with ALL users, even root.

Here's what I've done so far in order:

- unmerged corefonts, freefonts, and xMule
- unmerged and re-emerged kdebase multiple times
- changed /etc/rc.conf to load xdm and AfterStep to check for x11 functionality
- tried to re-emerge x11 but the compilation failed for some reason (got a "no target to make..." error)
- rm -fr'ed all my DCOP ICEauthority and .kde directories

Not sure what else to do. AfterStep, twm and blackbox all work just fine so I'm ruling out x11 as being the issue. I should also mention that kdm has ceased to work. Even if my /etc/rc.conf file says it should use kdm, it still uses xdm.

Here's what ~/.xsession-errors thinks about this situation:

xset: bad font path element (#109), possible causes are:
Directory does not exist or has wrong permissions
Directory missing fonts.dir
Incorrect font server address or syntax
startkde: Starting up...
startkde: Running kpersonalizer...
mkdir: Owner of /tmp/.ICE-unix should be set to root
/usr/X11R6/bin/iceauth: creating new authority file /home/ccellist/.ICEauthority
QFont::setPointSize: Point size <= 0 (-3)
QPixmap: Cannot create a QPixmap when no GUI is being used
QPixmap: Cannot create a QPixmap when no GUI is being used
kbuildsycoca running...
Reusing existing ksycoca
kio (KService*): WARNING: The desktop entry file Utilities/kfilereplacepart.desktop has Type=Service but is located under "apps" instead of "services"
kio (KService*): WARNING: Invalid Service : Utilities/kfilereplacepart.desktop
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'kmplayer_component.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'video/x-avi'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'klinkstatus_part.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/english'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'klinkstatus_part.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-c'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'klinkstatus_part.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-c++'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/kde/3.3/share/applications/kde/kvoctrain.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-kvtml'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/kde/3.3/share/applications/kde/kuickshow.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'image/x-psd'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/kde/3.3/share/applications/kde/kuickshow.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'image/x-eim'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/english'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/mathml'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/richtext'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/tab-separated-values'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-authors'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-c'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-c++'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-comma-separated-values'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-copying'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-credits'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-csh'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-dcl'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-dsl'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-dtd'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-emacs-lisp'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-fortran'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-gtkrc'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-idl'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-install'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-perl'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-python'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-readme'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-scheme'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-setext'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-sh'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'vimpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-sql'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/kde/3.3/share/applications/kde/kpovmodeler.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'KPovModeler/Document'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'kcertpart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'application/binary-certificate'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'OpenOffice.org 1.1/web.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'application/vnd.stardivision.writer.global'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/kde/3.3/share/applications/kde/kmid.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'audio/midi'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'Multimedia/xmms.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'audio/mp3'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'Multimedia/xmms.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'audio/x-mpeg'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/share/applications/xmms.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'audio/mp3'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/share/applications/xmms.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'audio/x-mpeg'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'kxsldbg_part.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/english'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'kxsldbg_part.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-c'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'kxsldbg_part.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-c++'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: '/usr/share/applications/kde/kmplayer.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'video/x-avi'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'katepart.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'text/x-fortran'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'knotify.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'KNotify'
kbuildsycoca: WARNING: 'OpenOffice.org 1.1/writer.desktop' specifies undefined mimetype/servicetype 'application/x-doc'
QFont::setPointSize: Point size <= 0 (-3)
ICE default IO error handler doing an exit(), pid = 881, errno = 0
kdeinit: Shutting down running client.
mkdir: Owner of /tmp/.ICE-unix should be set to root
QPixmap: Cannot create a QPixmap when no GUI is being used
QPixmap: Cannot create a QPixmap when no GUI is being used

I'll try to post /var/log/messages and the Xorg log file in a minute but they were both surprisingly unhelpful.

-Arturo

Ok, I ran startx (kde default) from the console, and I get a few interesting messages:

Could not init font path element /usr/share/fonts/local/, removing from list!

Output of /var/log/messages as promised:
Dec 16 00:15:44 webern su(pam_unix)[24847]: authentication failure; logname=ccellist uid=1000 euid=0 tty=pts/2 ruser=ccellist rhost= user=root
Dec 16 00:15:46 webern su[24847]: pam_authenticate: Authentication failure
Dec 16 00:15:49 webern su[23618]: PAM pam_putenv: delete non-existent entry; REMOTEHOST
Dec 16 00:15:49 webern su[23618]: PAM pam_putenv: delete non-existent entry; XAUTHORITY
Dec 16 00:15:49 webern su(pam_unix)[23618]: session opened for user root by ccellist(uid=1000)
Dec 16 00:15:49 webern su[23618]: PAM pam_putenv: delete non-existent entry; REMOTEHOST
Dec 16 00:15:49 webern su[23618]: PAM pam_putenv: delete non-existent entry; XAUTHORITY
Dec 16 00:16:20 webern su(pam_unix)[23618]: session closed for user root

So as an update, kde does work, but it crawls at a ridiculous speed. Loads things slowly, logs out painfully slowly as well. In fact, I just logged out and the whole system appears to have frozen. Apparently something is still working because it's my internet gateway, and I'm obviously still connected from my laptop. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

This happened to me on a Gentoo system after I had done some filesystem hygiene and accidentally cleaned away a few files too much. I had removed the symbolic link that associated the service net.lo with the runlevel boot. The fix was to start the service:
/etc/init.d/net.lo start
And make it permanent:
rc-update add net.lo boot

I found the problem by comparing the output of route (run as root) with that from a working system. The following line was missing:
loopback * 255.0.0.0 U 0 0 0 lo

That seemed to cause the various KDE processes to not be able to communicate properly on the local system, so maybe they tried to communicate over the network instead, therefore being much slower.