I'm starting a new thread on this topic. The 1st thread,https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...0-a-4175732355, has gotten a bit cluttered and confusing.

I am in the process of trying to upgrading several Slackware 14.2 systems to 15.0. I've followed the instructions in the ISO UPGRADE.TXT file. Upgrading per se has worked. But trying to launch the KDE desktop for users that existed under 14.2 does not.

On my most recent effort, after booting an updated 15.0 to init 3, then doing init 4, I get the message, "Could not start kdeinit4. Check your configuration."

This is a different failure than I've gotten before. What is this? How do I fix it? What log files would give information on this error? I've search /var/log and have not seen anything that looks applicable.

By "then doing init 4" you mean "startx" ?

Your ~/.xinitrc may be corrupted
You can overwrite existing one by running:

On Slackware 15.0, it should be trying to start kdeinit5, not kdeinit4.

Two questions:

What action did you take at step 5 of the instructions in UPGRADE.TXT?

Do you get the same problem with a new user account?

startx launches the desktop for the user running startx, no login screen. Normally, these workstations boot to init 4 showing the (sddm?) login screen.

I did do xwmconfig and switched between xfce and kde for both root and a normal user; and then ran startx for both users. The desktops came up OK. But if I do init 4 I still get the kdeinit4 error.
After the initial setup from the DVD I ran 'slackpkg new-config and accepted all but some I had previously customized. I then did 'slackpkg upgrade-all' to get the latest Slackware 15.0 and at the new-config prompt I selected 'P' and again overwrote all configs with the new versions except for the following:
I don't get that far. When I do init 4 I get that message, no login page so no user selectable. As mentioned above, I can get the KDE desktop running startx as a user.

So the problem appears to be getting the login page. When I do startx > System Settings > About this System I see "KDE Plasama Version: 5.23.5", just like my other Slackware 15.0 system. So you're right, why is it trying to start kdeinit4 for the login page?

Of note, the /var/log/sddm.log file has not been update since I started trying to login in with 15.0.

I tried starting sddm manually as root. That did bring up the login page! However, when I entered the login credentials I got the splash screen where it normally sequentially displays the series of icons as a sort-of progress bar. This time, the little box where the icons get displayed came up, but no icon sequence. Instead, I got the "Could not start kdeinit4. Check your configuration." message. This time, I have messges in /var/log/sddm.log the tail end of which is:
No obvious errors here, but something is definitely messed up.

Is this fixable or should I restore this back to 14.2 and start the upgrade all over?

That could be part of your problem.
Everything is fixable. But if you have a full backup of your 14.2 setup, why not wipe it and do a clean installation?

There were some marked differences between 14.2 and 15.0. eg: Addition of PAM, SAMBA upgraded to a version which excluded some old protocols, KDE5, XFCE 4.16. Just those few things make for a bumpy upgrade path... particularly if you're not using all of the new config files as your base. The script suggested in the UPGRADE.TXT file will save your old config files with a .bak extension, so they can referred to and all of your customisations aren't lost.

For many years now, my own modus operandi is to install the latest version on a spare partition and gradually transition things over from the old installation as required (or remembered). One thing which I find eases transition is keeping my tweaks & customisations under /usr/local, wherever it is possible to do so.

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Yup! That's what I'm doing -- well, a clean UPGRADE, anyway. I'll post back results.

After restoring the 14.2 system, I did the 15.0 upgrade carefully following the steps in UPGRADE.TXT. Before update new-configs, I saved the few I've modifed and want to keep as shown in my post #4. I then did 'slackpkg new-config' and overwrote ALL configs with the new version. I then copied my saved configs back.

After rebooting, I ran xwmconfig as root and tested both root and a normal user with startx. That worked. Finally, it did init 4 to bring up the login screen and logged in as the normal user. Again, that worked. So, I can only conclude that I must have skipped something on my initial upgrade.

The only problem is that it did not preserve KDE favorites, panel settings, or task manager bar; nor my System Settings auto-login setting. On these computers that's not too big a deal because not much is configured for these things as these computers are primarily used as a Virtual Machine host and users don't normally log in (except me for admin).

Nevertheless, it is unfortunate that these settings are lost. Once upon a time our office experimented with using Linux/KDE as a workstation alternative to upgrading to Windows 10. I extensively customized the desktop with a Windows-like look-and-feel, include the Windows background, fonts, icons, Filed Explorer, etc. All of that would have been lost with this upgrade had we ended up going with that solutions (which we didn't).

Lost settings?

Not doing a full backup before such a major step as a system upgrade is?

Triumph without peril brings no glory

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The restore I mentioned in the first sentence of post #7 was from a full backup. After the restore and before upgrading to 15.0, all KDE favorites, panel, etc. settings were there. After the upgrade they were not.

I've always started with a clean slate between KDE versions... That's probably not what you want to hear, but it hasn't failed me yet.

There was a major upgrade to KDE in Slackware 15.0. It should be no surprise that the settings are incompatible.

In an office setting, surely you'd use a standard image rather than upgrading each individual machine one-by-one?

With respect to my procedure, that essential what I did.
In Windows before 10 the same thing happened. Users had to reinstall apps, favorites, etc. Microsoft fixed that. I would have expected Linux (or at least Slackware) to do at least as well. Yes, KDE5 is different from KDE4. Nevertheless there should be an upgrade utility to help migrate KDE4 to KDE5, IMO. Users spend a lot of time settings up their desktop, favorites, panel, etc. All that shouldn't be a do-over because of an upgrade.
For user customizations, no. This is not a university computer lab environment. Each user can set whatever he/she wants on their desktop/favorites. Some users will have apps specific to their own use such as accounting software.

I get it that with upgrades things can change -- like always seems to happen with Tomcat -- and the system administrator needs to tweak and adjust things. A reset of the user experience should not be one of those things.

I have some computers with KDE 4 and some with KDE 5 on Slackware 15, but I never upgrade the config from the first to the new. For me KDE 4 is not the same desktop as KDE 5 at all. So doing a translate config tool is a job by himself and is not so simple. And the potential for interesting a lot of users maybe small but maybe someone could be interested. There was the same difficulty betwwen KDE 3 and KDE 4.

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