Bad update - X11 corrupted - dependency hell
Dick Brown
dikbrown at qwest.net
Wed Apr 14 19:54:08 UTC 2004
Martin,
You were right, and the XFree86-xfs wasn't there. I got the rpm
that you mentioned, but when I tried to install it, I got the message that:
/usr/X11R6/bin/mkfontdir was missing. Is this just a directory that I
can create, so that everything will be OK, or do you think that there's
another package that I need to install first?
Thanks for your help,
Dick
Martin Stone wrote:
> Dick,
>
> That's a good start. One item of concern: You say that when you ran
> X -probeonly, your screen blanked. Do you mean it blanked and stayed
> blank? That would be bad. It's supposed to blank your screen for a
> few seconds, then you get back your text console with the latest error
> messages displayed on it.
>
> So... we've determined that X doesn't think it has the fonts it
> needs... this could be because xfs just is not running, but I think
> it's more likely that xfs was the package that failed installation.
> Can you do the following:
>
> rpm -qa | grep '^XF' | sort
>
> and post the output to us? You should see XFree86-xfs-4.3.0-42 in the
> list towards the bottom. If you don't, that could be your trouble.
> You might try something like:
>
> wget
> http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/core/1/i386/os/Fedora/RPMS/XFree86-xfs-4.3.0-42.i386.rpm
>
>
> (or download the RPM to your system in your favorite way)
>
> and then:
>
> rpm -ivh XFree86-xfs-4.3.0-42.i386.rpm
> chkconfig --level 2345 xfs on
> service xfs start
>
> Then try starting X and logging all messages on your own with
> something like:
>
> X > /tmp/myXlog.txt 2>&1
>
> And let us know how that works out for you...
>
> Cheers,
> Martin
>
>
>
> Dick Brown wrote:
>
>> OK, there was no 'rhgb' in my boot loader, so I got in and manually
>> changed /etc/inittab.
>>
>> The command 'X -probeonly' didn't seem to do anything helpful. I saw
>> some text flash on the screen, but then the screen blanked. I
>> checked the log file, but no help there. I went ahead and just ran
>> 'X' and again checked the log file. I saw the following messages
>> near the bottom:
>>
>> could not init font path element unix/:7100, removing from list
>> fatal server error: could not open default font 'fixed'
>>
>> Dick
>>
>> Martin Stone wrote:
>>
>>> Dick,
>>>
>>> Here's a way to boot from the hard disk and skip the graphical stuff:
>>>
>>> When the GRUB bootloader screen comes up, hit the 'a' key - this
>>> allows you to modify the kernel parameters that are being used to
>>> boot your system. Backspace over 'rhgb' to remove it, then type '3'
>>> (without the quotes) and hit Enter. This tells the Linux kernel to
>>> boot to runlevel 3 instead of what is specified in /etc/inittab
>>> (that would be '5' in your case.) Runlevel 3 is the normal runlevel
>>> with all normal services running except for X. Much easier to
>>> troubleshoot your system from this point than from a rescue disk.
>>>
>>> After you've booted to runlevel 3, you can log in normally and try
>>> to diagnose your X problem. I recommend starting by trying:
>>>
>>> X -probeonly
>>>
>>> and seeing (and telling us!) what error messages are reported.
>>>
>>> Good luck!
>>> Martin
>>>
>>>
>>> Dick Brown wrote:
>>>
>>>> Thanks to those who have replied so far.
>>>>
>>>> I did make a boot disk, and can get to a system prompt with "linux
>>>> single". The problem I'm having is that I can't get a graphical
>>>> login. When the login prompt comes up, the system automatically
>>>> tries to go to the graphical login. Unfortunately, it can't get
>>>> there, so keeps cycling from text login to graphical login and
>>>> back, so I can't do anything.
>>>>
>>>> There was one other thing I tried, and maybe this was bad. When I
>>>> couldn't log in normally after the failed update, I tried
>>>> reinstalling Fedora over itself. It seemed to go fine installing
>>>> over RH8, so I figured it would be okay to install over itself,
>>>> too. Would this have messed it up?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> Dick
>>>>
>>>> jludwig wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>> I recently decided to upgrade from RH8 to Fedora. I downloaded
>>>>>> the .iso files, burned them and installed without a hitch
>>>>>> (checked the md5sum and the finished CDs first).
>>>>>> Unfortunately, when I performed the system update, the X11
>>>>>> package
>>>>>> was corrupted. Now I can't boot into Fedora normally. I can get
>>>>>> in through the "Linux rescue" from the install disk, but I'm
>>>>>> afraid I
>>>>>> don't know what to do from there. I'm at that dangerous stage
>>>>>> where I know enough to get myself into trouble, but not enough to
>>>>>> get myself out,
>>>>>> so I don't really want to touch anything without some advice
>>>>>> first. Is there an easy fix to this?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>>> Dick
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> What were the error messages, if any, while booting?
>>>>> This will give me/us an idea how to help you fix this problem.
>>>>> jludwig <wralphie at comcast.net>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
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