Can't login after upgrade to 13.04

[JohnMoore]

The upgrade (from DVD) proceeded normally with no errors visible.

After rebooting, I was taken to the signon screen.

When I enter my password, the screen goes black, and the password screen reappears. If I enter an incorrect password, I get a popup telling me that the password is incorrect, but if I enter a correct one, wash-rinse-repeat...

I've logged in from tty and dmesg tail doesn't indicate any errors. lightdm.log, however, registers the session with bus path /org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Session0. This is followed immediately with the session exiting with return value 0.

These lines follow:
User session quit
Stopping display
Sending signal 15 to process 1426
Process 1426 exiting with reeturn value 0
X Server stopped
Removing X server authority ...
Releasing VT 7
Display server stopped
switching to greeter

and so forth and so on.

Any suggestions? I did the upgrade on my laptop and all worked beautifully (thus I am able to post).

I have tried using the GRUB menu to boot into earler kernels--no change. Any wizards around today?

[JohnMoore]

Well, I've partially gotten the system to work.

From a tty console, I used apt to install kdm, and pick it as default.

Rebooting, I got the "old" kdm login screen--but (wait for it) THE SYSTEM COMES UP!

I'm still not happy, since there's something broken about this, but at least the system is up.

John

[JohnMoore]

Should I worry about the fact that I'm still running kdm instead of lightdm? And is this likely to cause any problem the next time I upgrade?

Thanks.

[Snowhog]

Reinstall lightdm (sudo apt-get install --reinstall lightdm). If you aren't asked which DM to use as default, then afterwards, type:

sudo dpkg-reconfigure lightdm

[SteveRiley]

Try switching back to LightDM and see what happens.

sudo dpkg-reconfigure lightdm

Select LightDM from the menu that appears. When that's finished, power your machine down and then back up. Does LightDM behave normally now?

[JohnMoore]

Switched back - same problem

Try switching back to LightDM and see what happens.

I reconfigured to use lightdm, and restarted. The results were exactly what I experienced before. I get the lightdm login screen (with the "Guest" as well as my own account).

If I deliberately enter an incorrect password, it tells me I have done so. When I enter the correct password, the screen goes black--and the lightdm login screen reappears in a few seconds.

One difference I have noticed between the two PC's running 13.04: on the laptop (which works fine), when the lightdm signin screen goes black, I see a momentary "X" graphic cursor, then the boot continues. On the PC that's broken, when the lightdm screen goes black there is no cursor visible at all. Normally, I would just purge lightdm and keep on runnin' with kdm, but every time I upgrade, I'll be extra anxious.

[SteveRiley]

Heh, I see now that Snowhog beat me by three minutes.

FWIW, I use KDM. LightDM is a Canonical-backed project and I don't know of any other distro that uses it. I remain unconvinced by the arguments that Linux desktops need a DE-agnostic display manager. LightDM basically has to start its own mini environment, complete with a display server and policy engine, just to throw up the login screen. All that stuff then gets torn down when KDE starts.

Matthew Garrett complains:

The only real problem LightDM solves is that it makes it easier to write custom greeters, and if you're really seeking to differentiate your project based on your login screen then maybe your priorities are a little out of line. I'm sure that Ubuntu will release with a beautiful 3D greeter that has a wonderful transition to the desktop. It's just a shame that it won't do any of the useful things that the existing implementations [i.e., existing display managers --SMR] already do.

KDE is not abandoning KDM. Since my desktop is KDE, I'd rather use KDE's display manager.

[JohnMoore]

Aha! I had thought that there was something wrong with kdm, and I would wind up in trouble as I continued to move into the future without LightDM.

Since that appears to be in error, I think I'll reinstall kdm, purge lightdm and try to to worry so much!

Thanks!