Bad update - X11 corrupted

[Martin Stone]

Jay,

Yes, this is true - if you append S to the kernel line you will get single-user 
mode.  What's less well-known is that this will work for other runlevels as 
well!  So if your initdefault is set to 5 in inittab and you want to boot 
runlevel 3, you can append 3 to your kernel line... cool, huh?  I advised him to 
go with 3 rather than S because everything on his system was working except for 
X, so why inconvenience himself with single-user mode when he doesn't have to :-)

Martin


Jay Daniels wrote:
> Single User Mode
> Read somewhere you can just add an "S" without the quotes to the end
> of the kernel line, is that correct?
> 
> 
> jay
> 
> On Wed, Apr 14, 2004 at 02:11:51PM -0400, 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>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
> 
>