Silly Question - New Login

[Berna Massingill]

On Sun, Aug 07, 2005 at 04:11:36AM -0500, Berna Massingill wrote:

>>  On Sat, Aug 06, 2005 at 10:08:21AM -0400, Jim Cornette wrote:
>>  
>>  >>  Berna Massingill wrote:
>>  >>  
>>  [ snip ]
>>  
>>  >>  >>>Applications --> System tools -->> New Login
>>  >>  >>>
>>  >>  >>>This will let you open different users for different consoles. There are 
>>  >>  >>>items like sound that don't work wel on the new login, but it is handy 
>>  >>  >>>for running KDE or XFCE in one console and Gnome in the other.
>>  >>  >>>     
>>  >>  >>>
>>  >>  >
>>  >>  >The command-line version of this (for those who are into such things)
>>  >>  >might be  "X :1 -query <machinename> -once".
>>  >>  >
>>  >>  >I say "might be" because I just tried this on my newly-installed FC4
>>  >>  >system, and got (1) a blank screen with a little X in the middle,
>>  >>  >and (2) error messages when I went back to the original screen
>>  >>  >(with control-alt-F7).  I also tried it from a text console, with
>>  >>  >the same result.  
>>  >>  >
>>  >>  >So I tried your GNOME-GUI way, described above, and that didn't work
>>  >>  >either, though the symptoms were slightly different -- blank screen with
>>  >>  >a cursor at the top, very similar to what was happening with the text
>>  >>  >consoles before I applied the "copy libvgahw.a from an FC3 system"
>>  >>  >fix discussed recently in this list.
>>  >>  >
>>  >>  >Hm.  Anyone know what's wrong?  This can be a useful thing to have.
>>  
>>  [ snip ]
>>  
>>  >>  The properties in the command is the command "gdmflexiserver" on my 
>>  >>  computer. I ran this from the commandline and it brought up another 
>>  >>  screen for login on F8 While there was still a session on F7. This seems 
>>  >>  to be a function from gdm login manager.
>>  
>>  Do you remember doing anything special to enable this?  I'm wondering
>>  why this (starting a second session as you described previously from
>>  a GNOME menu) would work for you and not for me.


Update / some mysteries solved:

(*) On my system gdmflexiserver starts a second graphical session, but
on virtual terminal 9, not 8. 

(*) "X :1 -query localhost -once" also does *something* with virtual
terminal 9, but whatever it is is not a huge success -- I get a blank
screen with a little "X" in the middle.

(*) The following lines appear in /etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf:

[xdmcp]
# Distributions: Ship with this off.  It is never a safe thing to leave
# out on the net.  Setting up /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.deny to only
# allow local access is another alternative but not the safest.
# Firewalling port 177 is the safest if you wish to have xdmcp on.
# Read the manual for more notes on the security of XDMCP.
#Enable=false

I *think*, but I'm not sure, that all of this started working better
when I changed "#Enable=false" to "Enable=true".  Based on the comments,
it does seem that "X :1 -query" won't work without this change.


Further questions:

(*) Why do these second X sessions use virtual terminal 9 rather than 8?

(*) Why does "X :1 -query" still not work?

(*) Where is the "-query" option to "X" documented, anyway?  It doesn't
seem to be in the man page for the "X" command.



-- blm