[ale] no user/password fields on gnome logins screen

[John Heim]

There is no /etc/X11/xorg.conf file on the machine. Although, 'man 
xorg.conf' says that X looks for an xorg.conf file in about 100 different 
locations under about 100 different names. And I haven't checked them all. 
I guess I'll have to do that.

Anyway, I created an /etc/X11/xorg.conf file according to that page and it 
didn't work. I found lots of messages out there about that technique not 
working. What does work is to run 'setxkbmap -optionn 
terminate:cntrl_alt_bksp'. So then I get the hotkey for killing X. But I 
still have the original problem of not having a proper login window.

I also tried generating an /etc/X11/xorg.conf file by running 
'Xorg -configure' but that didn't help either.

Well, another thing is that I left something out of my original description 
of the problem. I am installing linux via FAI (Fully Automated Install). So 
I have about 20 machines with this problem right now.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Charles Shapiro" <hooterpincher at gmail.com>
To: "Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts" <ale at ale.org>
Sent: Tuesday, July 12, 2011 9:53 AM
Subject: Re: [ale] no user/password fields on gnome logins screen


I can't necessarily help you on your gdm3 login fields trouble, but
ctrl-alt-backspace is probably disabled in your
X config file ( /etc/xorg.conf I think ).  You can set "dontzap" to
false I believe to re-enable it, as detailed here (
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/XorgCtrlAltBackspace ).  I've done this on my
personal box without ill effect. I have no experience with gdm or
gdm3, since I login exclusively in text mode and then explicitly start
X from the command line. Call it an idiosyncracy from my years of
using a green screen.

-- CHS


On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 10:37 AM, John Heim <john at johnheim.net> wrote:
> Anybody have any idea why the gnome login screen would come up without the
> boxes to enter your user ID and password? Obviously, that makes it kind of
> difficult to log in. I can switch to a text console and restart gdm3 and
> then I get a normal login window. But if I reboot, it goes back to not
> having places to type in your user ID and password. Alternately, anybody
> know of how you can restart gdm3 at the login window? You used to be able 
> to
> do that by pressing control+alt+backspace but it doesn't work anymore.
>
> I see in the syslog error messages from gtk that say that something is
> creating widgets "not in a window". I presume that's the problem and that
> the user ID and password widgets are being created outside a window (or
> something). But I can't figure out why it would do that or why restarting
> gdm3 would fix the problem.
>
> PS: I'm blind but sighted people have told me that the screen resolution
> looks the same before and after restarting gdm3. Everything looks the same
> (according to them) except that after restarting gdm3, the login window
> contains places to put your ID and password.
>
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