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Bes

Member

Registered: 2007-06-20

Posts: 79

Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

Hi,

As per the title please... I need to rerun Xorg -configure, but cannot for the life of me figure out how to shut down X and get to a command line

Thanks

tdphys

Member

From: Lower Mainland

Registered: 2005-06-14

Posts: 50

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

ctrl-alt-backspace will shut down the x-server, unless you're running gdm or something, which will restart X.

You can also jump into a terminal with ctrl-alt-f5  from which you could run your configuration stuff.  Get back to X with ctrl-alt-f7.

Last edited by tdphys (2008-04-19 16:41:57)

Bes

Member

Registered: 2007-06-20

Posts: 79

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

Ctl alt and backspace just takes me out to the login screen.. from there I can't get to the terminal without X running.

Ctrl Alt F5 gets me to the command line, but I can't kill the X server

Thanks though

Last edited by Bes (2008-04-19 17:02:00)

lucke

Member

From: Poland

Registered: 2004-11-30

Posts: 4,018

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

If you start your login daemon from inittab, type "init 3" in the virtual console and then "init 5" when you want your X back.

If you start your login daemon in rc.conf, try running /etc/rc.d/(k|g)dm stop or just run "killall X".

Bes

Member

Registered: 2007-06-20

Posts: 79

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

hmm any init commands appear to do nothing (as root user)

Nicky726

Member

From: Czech Republic

Registered: 2008-02-15

Posts: 145

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

As was already mentioned here, to get to console try something lik ctrl+alt+f2 (or some other function key), then you can edit your /etc/rc.conf and remove kdm/gdm or what you use to make sure, you won't go to X next start, or killall X, and then do needed changes

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tj

Member

Registered: 2008-01-11

Posts: 48

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

Ctl alt and backspace just takes me out to the login screen.. from there I can't get to the terminal without X running.

Ctrl Alt F5 gets me to the command line, but I can't kill the X server

Thanks though

so with ctrl+alt+f5 you're at the console
log in if you need to, then

ps ax | grep gdm
 4441 ?        Ss     0:00 /usr/sbin/gdm-binary
 4442 ?        S      0:00 /usr/sbin/gdm-binary
 4444 tty7     SLs+   3:38 /usr/bin/Xorg :0 -audit 0 -auth /var/lib/gdm/:0.Xauth
 6633 pts/0    S+     0:00 grep gdm
 kill 4444

the above example assumes gdm is your login manager so substitute whatever you're using, and you can kill the other instances of gdm (in my example processes 4441 and 4442 but don't waste your time on the grep process 6633

now redo your X config

(actually you could run this from a terminal from within X and it should have the same effect of dropping you back to console

Last edited by tj (2008-04-20 09:36:15)

Xherziu

Member

Registered: 2008-04-16

Posts: 58

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

I got a weird problem here.  I boot up and it takes me to bash, then I start x and it takes me to vc7, I used to be able to switch vc's but something went wrong and when I switch back to vc1 my monitor goes into a power save... anyone got an idea on what the problem might be? 

I think it started to do this when I messed around with my daemons... here is what I got right now:

Daemons:  syslog-ng network netfs crond portmap fam hal

Am I missing an important daemon?

jacko

Member

Registered: 2007-11-23

Posts: 840

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

when I switch back to vc1 my monitor goes into a power save...

means your xorg is not loading properly. power save mode is a nice way of saying, I WON'T load.

I think though, if u switch to back to another vc u can check the xorg log for the error.

11010010110

Member

Registered: 2008-01-14

Posts: 284

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

Ignore the running X and just edit the file

When you finished editing it go to vc7 and do alt ctrl backspace. X will immediately restart with the new settings

You may temporarily disable *dm the same way as you installed it

Davigetto

Member

From: In your mind

Registered: 2007-05-10

Posts: 266

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

I will explain you my method to stop X when X are loaded:

1- Ctrl + Alt + F1
2- enter console as root
3- Execute "/etc/rc.d/kdm stop" (or gdm|entranced|slim|xdm stop, depends on your login manager).
4- X will be killed and xou can reconfigure Xorg.

I hope it will help you.

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richs-lxh

Member

Registered: 2008-08-23

Posts: 76

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

I still can't get out of X ?

Trying to install the latest Beta Nvidia driver, I think I may have to just edit my config to boot to runlevel 3.

Strange, I have always used either killall gdm, /etc/rc.d/gdm stop etc...... just keep getting xserver still running message.

Oh well, ya learn something new every day.

richs-lxh

Last edited by richs-lxh (2008-08-27 13:59:20)

haxit

Member

From: /home/haxit

Registered: 2008-03-04

Posts: 1,247

Website

Re: Dumb question- how do I get to the command line without X running?

Kill everything that is X, also try running:

rmmod nvidia

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