Arch Linux

tomdodson

Member

Registered: 2019-12-30

Posts: 4

[SOLVED] Sometimes greeter doesn't start with lightdm

Hi,

One of the first steps after installing arch was to install a display manager. I went for the basic settings found in the light dm wiki page https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Li … stallation.

What I notice is about 20% of the time the greeter doesn't start. I get only a black screen. I need to use ctrl+alt+F2 to enter a new tty session then manually start my DE (cinnamon) with startx.

I installed both lightdm and lightdm-gtk-greeter. I edited /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf to specify

greeter-session=lightdm-gtk-greeter

I started and enabled light dm

sudo systemctl enable lightdm && sudo systemctl start lightdm

The odd thing to me is that it isn't every time I reboot I get the issue. Maybe 1 in 5 attempts and I have to do my work around.

Does someone know of more config files/logs I can check?

Last edited by tomdodson (2020-01-04 02:49:33)

c00ter

Member

From: Alaskan in Washington State

Registered: 2014-08-28

Posts: 421

Re: [SOLVED] Sometimes greeter doesn't start with lightdm

Have you researched "kernel entropy" and tools such as haveged or rng-tools to help overcome it? You will also want to ensure that linux-firmware is installed. https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ra … generation

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UNIX was not designed to stop you from doing stupid things, because that would also stop you from doing clever things. -- Doug Gwyn

seth

Member

From: Won't reply 2 private help req

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 78,146

Re: [SOLVED] Sometimes greeter doesn't start with lightdm

If it's not the entropy pool (check your journal for "crng") may just https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Li … TTY_output ?

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tomdodson

Member

Registered: 2019-12-30

Posts: 4

Re: [SOLVED] Sometimes greeter doesn't start with lightdm

Thanks for the replies, I've never heard of kernel entropy I will check into that. I will try adding that setting in lightdm (I overlooked the solution on the page i was reading. RTFM right?).

I'll make that change and reboot several times and report back on my status.

tomdodson

Member

Registered: 2019-12-30

Posts: 4

Re: [SOLVED] Sometimes greeter doesn't start with lightdm

That was it! Note that there are two settings for

logind-check-graphical

One under the [LightDM] tag and one globally at the top of the file. I had to use the one under the [LightDM] tag, but I tried rebooting several times and It appears to consistently show me the greeter.

Thanks this issue is solved.

seth

Member

From: Won't reply 2 private help req

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 78,146

Re: [SOLVED] Sometimes greeter doesn't start with lightdm

Cool.
Please always remember to mark resolved threads by editing your initial posts subject - so others will know that there's no task left, but maybe a solution to find.
Thanks.

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How to upload text · How to boot w/o GUI · Disable Windows Fast-Start! · Fix your xinitrc