/dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

Pawcatuck · 2009-11-07 22:16:48

I ran a pacman -Syu on my other computer this morning, and now Arch won't boot. I get an error message saying:

Error in file /etc/dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

Then the boot process fails to load HAL, and I have to [Ctrl-Alt-Del].

I searched for the filename and found http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=77506 from the Testing forum three months ago, but from that I can't figure out what to do. Should I delete the xorg-server.conf? I'm taking a guess that something went wrong with the Xorg installation, but since I can't get to a prompt, I'm at a loss about how to try upgrading the Xorg package. I've got a Puppy Linux disc from which I can edit text files on the hard drive.

I'm really sorry if this topic has been thrashed through, but although the latest Xorg seems to be a problem, I haven't been able to find a thread besides the above one that refers to this exact situation, where I can't even get to the login. I have an older Intel video card, an 82852/855GM.

JGC · 2009-11-07 23:32:36

Posting the contents of the file would be handy. I think reinstalling xorg-server might just solve your problem.

grey · 2009-11-07 23:56:45

I'd use puppy to edit the DAEMONs array in /etc/rc.conf to

DAEMONS=(syslog-ng network netfs)

Then boot Arch into a console, remove /etc/dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf and re-install xorg-server with pacman -U.

Pawcatuck · 2009-11-08 00:22:45

Thanks for reminding me I should always look twice. I thought -- or assumed -- that the file was empty, but the contents tell me otherwise:

 szerkesztésére használja a Nyomtatás beállítása párbeszédablakot.</longdesc>
                        </local_schema>
                    </entry>
                    <entry name="center-vertically">
                        <local_schema short_desc="Alapértelmezett függőleges középre igazítás">
                            <longdesc>Ez az érték meghatározza a Nyomtatás beállítása párbeszédablak oldalak vízszintes középre igazítására vonatkozó alapértlmeztt beállítását. Ezen érték szerkesztésére használja a Nyomtatás beállítása p

The philosophical question is: how did I end up with a Hungarian xorg-server.conf, even a truncated one like that? (When I installed Arch, I chose what I guessed to be the nearest repo, the University of Waterloo, Ontario, and have never reset it. On the computer I'm using now, I ran that Python script to get the fastest servers at the time, and I probably should do that on the other one when I get it back online.)

The practical question is: I believe what I want to do is pacman -Su xorg-server xorg-server-utils. Am I on the right track? And if so, how do I get to the login?

(on edit) Hi Grey; thanks, I'll look at that tomorrow.

Last edited by Pawcatuck (2009-11-08 00:24:18)

Pawcatuck · 2009-11-08 15:35:41

This isn't going particularly well.

I commented my DAEMONS line and wrote a new one to conform with what grey explained. I was then able to log in. I removed the xorg.conf file. I ran pacman -R xorg-server, which might have been a mistake.

Running pacman -U xorg-server returns:

error: 'xorg-server': cannot open package file

Running pacman -S xorg-server gives me a file not found.

Running pacman -S xorg starts the reinstallation procedure, but when I execute it, it lists a number of files, scrolling off the top of the tty screen, with the messages:

(filename) exists in filesystem.
Errors occurred, no packages were upgraded.

I didn't really know what to do with that information. So I looked at the Wiki (via an older Ubuntu install that shares this disc) and found out about the pacman -f option (which I think should be used with -U; is that right?), but the Wiki article had the caveat that this ideally should never be used. That's a pretty strong warning, so I'm not going to run it without some encouragement. Is

pacman -Uf xorg-server

a viable option in my situation? (And if so, is that the right syntax?) Or is there something else (there probably is) that I need to be trying first?

Thanks.

p.s. As a correction to my second post, I did run the Python script during installation and have several repositories enabled and synced, not just the one at the University of Waterloo.

----------------------------

(Later that night:) I found where the xorg-server packages were stored in pacman and deleted them. The idea was that if the package was damaged in some way, pacman -U would keep trying and failing to open it, and this way I could force a download of a fresh one. But when I tried to install it, I ended up with the same

(filename) exists in filesystem.

message that I got before deleting those packages.

I went through the log files and couldn't find a record of this operation. I'm thinking that it might help if I manually delete the packages pacman didn't want to replace. (Then again, it might do a lot of harm.) But the list exceeds the size of my terminal. I was hoping that a log of the operation would be captured somewhere; I read somewhere that pacman doesn't log failed or incomplete operations, but I didn't know if a record might exist elsewhere.

Last edited by Pawcatuck (2009-11-09 02:57:02)

Arch Linux

#1 2009-11-07 22:16:48

/dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

#2 2009-11-07 23:32:36

Re: /dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

#3 2009-11-07 23:56:45

Re: /dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

#4 2009-11-08 00:22:45

Re: /dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

#5 2009-11-08 15:35:41

Re: /dbus-1/system.d/xorg-server.conf

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