Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

jlacroix · 2011-08-04 23:31:44

Hello everyone. I decided to redo my laptop a few days ago, and started to think about display managers. Mainly, I was thinking about which display manager to use (gdm or slim) for an XFCE-based Arch install, and I started to ask myself, why even install one at all? I'm very proficient with the command line, so I started to wonder if the reason I use a display manager in the first place is possibly because I'm a creature of habit.

So, what are your opinions or experiences of operating without a display manager (using startx whenever you want a GUI) rather than installing a display manager at all? Are there any caveats to not having a DM, or maybe they provide something valuable I'm forgetting about? I'm considering setting up my laptop with XFCE and no display manager to see how that would work. Maybe it's not really necessary for me.

Note: I hope I posted this in the right place, it's more of an opinion post than requesting help.

Last edited by jlacroix (2011-08-04 23:32:47)

Inxsible · 2011-08-04 23:33:22

not necessary at all. I haven't used one ever on Arch.

karol · 2011-08-04 23:36:40

Inxsible wrote:

not necessary at all. I haven't used one ever on Arch.

+1

You don't even need startx but it's pretty handy.

jlacroix · 2011-08-04 23:37:07

karol wrote:

Inxsible wrote:
not necessary at all. I haven't used one ever on Arch.
+1
You don't even need startx but it's pretty handy.

What do you do instead?

stlarch · 2011-08-04 23:43:25

I don't use one either, but some others seem to like cdm.

karol · 2011-08-04 23:56:33

jlacroix wrote:

karol wrote:
Inxsible wrote:
not necessary at all. I haven't used one ever on Arch.
+1
You don't even need startx but it's pretty handy.
What do you do instead?

I have

x:5:respawn:/bin/su - -- karol -l -c '/usr/bin/xinit -- /usr/bin/X -nolisten tcp :0 </dev/null >/dev/null 2>&1'

in my /etc/inittab. It's a slight modification of https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/St … .2Finittab - w/o the startx part.
Instead of

     ├─login───bash───startx───xinit─┬─.xinitrc───dwm───firefox───23*[{firefox}]
     │                               └─X

I get

     ├─su───bash───xinit─┬─.xinitrc───dwm───firefox───23*[{firefox}]
     │                   └─X

(pstree output)

Not sure if it's worth the hassle ;P

Last edited by karol (2011-08-04 23:57:28)

skunktrader · 2011-08-04 23:57:17

Did you try this yet?
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Start_X_at_boot

Edit: karol beat me to it

Last edited by skunktrader (2011-08-04 23:58:37)

Inxsible · 2011-08-05 00:04:27

I have this:

x:5:once:/bin/su inxs -l -c '/bin/bash --login -c /usr/bin/startx >/dev/null 2>&1'

But startx and xinit, I believe are both from the same package. xorg-xinit. So it won't save you any diskspace. But one process less, I guess

hauzer · 2011-08-05 00:36:54

I use SLiM, it's just nice to have a greeting screen, although in Windows I always set up autologin, so that couldn't be a habit from there. I don't know.. Maybe I'll just kill SLiM for a while and see how it'll go.

throdon · 2011-08-05 02:15:18

I feel more like a hacker (and I guess more secure without one) Nobody knows what to do if they start my computer up and I can t sign in for them.

jlacroix · 2011-08-05 04:00:38

throdon wrote:

I feel more like a hacker (and I guess more secure without one) Nobody knows what to do if they start my computer up and I can t sign in for them.

LOL, I was thinking something similar to that in the back of my mind.

I started creating an XFCE based image on my laptop, without a display manager, and I am liking it. I'm still trying to get Samba to work (I already created a topic about that) but so far I'm loving XFCE and having a blast playing around with it.

Brcher · 2011-08-05 04:25:34

With startx (err, xinit) in your iniitab, wouldn't you be in trouble if an update messed up your (extremely temperamental) nvidia videocard?

I never saw the point in a display manager- you still have to put in your name/password (right?), so you aren't saving any time at startup. Unless s-t-a-r-t-x takes a long time to type I guess. And I recently gained an irrational hatred of them due to a certain prominent distro's auto-respawning display manager. (and confusing GUI once it started!) Also, you don't always need a to startx (what if you're just writing something or coding? No need to start up x over that...)

lolilolicon · 2011-08-05 04:36:52

We all know that display managers are not necessary, and are largely deemed bloat. No point in echoing that.
The question is, do they provide any real advantage? Or, by comparison, is there any disadvantage of the startx/xinit procedure?

ANOKNUSA · 2011-08-05 04:49:03

I use the mingetty auto-login feature, as my laptop's locked down in the BIOS. That avoids the problem of allowing someone to login at the DM screen, and prevents them from gaining root access with any live media. I suppose I should encrypt my home folder too, since even though the machine's a brick to anyone who steals it the drive's still accessible, but I rarely take it with me anywhere it might be snagged so I've procrastinated.

alphaniner · 2011-08-05 04:52:16

So your BIOS lockdown isn't something that can be cleared by resetting CMOS? Nice, but god forbid you forget that password.

ANOKNUSA · 2011-08-05 05:59:21

alphaniner wrote:

So your BIOS lockdown isn't something that can be cleared by resetting CMOS? Nice, but god forbid you forget that password.

You probably could actually open the thing and manually perform a BIOS reset, but really: how much effort is a thief gonna go through for it? Between model-specific research and the time and tedium just to pawn it for 50 bucks--hell, you might as well just get a job with a steady paycheck. While thieves likely assume (mostly correctly I suspect) that the average person uses a simple password and not much else for security, they'd get my machine, have no idea what to do with it and toss it in the trash. I'd get the last laugh in my own dorky, impotent way.

Awebb · 2011-08-05 06:59:09

I run slim as a daemon. We sometimes have power cuts, my computer restarts (happens often at night). Now I have a very loud NVIDIA gfx card, that needs X running to throttle down the fan. So, after a crash, I want X up, but after a crash I certainly don't want to be logged in automatically. I also find it less than comfortable working in a tty on this machine, I can't use the second monitor, I can either have KMS drivers or a silent gfx fan and the resolution doesn't fit with the nvidia drivers.

There are disadvantages of using startx from a tty:
1. One tty is blocked as long as you're in X.
2. Anyone with access to your computer can switch to that tty and zap your X with <C-c>. That alone is annoying enough to know...
3. ... but after that he has your login open unprotected. I know, anyone with physical access to a machine can do anything, but after someone broke into my system with a grub trick (or whatever), I usually have a chance to notice it.

Inxsible wrote:

x:5:once:/bin/su inxs -l -c '/bin/bash --login -c /usr/bin/startx >/dev/null 2>&1'

So I got this right? It asks you for your login data and then starts x?

lolilolicon · 2011-08-05 07:19:10

Awebb wrote:

There are disadvantages of using startx from a tty:
1. One tty is blocked as long as you're in X.
2. Anyone with access to your computer can switch to that tty and zap your X with <C-c>. That alone is annoying enough to know...
3. ... but after that he has your login open unprotected. I know, anyone with physical access to a machine can do anything, but after someone broke into my system with a grub trick (or whatever), I usually have a chance to notice it.

You don't have to leave the login open. Just replace `startx' with:

startx &
logout

in ~/.bash_profile, for example. Works for me.

litemotiv · 2011-08-05 09:43:01

This is not really an Arch Discussion, moving to GNU/Linux.

Inxsible · 2011-08-05 12:43:50

Awebb wrote:

Inxsible wrote:
x:5:once:/bin/su inxs -l -c '/bin/bash --login -c /usr/bin/startx >/dev/null 2>&1'
So I got this right? It asks you for your login data and then starts x?

No. I login straight into my i3 wm. The good thing is, unless the thief is a linux junky, he isn't going to be able to do anything on login because everything is keybindings based on my setup. All you see is a screen session on desktop 1

Cloudef · 2011-08-05 13:01:07

.jari//LOLI :: /home/jari :: branch: master? [16]
>> cat .bash_profile 
. $HOME/.bashrc

if [[ -z "$DISPLAY" ]] && [[ ! -a "/tmp/.X11-unix/X0" ]] && [[
"`whoami`" != "root" ]]; then
  /usr/bin/xinit -- /usr/bin/X -nolisten tcp :0 </dev/null >/dev/null 2>&1
  logout
fi

I use that

Awebb · 2011-08-05 14:29:34

lolilolicon wrote:

startx &
logout

I was just hit by the obvious train, I guess ~.~
Thanks :-D

@Inxsible: :-)

karol · 2011-08-05 14:40:11

Brcher wrote:

With startx (err, xinit) in your iniitab, wouldn't you be in trouble if an update messed up your (extremely temperamental) nvidia videocard?
I never saw the point in a display manager- you still have to put in your name/password (right?), so you aren't saving any time at startup. Unless s-t-a-r-t-x takes a long time to type I guess. And I recently gained an irrational hatred of them due to a certain prominent distro's auto-respawning display manager. (and confusing GUI once it started!) Also, you don't always need a to startx (what if you're just writing something or coding? No need to start up x over that...)

I have two other consoles I can use if my X is having a bad day.
If I'm testing something, I can always disable init 5, boot to init 3 test, reboot and so on.

George.Harmony · 2011-08-05 14:48:19

xinit

All I've used for the last 2 years.

Last edited by George.Harmony (2011-08-05 14:50:08)

bluepumpkin · 2011-08-06 01:34:34

I have this in my .kshrc (I use openbsd's pdksh).

if [ "$TERM" = "linux" -a "`tty`" = "/dev/tty1" ]; then
        xinit
        exit 0
fi

Arch Linux

#1 2011-08-04 23:31:44

Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#2 2011-08-04 23:33:22

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#3 2011-08-04 23:36:40

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#4 2011-08-04 23:37:07

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#5 2011-08-04 23:43:25

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#6 2011-08-04 23:56:33

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#7 2011-08-04 23:57:17

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#8 2011-08-05 00:04:27

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#9 2011-08-05 00:36:54

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#10 2011-08-05 02:15:18

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#11 2011-08-05 04:00:38

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#12 2011-08-05 04:25:34

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#13 2011-08-05 04:36:52

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#14 2011-08-05 04:49:03

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#15 2011-08-05 04:52:16

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#16 2011-08-05 05:59:21

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#17 2011-08-05 06:59:09

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#18 2011-08-05 07:19:10

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#19 2011-08-05 09:43:01

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#20 2011-08-05 12:43:50

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#21 2011-08-05 13:01:07

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#22 2011-08-05 14:29:34

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#23 2011-08-05 14:40:11

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#24 2011-08-05 14:48:19

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

#25 2011-08-06 01:34:34

Re: Display Managers, How Necessary Are They?

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