Can a non-root user start KDE?

[morphynoman]

As you know it starts at runlevel 3 by default. So, when I login as non-root user and try to 'startx' it does not start KDE. How could I setup KDE for a normal user can run KDE?

Thanks for your attention

[purehate]

As root....

bt~#echo "exec startkde" > /home/(user)/.xinitrc

then log in as your user and start KDE

[Shavx]

Or just use Sudo or Su

[purehate]

Or just use Sudo or Su

umm... that's not what he asked

[morphynoman]

It didn't work.

May be I didn't explain it well. I already use KDE. As root startx starts KDE. But I have create a user account, obviously with permissions of a normal user.

At level 3 I log as user, but when invoke startx it says "Cannot move /var/log/Xorg.0.log to Xorg.0.log.old Giving up..." and doesn't start KDE. Obviously i gave 777 permission to that file but nothing seems to change.

So my question is, where is supposed to configure KDE to run it as non-root user?

Thanks again

[purehate]

Each user has to have a seperate .xinitrc file in their home directory in order to give startx a file to read and a command to run....

Look here in the beginning of the startx script...

b4cktr4ck3 ~ # cat /usr/bin/startx


#!/bin/sh

# $Xorg: startx.cpp,v 1.3 2000/08/17 19:54:29 cpqbld Exp $
#
# This is just a sample implementation of a slightly less primitive
# interface than xinit. It looks for user .xinitrc and .xserverrc
# files, then system xinitrc and xserverrc files, else lets xinit choose
# its default. The system xinitrc should probably do things like check
# for .Xresources files and merge them in, startup up a window manager,
# and pop a clock and serveral xterms.
#
# Site administrators are STRONGLY urged to write nicer versions.
#
# $XFree86: xc/programs/xinit/startx.cpp,v 3.16tsi Exp $
userclientrc=$HOME/.xinitrc
sysclientrc=/usr/lib/X11/xinit/xinitrc


userserverrc=$HOME/.xserverrc
sysserverrc=/usr/lib/X11/xinit/xserverrc
defaultclient=xterm
defaultserver=/usr/bin/X
defaultclientargs=""
defaultserverargs=""
clientargs=""
serverargs=""

if [ -f $userclientrc ]; then
    defaultclientargs=$userclientrc
elif [ -f $sysclientrc ]; then
    defaultclientargs=$sysclientrc

See the part I highlighted in red? That is the name of the file the script is looking for to find out what desktop or window manager to excecute. This is how you can give every user their own desktop. For example here is mine...

pwnsauce ~ # cat /home/purehate/.xinitrc 
sudo bash -c set > $HOME/.exports
exec awesome

I use awesome as a window manager so that's what my file says to execute. I'm fairly certain you have probably not properly configured the user properly or their is some other type of user error involved.

My question is why are you trying to create a user? Backtrack is meant to be run as root and not run as a everyday operating system.

[morphynoman]

I have read thousands of times in this forum that Bt is not supposed to be the main operative system, but for a long time I desired to try Slackware because I'll always used Debian and OpenSuse. During this time I looked for a good security suite, so BT seemed to be the best option.

Now it's easy to see the need of creating a non-root user. But, if you will I prefer to talk about the main question that now is why my user can't start a X session. I have a .xinitrc file in my /home/$user dir ending with 'startkde' and nothing of I've tried worked.

Thanks again for your attention

[purehate]

Ok so first of all are you sure you know the proper way to create a user? If you want post your commands and Ill take a look.

Next could you post the entire exact error that happens when you try to startx?

[morphynoman]

After some tries, it seemed to almost start XserverI, and I know that it makes not much sense but adding my user to sudoers what I obtain is

Fatal error

...Can't access to /dev/tty0 (Permision denied)

But:

Morphy ~ # ls -l /dev/tty0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 Nov 17 17:47 /dev/tty0 -> vc/0

It looks like I have no permission but is 0777


Thanks to those who lost 1 second with this.

[morphynoman]

For the first error:

xf860OpenConsole: Cannot open/dev/tty0 (Permission denied)

cd /dev/cv
chmod 666 0

and for the next:
xf86OpenConsole: Cannot open virtual console 7 (Permission denied)

cp -Rfv /root/{./kde*,.local,.qt*} /home/tahl/
  chown -Rv tahl:users /home/tahl/
  chmod u+s /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg
  ls -l /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg

Thanks again