13.10 slim/openbox not functioning properly

[Nick_Buonanno]

Thanks in advance for any help I can get on this. I have a fresh Ubuntu server install that started from 12.04 and got do-release-upgraded a few times up to 13.10 (long story short, that was the only available method of installing). While still on 12.04, I installed Slim and Openbox for a bare-bones X environment. Everything worked fine, got some tweaks in place for OB, etc. After updating to the current release, Slim starts, but if I log in, it just hangs at a blank background and doesn't start Openbox. If I specifically select Openbox as the session, it starts, but the background doesn't change from the slim theme, and programs that normally should auto-start won't.

I've tried digging through some error logs, but haven't found anything noteworthy yet. Would anyone happen to know what to check, or at least have an idea of where I can get started?

[Nick_Buonanno]

Figured it out... kind of. I did an apt-get purge xfce4*, since I used to run xfce. I did another purge of slim, openbox, and xorg. Reinstalled everything, rebooted, and now it seems to log in properly again. Oh well.

[Bashing-om]

Nick_Buonanno; Hi ! My welcome to the forum (belatedly) !

It is regretful that none responded to your post. Be aware it is perfectly acceptable to bump up your post after 24 hours of no response; generally by updating the info with what you have tried. This is a busy forum, and sometimes things fall between the cracks.

Great that you did find a solution !
It is gratifying that you did follow procedure and advise of a solution, please mark this thread as solved - 1st post -> thread tools.
As this aids others seeking solutions in a similar situation, and helps keep the forum tidy.

And

keep on keep'n on

[Nick_Buonanno]

Turns out this wasn't quite as "fixed" as I had counted on. I'm getting the same issue on not only the same machine, but another one that I have the same operating system/login manager/window manager set up on. I'm still trying to dig for log files that can tell me what's going on, but I still haven't found anything. To reiterate, when I try and log in via Slim normally, the log in window disappears, but the theme background remains and openbox doesn't start. If I restart the slim service, and specify openbox as the session, it will log in, but the background still remains, and my ~/.config/openbox/autostart file doesn't run (I can at least run it manually).

[Bashing-om]

Nick_Buonanno; Hey ,

Let me re-boot and check an idea out ..Find all the config files.

I'll be BacK

[Bashing-om]

Nick_Buonanno; I have a starting point.
Slim;
Lets see how you are starting openbox:

cat ~/.xinitrc

and what is configured in the default slim file ?

cat /etc/slim.conf

openbox:
If all looks good with slim, there are 4 config files to look at for openbox's operation.
Hey, I have never run openbox, this may be a struggle to comprehend !

sometimes I wonder other times I do not know

[Nick_Buonanno]

The way my system is currently set up, I don't have/use an xinitrc file. My slim.conf file contains the following lines:

# login_cmd exec /bin/sh - ~/.xinitrc %session
login_cmd exec /bin/bash -login /etc/X11/Xsession %session

If I were to comment out the currently executed line, and uncomment the line referencing .xinitrc, would I have to have that file already in place in my home directory?

[ibjsb4]

I do not run a display manager, but instead use .xinitrc to start a session. I think you need to create a ~/.xinitrc file with two lines in it.

#!/usr/bin/env bash
exec openbox

Then make it execuatble

sudo chmod +x .xinitrc

That (with the proper slim setting) should get you going.

[Bashing-om]

@Nick_Buonanno;
+1 ^ ibjsb4 .

Here is an example, here I am set up for trouble shooting a couple of niggly problems. Your interest is only as ibjsb4 advised:

sysop@1304mini:~$ cat ~/.xinitrc
#!/usr/bin/env bash
#started creation of this file 23may2013
#
#
echo "starting the X session, Billy" >&2
export XAUTHORITY=/home/sysop/.Xauthority
exec startxfce4 --with-ck-launch > /home/sysop/errors-boot.txt 2>&1
#end
sysop@1304mini:~$

Where here I am starting my DM "xfce4" and you want to start "openbox".

"openbox" is highly configurable. From the documentation, once you get it operational you can spend a life time tweaking on it !

ain't nothing but a thing

[Nick_Buonanno]

Thanks for the responses. I'll follow up shortly.

UPDATE: Everything seems to work as it did before now that I'm using the .xinitrc setup. One thing I did learn via Google is that I need to exec "openbox-session" instead of "openbox" for it to run my autostart script. I may go back and try and set it up using the Xsession line, and edit the list of available sessions to specify openbox-session. Thanks again for your help, @Bashing-om and @ibjsb4; it feels great to have everything back to normal.