Password working in CLI but not GUI

[gingikinz]

Hello everyone! I'm new to Linux, and I downloaded the most recent version of Debian AMD64. It was working just fine until this morning.

I booted up and typed in my password (the correct password) and pressed enter, and nothing happened. I rebooted several times with the same result. I opened the command line and successfully logged in using my username and the same password that I typed in on the gui login screen, and I can navigate Linux like normal. The 'enter' key works fine, but it seems like the gui login screen won't accept it.

Things I've done: reset password through CLI, removed the Xauthority file, Googled and Binged, with no change.

I'm using the KDE desktop. I'm running it in VirtualBox

I've looked online a bunch and haven't found anything that's solved the problem, do y'all have any ideas? I hope I'm not missing anything super obvious, but I'm still new to this. Please help

[Head_on_a_Stick]

You should be able to get your desktop running from a console login with the startx command.

Check the output of

Code: Select all

localectl

Make sure the X11 keymap is correct.

[gingikinz]

You should be able to get your desktop running from a console login with the startx command.

When I do that the screen goes black. I can get back to the command line with ctrl-alt-F1, though.

The keyboard is working fine in the command line, enter and everything. Would the GUI handle it differently?

[Deb-fan]

Though everything was working normally up to now? Have you been mucking around with ie: Using sudo to launch graphical apps, in particular have you messed around in your user's /home with a file manager launched with elevated privileges? Try chowning the contents of your home.

Code: Select all

sudo chown -R youruser:youruser /home/youruser

See if X starts working again.

[gingikinz]

Though everything was working normally up to now?

Yes, there were no problems until I booted it up yesterday.

Using sudo to launch graphical apps, in particular have you messed around in your user's /home with a file manager launched with elevated privileges? Try chowning the contents of your home.

Tried chowning, startx still brings up a blank screen.

Here's the error messages when I was logged in as root (it won't let me upload an image):

# sudo conqueror
qt.qpa.screen: QXcbConnection: could not connect to display

# sudo firefox
Error: no DISPLAY environment variable specified

# sudo localectl
System Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8
VC Keymap: n/a
X11 Layout: us
X11 Model: pc105

Using startx will make it so I can't access tty1 because the screen goes black, so I'll use tty# until I need to restart. I can get back to the gui login with ctrl-alt-F7, but nothing has changed.

I've been browsing through the log files and I'm not making much sense of it. It might have to do with permissions? I tried startx as root and it has the same result.

[Dai_trying]

You could check you have free space on your / partition, log in to tty1 and type df this will show you if anything looks too high, I have had occasions where gui will not log in if there is no free space available.
If usage is above 95% I would free up some space, clearing apt cache of installed packages would usually give you some spare, and also check you do not have anything spamming your logs.

[gingikinz]

Used df, everything is under 10% use.

After looking through the etc folder, I can't find the kde4 folder. Could the desktop environments have been deleted somehow?

[pendrachken]

Look in /var/log/Xorg.0.log to see if your keyboard is being recognized by X when it starts up.

Also, when you type your password do you see any visual feedback? I.E. the "dots" filling the password input space as you type.

[gingikinz]

The dots would show up like normal; enter just would not submit the password. My guess is that the password wouldn't enter for some reason because there was no desktop to go to after logging in.

Turns out that the DE files were deleted somehow, and that VirtualBox glitched and disconnected the VM from the internet. Once I was reconnected I downloaded Xfce and it is working now. Not sure why this happened, but I'm glad it is working!

[Head_on_a_Stick]

I tried startx as root

Don't do that. Ever.

And I think Deb-fan was advising that starting programs as root might cause your problem rather than solve it.

[Deb-fan]

^Yep.

[gingikinz]

Okay, sorry I misunderstood.

I will not do that from now on.