no GUI after upgrade to buster

[L_V]

did you update befeore installing...

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apt update
apt install firmware-amd-graphics


And report this

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apt policy firmware-amd-graphics
grep ^d /etc/apt/sources.list

[Deb-fan]

Honestly would do it right this time, fresh install, including /home. Backup what you want from it and just restore afterwards. Yes you'll need non-free and or contrib packages. I'm not using Buster at the moment but Google says the package you can't find is in Busters repos. Did you "sudo apt update" after changing sources.list? No real reason to have 3 swap partitions (imo anyway. Though no real harm if that's someone's preference.) Your fstab files are an overly complicated mess. Though again can be someone's preference.

Never gotten into keeping a dedicated /home, always just leave it under / and most things on a shared data partition, accessible by all Os's on the system. The config files left behind in an unformatted /home could potentially cause conflicts/problems.

[Deb-fan]

Oops my bad, some of that was blkid output, not all fstab content. Apologies OP. Just me, would still go the reinstall route.

[Head_on_a_Stick]

I don't understand, did you update your old system or install a new one?

thanks for response
I have upgraded from stretch to buster.

That doesn't answer my question at all

Did you run the Debian buster installer and use it to install a new system?

why debian is booting into root partition instead of /home

What does this mean? Do you mean that you can't see /home in Debian? Use the findmnt command to view your mountpoints.

And yes, you need firmware-amd-graphics for your AMD graphics card and the package does exist. Did you update your package database after adding the non-free component to your sources?

[serandrzej]

I managed to install firmware-amd-graphics but still no GUI. I can't boot into /home partition.

[serandrzej]

Did you run the Debian buster installer and use it to install a new system?

(sorry for late answer, did not realized 2nd page) At first I upgraded via apt update dist upgrade etc. then when I couldn't make system work I installed it several times from CD.
oh, and I should have mentioned that I also run debian on dell vostro, here upgrade went smoothly (still minor issues to be handled later), but on dell I didn't have separate / and /home partition (and only windows next to debian)

[L_V]

Can you try to add a test user, and log in test session.

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adduser test

+

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grep home /etc/fstab
blkid | grep home
mount | grep home

[serandrzej]

Do you mean that you can't see /home in Debian? Use the findmnt command to view your mountpoints.

I can see /home partition, even in graphic mode but only from ubuntu.
here are readings from findmnt run from debian root CLI (again, not able to attach the file):

TARGET SOURCE FSTYPE OPTIONS
/ /dev/sda5 ext4 rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro
├─/sys sysfs sysfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime
│ ├─/sys/kernel/security securityfs securityfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime
│ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup tmpfs tmpfs ro,nosuid,nodev,noexec,mode=755
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/unified cgroup2 cgroup2 rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,nsdelegate
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/systemd cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,xattr,name=systemd
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/cpu,cpuacct cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,cpu,cpuacct
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/rdma cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,rdma
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/cpuset cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,cpuset
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/pids cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,pids
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/net_cls,net_prio cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,net_cls,net_prio
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/blkio cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,blkio
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/perf_event cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,perf_event
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/memory cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,memory
│ │ ├─/sys/fs/cgroup/devices cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,devices
│ │ └─/sys/fs/cgroup/freezer cgroup cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,freezer
│ ├─/sys/fs/pstore pstore pstore rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime
│ ├─/sys/firmware/efi/efivars efivarfs efivarfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime
│ ├─/sys/fs/bpf bpf bpf rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,mode=700
│ └─/sys/kernel/debug debugfs debugfs rw,relatime
├─/proc proc proc rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime
│ └─/proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc systemd-1 autofs rw,relatime,fd=29,pgrp=1,timeout=0,minproto=5,maxproto=5,direct,pipe_ino=12038
├─/dev udev devtmpfs rw,nosuid,relatime,size=1712712k,nr_inodes=428178,mode=755
│ ├─/dev/pts devpts devpts rw,nosuid,noexec,relatime,gid=5,mode=620,ptmxmode=000
│ ├─/dev/shm tmpfs tmpfs rw,nosuid,nodev
│ ├─/dev/hugepages hugetlbfs hugetlbfs rw,relatime,pagesize=2M
│ └─/dev/mqueue mqueue mqueue rw,relatime
├─/run tmpfs tmpfs rw,nosuid,noexec,relatime,size=346464k,mode=755
│ ├─/run/lock tmpfs tmpfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,size=5120k
│ └─/run/user/0 tmpfs tmpfs rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=346460k,mode=700
├─/boot/efi /dev/sda1 vfat rw,relatime,fmask=0077,dmask=0077,codepage=437,iocharset=ascii,shortname=mixed,utf8,errors=remount-ro
└─/home /dev/sda8 ext4 rw,relatime

debian partitions are /dev/sda5 and /dev/sda8

[serandrzej]

did you update befeore installing...

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apt update
apt install firmware-amd-graphics


And report this

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apt policy firmware-amd-graphics
grep ^d /etc/apt/sources.list

apt policy firmware-amd-graphics returns this:
firmware-amd-graphics:
Installed: 20190114-1
Candidate: 20190114-1
Version table:
***20190114-1 500
500 http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian buster/non-free amd64 Packages
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

grep ^d /etc/apt/sources.list - just hangs and nothing happens

[serandrzej]

Can you try to add a test user, and log in test session.

I added a test user and logged on as the new user (in text mode)

grep home /etc/fstab returns:
home was on /dev/sda8 during installation
UUID=9f475........... /home ext4 defaults 0 2

blkid | grep home run from root, not test user returns:
/dev/sda8 LABEL="home" UUID="9f475....." TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="home" PARTUUID="61ecb978..."

mount | grep home:
/dev/sda8 on /home type ext4 (rw,relatime)

[L_V]

grep ^d /etc/apt/sources.list - just hangs and nothing happens

Then, problem.

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ls /etc/apt/sources.list
cat /etc/apt/sources.list

Just after boot, if you log in root session, and execute sddm: what happen ?

EDIT: sddm for KDE. Replace sddm by the login manager you use / I don't remember since last month.

[serandrzej]

fresh install, including /home.

probably I will eventually resort to that, although would prefer not to, but actually trying to solve the issue in a proper way is quite gripping and educating and maybe will contribute to some corrections. so for now let's to try and try to possibly get rid of errors:)

The config files left behind in an unformatted /home could potentially cause conflicts/problems.

can config files on /home partition mess up with booting?

[serandrzej]

Then, problem.

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ls /etc/apt/sources.list
cat /etc/apt/sources.list

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ls /etc/apt/sources.list

returns /etc/apt/sources.list

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cat /etc/apt/sources.list

returns 3 entries - 2 default, and 1 you suggetsted previously (..buster non-free)

actually, Ive just realised that deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster main is missing, only security was there. Added now, after apt update all packages were anyway up to date.

Just after boot, if you log in root session, and execute sddm: what happen ?

sddm - command not found so I replaced it with lightdm and then upcame something like this:
"**(lightdm:668): WARNING [...] could not enumerate user data directory /var/lib/lightdm/data: Error opening directory '/var/lib/lightdm/data': No such file or directory"


Question: could reinstall of ubuntu help in case the problem lies with UEFI? I mean, maybe buster was to confused during upgrade/reinstall and mixed up booting "things", and ubuntu could straighten things out.

[djk44883]

I followed properly (as it seems) the upgrade procedure, I did format / root partition, but left /home untouched, just assigned new /home to old /home, while new / root partition was placed on old, formatted / root.

I don't understand, did you update your old system or install a new one?

thanks for response
I have upgraded from stretch to buster. stretch (and jessie before) worked fine (apart from minor glitches I got used to live with - I put them down to the simplicity of my netbook asus x102b or sth like this)

If you did an upgrade and not a new installation... why "I did format"???

Now I can see that system is booting directly into / root partition instead of /home which ends up with GUI not loading, only cmd line is available. But I can access /home in graphical mode from ubuntu (as well as via cmd), so files are in place.

"boot into" / "instead of"?? so you can get to a command line and

Code: Select all

ls /home

is empty? Execute

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mount [or] cat /etc/mtab

to see what is mounted and where

[serandrzej]

If you did an upgrade and not a new installation... why "I did format"???

at first I did regular upgrade (I followed the whole procedure update, dist upgrade, change source.list update.. etc - I probably followed every step and in the right order, on my other laptop it worked but there are only 2 systems and no separate /, /home)
but it failed, no GUI, so I installed buster from CD on top of lame buster which was already there. this ofcourse did not produce expected result, then I installed from CD several times, to no avail, no GUI.

Now I can see that system is booting directly into / root partition instead of /home which ends up with GUI not loading, only cmd line is available. But I can access /home in graphical mode from ubuntu (as well as via cmd), so files are in place.

"boot into" / "instead of"?? so you can get to a command line and

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ls /home

is empty?

I expected the system to boot into /home partition via GUI, and not /. and yes, command line is the only interface now and ls /home returns some files, moreover, all the files in from stretch /home partition are in place, and I can access them, and from ubuntu also in graphical mode.

Execute

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mount [or] cat /etc/mtab

to see what is mounted and where

cat /etc/mtab returns this:

sysfs /sys sysfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
proc /proc proc rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
udev /dev devtmpfs rw,nosuid,relatime,size=1712712k,nr_inodes=428178,mode=755 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts rw,nosuid,noexec,relatime,gid=5,mode=620,ptmxmode=000 0 0
tmpfs /run tmpfs rw,nosuid,noexec,relatime,size=346464k,mode=755 0 0
/dev/sda5 / ext4 rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro 0 0
securityfs /sys/kernel/security securityfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
tmpfs /dev/shm tmpfs rw,nosuid,nodev 0 0
tmpfs /run/lock tmpfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,size=5120k 0 0
tmpfs /sys/fs/cgroup tmpfs ro,nosuid,nodev,noexec,mode=755 0 0
cgroup2 /sys/fs/cgroup/unified cgroup2 rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,nsdelegate 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/systemd cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,xattr,name=systemd 0 0
pstore /sys/fs/pstore pstore rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars efivarfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
bpf /sys/fs/bpf bpf rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,mode=700 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/freezer cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,freezer 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/cpuset cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,cpuset 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/devices cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,devices 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/cpu,cpuacct cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,cpu,cpuacct 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/perf_event cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,perf_event 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/blkio cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,blkio 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/net_cls,net_prio cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,net_cls,net_prio 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/pids cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,pids 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/rdma cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,rdma 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/memory cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,memory 0 0
systemd-1 /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc autofs rw,relatime,fd=31,pgrp=1,timeout=0,minproto=5,maxproto=5,direct,pipe_ino=11092 0 0
mqueue /dev/mqueue mqueue rw,relatime 0 0
debugfs /sys/kernel/debug debugfs rw,relatime 0 0
hugetlbfs /dev/hugepages hugetlbfs rw,relatime,pagesize=2M 0 0
/dev/sda8 /home ext4 rw,relatime 0 0
/dev/sda1 /boot/efi vfat rw,relatime,fmask=0077,dmask=0077,codepage=437,iocharset=ascii,shortname=mixed,utf8,errors=remount-ro 0 0
tmpfs /run/user/0 tmpfs rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=346460k,mode=700 0 0


/dev/sda8 is buster /home and /dev/sda5 is /