Pclinuxos-64-full monty

[onederer]

Hi,

 

I downloaded and installed PClinuxos-64-FullMonty. I had booted in as root to setup the OS. I decided to try the 3-D effects. I activated the rotating-square application for virtual desktops. While I was checking it out, except what was in the squares for virtual desktops, everything else disappeared from the screen! Nothing was left which could be used to rescue the failure. Nothing of value could be used, not even the right click of the mouse.

 

Using Konsole, and looking in the root directory and at the Desktop, the files still seem to be intact, but not the administrative components on the bottom tool-bar. So now, the quandry is how to put back the items so that they can be seen again on the root's desktop. I can't do much as the user in a GUI environment, and can't activate items that need root. It looks like the entire root desktop has to be recreated. I don't know how to do this. The user's environment is fully functional.

 

Anyone know how to resurect the entire root's desktop environment?

 

Cheers!

Edited August 27, 2014 by onederer

[saturnian]

Since it's a fresh installation, would it be easier to just reinstall?

 

I almost never log into the root session of an installed system -- I can't even remember the last time I did that. With root access from the command line, or a root window of the file manager, when is logging into the root session necessary?

Edited August 27, 2014 by saturnian

[réjean]

I am with saturnian on that one. Whenever I try login in as root to solve a problem I end up creating 3 more problems (or more). Why do you want to login as root anyway? I am replying from PCLinuxOS KDE 64-bit but as a user i.e. "rejean". I would hate going into as "root" but if it can help you I would do it but I would rather not change too many things. On the other hand since I have a separate /home partition a reinstall wouldn't be too hard to do. Again, as saturnian suggested a reinstall wouldn't be out of the question; would it?

Just login as root and here are I saw some shortcuts that might help you:Refresh Desktop (F5), Activities (Alt+D, Alt+A), Unlock Widgets (Alt+D,L, Folder Settings (Alt+D, Alt+S).

Hope this helps!

Edited August 27, 2014 by réjean

[onederer]

I don't really want to start all over again! I spent too much time with the partition manager. I'd prefer not to have another repeat performance. I won't go into details of what happened with that manager, but it wasn't pleasant.

 

The user section is running real fine. I'm inclined to believe that the root is intact, except for the desktop. That, I'd like to reconstruct if at all possible. When the root's desktop went belly up, no keypress was effective. Nothing worked in root's desktop mode

 

I need to resurrect the desktop from the user's KDE Konsole, as root. It might have been a fresh install, but it is no longer that way. A lot of time has been spent setting up the user's settings, as was the root's settings.

 

I was using root to setup the machine, when this happened. Guess that I need to stay away from the 3-D functions! I'm currently using the user's desktop to write this.

 

Can you help me re-establish root's desktop? And I will try what you sent me, but I don't believe that it will work, since there are nothing on the desktop to press or use, anywhere. it has to be done via user's site, with the console, as root.

 

Cheers!

[Guest LilBambi]

Are you using su or sudo? I do not think you have a separate root account when using sudo.

 

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RootSudo

 

That's the only thing I can figure happened; unless you got hacked while surfing using root?

[V.T. Eric Layton]

Su or sudo? Isn't that an old Genesis song?

 

[securitybreach]

Are you using su or sudo? I do not think you have a separate root account when using sudo.

 

Actually you can. I setup sudo but also used a root account too:

 

 

The reason it asks for user and root password is that packer (arch AUR frontend) builds as user and installs as root. If I use sudo to edit a file in /etc, then it just asks for the root password instead of the user password. It's almost like having sudo with a separate root account. Ingenious in my opinion since it uses multiple authentication depending on what you are doing

[saturnian]

Ah... Somewhat tangential to the topic, but now I remember why I used to log in as root. I had permissions issues in my multi-boot set-ups between (on the one hand) .rpm distros like PCLOS, Fedora, maybe Scientific Linux, and (on the other hand) .deb distros like Debian. After installing PCLOS or Fedora, I would log in as root and run usermod -u 1000 -g 100 [username]. But in Fedora's GNOME spin (according to my notes) there was no root login like there was in the KDE spin, so when I installed Fedora's GNOME spin I went to a tty console (whatever you call it, ctrl+alt+fn) and logged in as root there to run that usermod command. After realizing that I could do that, I haven't logged into a normal (GUI) root session since, unless I count some live sessions that I've run as root.

 

Considering all that, perhaps onederer could do something similar to fix the root desktop? I don't know what the fix would be, but if you've got a console root session going, at least you're in there and you can run commands and stuff.

 

I'd have no idea what to do to fix the desktop once I got into the console root session, though. So I'd reinstall, even though it might be a pain to do it.

[réjean]

What if you click on PC (bottom left) -> leave -> Switch User. Then you may be asked if you want to start a new session. If you say yes then before choosing to login as "root" with your password look below where it says Session type. What are your options and which one do you choose?

[onederer]

I guess that my last message didn't get through. Someone up there still loves me! Root account mysteriously healed itself! How, why? I really don't know. The only thing that's missing are the icons which were on the desktop. However, the bottom tool bar came back up intact, and fully functional. I'm back in business!

 

And I don't have "sudo" in my user account. I tried to download it. 'Puter told me that it can't find it. In user mode, I also tried to use, without success, "DoAsRoot". But that application is missing in the repository. I don't really know how to use it. It is supposed to be a "service" application. I'm still trying to find out more about it, and where I can get from.

 

In Konsole, I have to invoke "su" to get "root" to get things done. Sometimes that's a pain.

 

So, this is an update as to where I am at the moment!

 

Cheers!

[V.T. Eric Layton]

Sometimes, the tech gods are merciful. I suggest you go out back and burn an old mobo or something on your grill as a sacrificial offering in gratitude for the gods' kind treatment of you.