User login screen does not appear during boot

[peterzay]

The user login screen does not appear during the boot process. The system hangs. No keyboard interaction helps.

However, it is possible to "exit" to the TTY and login there to command line mode.

This is not reproducible and occurred for the first time during the previous boot attempt.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: plymouth 0.8.2-2ubuntu2.2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-40.87-generic 2.6.32.57+drm33.23
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-40-generic i686
Architecture: i386
Date: Tue Apr 3 14:13:36 2012
DefaultPlymouth: /lib/plymouth/themes/ubuntu-logo/ubuntu-logo.plymouth
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release i386 (20100429)
MachineType: LENOVO 2746CTO
ProcCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-40-generic root=UUID=17572f50-ecf1-466d-a20e-0ded10d25e56 ro
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcFB: 0 inteldrmfb
SourcePackage: plymouth
TextPlymouth: /lib/plymouth/themes/ubuntu-text/ubuntu-text.plymouth
dmi.bios.date: 05/29/2009
dmi.bios.vendor: LENOVO
dmi.bios.version: 6AET58WW
dmi.board.asset.tag: ATN12345678901234567
dmi.board.name: 2746CTO
dmi.board.vendor: LENOVO
dmi.board.version: LENOVO 6AET58WW
dmi.chassis.type: 10
dmi.chassis.vendor: LENOVO
dmi.chassis.version: LENOVO 6AET58WW
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnLENOVO:bvr6AET58WW:bd05/29/2009:svnLENOVO:pn2746CTO:pvrThinkPadSL500:rvnLENOVO:rn2746CTO:rvrLENOVO6AET58WW:cvnLENOVO:ct10:cvrLENOVO6AET58WW:
dmi.product.name: 2746CTO
dmi.product.version: ThinkPad SL500
dmi.sys.vendor: LENOVO

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

What do you mean, "exit" to the TTY? How are you doing this? (And isn't that by way of keyboard interaction?)

[peterzay (peterzay)]

Exit to TTY by the following sequence: CTRL+SHIFT+F1 followed by CTRL+ALT+F1. I assume the latter worked.

No keyboard interaction brought back the GUI which is the minimal end-user expectation of an OS.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

Please boot with --verbose added to the kernel commandline and attach /var/log/kern.log.

[peterzay (peterzay)]

The attached log covers the period of the problem this morning (Apr 3 09:17:27).

If you need more, please advise how to add --verbose to the kernel command line and boot this way.

Thanks.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

On Tue, Apr 03, 2012 at 10:51:15PM -0000, peterzay wrote:
> If you need more,

Yes, the log is only useful if booting with --verbose.

> please advise how to add --verbose to the kernel command line and boot
> this way.

Hold down the shift key at boot time to get the grub menu, hit 'e' to edit
the boot option, then edit the line that has the word 'splash' on it to add
--verbose.

[peterzay (peterzay)]

Due to Bug #425979, Grub2 cannot be accessed the way you require.

What is the point of verbose logging a successful boot?

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

On Wed, Apr 04, 2012 at 01:09:35AM -0000, peterzay wrote:
> Due to Bug #425979, Grub2 cannot be accessed the way you require.

Then you can edit /etc/default/grub and run 'update-grub' instead to set
this option in the grub config.

> What is the point of verbose logging a successful boot?

Why would you call this a "successful" boot? Some services are failing to
start on your system. We need to see what the cause is.

[peterzay (peterzay)]

Here are the commands of my /etc/default/grub file:

GRUB_DEFAULT=0
GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0
GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
GRUB_TIMEOUT=10
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
#GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""

How do I set the verbose option in the above syntax?

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

On Wed, Apr 04, 2012 at 01:45:10AM -0000, peterzay wrote:
> Here are the commands of my /etc/default/grub file:
>
> GRUB_DEFAULT=0
> GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0
> GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
> GRUB_TIMEOUT=10
> GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
> #GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
> GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""

> How do I set the verbose option in the above syntax?

By adding it between the quotes in the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX variable:

  GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="--verbose"

--
Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer http://www.debian.org/
<email address hidden> <email address hidden>

[peterzay (peterzay)]

You will find attached the /var/log/kern.log file with the --verbose boot command line option set in grub.

Please update this post with your findings.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

unfortunately, the attached log shows no log entries from upstart. Can you confirm that you ran 'sudo update-grub' after the changes to /etc/default/grub?

[peterzay (peterzay)]

Yes, I can confirm that I ran 'sudo update-grub' after adding --verbose with 'sudo gedit /etc/default/grub'. I got the usual terminal confirmations of the update-grub process.

Do you see any indication in the kernel log that a verbose boot took place. I saw extra messages on screen during the verbose boot that I have never seen before.

The verbose boot did not give any outward appearance of any problems. The user login screen appeared as per normal.

Remember that the kernel log covers many days, most of which were normal non-verbose boots. Could that explain your issue?

[peterzay (peterzay)]

As a further test of comment #3, when I type CTRL+ALT+F1, I get TTY.

There, I login with admin user account.

Then I type "sudo gdm start" and get the following messages:

** (gdm-binary:1910): WARNING **: Failed to acquire org.gnome.DisplayManager

** (gdm-binary:1910): WARNING **: Could not acquire name; bailing out

As this point, I logout and hold the main power button to shutdown the machine. Upon reboot, an automatic recovery process occurs.

Hope this helps clarify the problem.

[peterzay (peterzay)]

Note that this bug is different from Bug #701060 and Bug #609845 in that CTRL+ALT+DEL has no effect.

[dino99 (9d9)]

That version is no more supported; and no expecting backport as it only concern 'security' problem.