Not starting automatically (/etc/dbus-1/system.d/org.freedesktop.DisplayManager.conf missing)

[little jo]

Hello,

I upgraded yesterday Ubuntu 11.04 into 11.10. After that I had by default gdm which work correctly. But i installed lightdm.

And after a reboot, lightdm doesn't start (there is no lightdm log). I have to launch the service manually (/etc/init.d/lightdm start) and it works.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
Package: lightdm 1.0.1-0ubuntu6
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-12.20-generic 3.0.4
Uname: Linux 3.0.0-12-generic i686
ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu3
Architecture: i386
Date: Sun Oct 16 09:35:11 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx" - Beta i386 (20100406.1)
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: lightdm
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to oneiric on 2011-10-14 (1 days ago)

[little jo (littel-jo)]

cat /etc/X11/default-display-manager
lightdm

kern.log
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.527261] type=1400 audit(1318749795.217:8): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm-guest-session-wrapper" pid=961 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.531494] type=1400 audit(1318749795.221:9): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/sbin/dhclient" pid=962 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.532403] type=1400 audit(1318749795.225:10): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-client.action" pid=962 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.532754] type=1400 audit(1318749795.225:11): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-script" pid=962 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.906894] type=1400 audit(1318749795.597:12): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/bin/evince" pid=963 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.914519] type=1400 audit(1318749795.605:13): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/bin/evince-previewer" pid=963 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 17.919368] type=1400 audit(1318749795.609:14): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/bin/evince-thumbnailer" pid=963 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 18.079685] type=1400 audit(1318749795.769:15): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/telepathy/mission-control-5" pid=965 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 18.080540] type=1400 audit(1318749795.773:16): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/telepathy/telepathy-*" pid=965 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:15 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 18.240422] type=1400 audit(1318749795.933:17): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/cups/backend/cups-pdf" pid=966 comm="apparmor_parser"
Oct 16 09:23:18 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 21.054926] init: failsafe main process (912) killed by TERM signal
Oct 16 09:23:18 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 21.109535] init: apport pre-start process (1048) terminated with status 1
Oct 16 09:23:18 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 21.115034] init: apport post-stop process (1084) terminated with status 1
Oct 16 09:23:19 joseph-desktop kernel: [ 21.372693] init: lightdm main process (1075) killed by TERM signal

[little jo (littel-jo)]

Ok, i found the reason of this bug... This file: /etc/dbus-1/system.d/org.freedesktop.DisplayManager.conf missed.

I have a trouble (blackout) during my update to 11.10, I think it's the reason.

Is there anything to do to repair my ubuntu ?

[Robert Ancell (robert-ancell)]

That file is provided by the lightdm package. You may be able to fix it by running 'apt-get install --reinstall lightdm', but the fact the file is missing indicates something failed when upgrading initially. If the upgrade failed you can continue it using 'sudo dpkg --configure -a'.

[manatlan (manatlan)]

Same trouble

    $ dmesg | grep lightdm
    [ 15.250865] type=1400 audit(1319402192.765:11): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load"
    name="/usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm-guest-session-wrapper" pid=1021 comm="apparmor_parser"
    [ 17.097495] init: lightdm main process (1129) killed by TERM signal

Lightdm seems to start, but it's killed 1 second after ;-(
the boot process stays ;-(
if I ctrl+alt+f1, and do "sudo service lightdm start" : it works as expected ;-(

I've got the file mentionned in #3
And did the tricks mentionned in #4

[Prateek Karandikar (prateek.karandikar)]

I have the same problem after upgrading from 11.04 to 11.10. The problem persists after sudo aptitude reinstall lightdm and sudo dpkg-reconfigure lightdm (in which I set lightdm as the default display manager).

[Prateek Karandikar (prateek.karandikar)]

Doing the following fixed it for me:

sudo aptitude reinstall unity-greeter
sudo dpkg-reconfigure unity-greeter #I guess this is not necessary

[Andrea Grandi (andreagrandi)]

@manatlan: I'm having exactly your same problem! I've to do as you do to temporary fix it.
I'll try the Prateek's solution and I'll let you know if it worked.

[Andrea Grandi (andreagrandi)]

The problems is not fixed for me. I tried the solution suggested by Prateek, but it didn't work.

[piviul (piviul)]

The same happens to me and the solution suggested by Prateek doesn't work... I have ubuntu 11.10 upgraded from 11.04. After the upgrade lighdm was working but then I've installed gdm and when I remove it there is no way to have lightdm started automatically (or better to have it killed by TERM signal during the init process)

[Matthew Newton (matthewn-alum)]

I'm in the same boat as piviul: 11.04 --> 11.10. Installed the gdm package for reasons I'll bore no one with. Didn't work out, so I did an 'apt-get purge gdm' and now lightdm gets killed on boot. reinstalling and dpkg-reconfigure-ing lightdm and unity-greeter have no effect. dmesg indicates that lightdm is getting killed with a TERM signal. How to set this straight?

[Robert Ancell (robert-ancell)]

little jo, did the suggestion in comment 4 fix the problem for you?

[Robert Ancell (robert-ancell)]

If you do have the /etc/dbus-1/system.d/org.freedesktop.DisplayManager.conf file, then you have a different bug. Please open a new bug report and attach /var/log/lightdm/lightdm.log as this will give more information about why lightdm is not starting.

[Jake LeMaster (ssoundasleep)]

This seems to be a gdm package bug. Before installing gdm, my /etc/X11/default-display-manager file contains:
/usr/sbin/lightdm

After installing gdm, the file contains:
/usr/sbin/gdm

After uninstalling gdm, the file contains:
lightdm

And now lightdm doesn't start on boot. If you fix it back to "/usr/sbin/lightdm", it works again.

This fixed the issue for people here too: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1871148

[S4qFBxkFFg (s4qfbxkffg)]

I had this problem, and Jake's solution worked for me too.

[S4qFBxkFFg (s4qfbxkffg)]

I filed a new report as suggested by Robert Ancell.

 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/899603

[Robert Ancell (robert-ancell)]

From the comments it appears this bug is fixed, or any remaining issues are bug 864174. Closing. Please open a new bug if you are still having similar issues with all updates installed.