Gnome desktop now UNusable (was -Re: Authentication Error After Updating up2date)

[Elton Woo]

On August 30, 2003 10:30 pm, Robert L Cochran wrote:
> I did an rpm -Fvh of up2date-3.9.20-2 and up2date-gnome-3.9.20-2 in
> my Severn installation and then tried to run up2date -u.
>
> I now get this error message:
>
> There was an authentication error: Unable to authenticate.
>
It was supposed to be fixed by installing by downloading
https://rhn.redhat.com/help/RHNS-CA-CERT
and copying it to /usr/share/rhn/RHNS-CA-CERT. Which I did.
Subsequently, I received notification from RHN about
updating the certificate, downloaded, and installed as prescribed
 *HERE*: 
 https://rhn.redhat.com/help/ssl_cert.pxt

Consequently, I was able to run rhn_register successfully.

This was all done whilst in the KDE desktop. BUT now
I cannot use the Gnome desktop. Whenever I log in, I get
a lot of pop-up dialogs, which are unreadable, since there
is no visible text, just the red warning logo. 

The gnome panel is now at the top of screen, but all that I can
make of the drop-down menu is a vertical line of black arrow heads. 
No text.
My startup programs are kmail, licq, and tkseti. Only the latter 
(tkseti) shows its normal interface with readable text and font.

The only way I can exit the Gnome desktop, is to use CTRL-ALT-BKSP.

NOTE: This is just after a new clean install of Severn (RH 9.0.93).
No rawhide packages have been installed. Thinking it was a driver
problem, I installed the "NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-4496-pkg2.run" drivers.

Gnome is still unusable.

A consistent error message that pops up whenever I load
*these* applications in KDE: System Tools  eggcups, rhn-applet, 
Evolution, MrProject --->

"An error occurred while loading or saving configuration information for 
{application name}. Some of your configuration settings may not
work properly."

"Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that 
you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS 
locks due to a system crash. See http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/ 
for information. (Details -  1: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' 
not opened successfully, no gconfd located: No such file or directory 
2: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' not opened successfully, no 
gconfd located: No such file or directory)
Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that 
you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS 
locks due to a system crash. See http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/ 
for information. (Details -  1: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' 
not opened successfully, no gconfd located: No such file or directory 
2: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' not opened successfully, no 
gconfd located: No such file or directory)
Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that 
you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS 
locks due to a system crash. See http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/ 
for information. (Details -  1: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' 
not opened successfully, no gconfd located: No such file or directory 
2: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' not opened successfully, no 
gconfd located: No such file or directory)
Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that 
you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS 
locks due to a system crash. See http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/ 
for information. (Details -  1: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' 
not opened successfully, no gconfd located: No such file or directory 
2: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' not opened successfully, no 
gconfd located: No such file or directory)
Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that 
you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS 
locks due to a system crash. See http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/ 
for information. (Details -  1: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' 
not opened successfully, no gconfd located: No such file or directory 
2: IOR file '/home/abe/.gconfd/lock/ior' not opened successfully, no 
gconfd located: No such file or directory)"

Could any of this be related to my present problems with Gnome?

I have looked in ~/.gconfd/ and sure enough there is no lock
subdirectory.

I'm rather out of my depth with this problem.

Elton.
-- 
   http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/stats/team/team_4504.html
  "You only live once, so let's make life EASIER for each other."
  LINUX Registered User #193975. AMD-K7 ATHLON CPU power on board.