Red Hat Bugzilla – Bug 115065
startx and switchdesk hang if PS1 prompt is set strangely
Last modified: 2007-11-30 17:07:00 EST
Description of problem: I had two machines where students had PS1='[\h \W] :' in their .bashrc files. When they ran startx (I think both users were logged in as root at the time), the X server would start, but then just sit there without ever appearing to run gnome-session. The server would have to be killed with ctrl-alt-backspace. 'switchdesk gnome' would also hang. I have no idea how the two could be related but once the PS1 line was commented out of .bashrc and the student logged back in startx worked properly again. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): Rhel3 AS. I up2dated XFree86 and dependancies, but the problem persisted. How reproducible: Seems readily reproducable. Steps to Reproduce: 1. add "PS1='[\h \W] :'" to .bashrc 2. logout and log back in 3. run "startx" Actual results: X server starts, but no X clients appear. An strace stops in the middle of reporting a call to waitpid() Expected results: Normal gnome session startup, which happens once the PS1 variable is unset and startx is run again Additional info: Yes, I know it sounds ridiculous.
Does the same thing occur if you create a new "dummy" user account without any customization or other files present, and just add the PS1 change to the new user's .bashrc?
With a dummy user on a fully up2dated system this does not seem to be reproducable. Either there was some other cause or the bug has been fixed since I filed this report. --Brad
Ok, I'm going to close the report as "WORKSFORME" then, since you've indicated it no longer occurs. If the problem happens again however, please contact Red Hat Global Support Services via telephone at 1-888-RED-HAT1 and mention this bug ID, and a support representative will assist you in troubleshooting the problem.