Description of Problem: X failed to start through gdm for my user account Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): a 7.0 -> 7.1 -> 7.2beta -> 7.3 ->7.3 beta -> 7.3 -> limbo -> null system, with some intermixed RedCarpet rpms Additional Information: It turned out that there were two problems. 1) i had a .xinitrc starting "panel" as last entry, and this binary no longer exists, and is replaced by gnome-panel (perhaps a symlink to solve this?) 2) in /etc/X11/prefdm I had an error saying: file not found line 1 DESKPRO Indeed, in /etc/sysconfig/desktop I had a single line saying: DESKTO (yes, without P). Checking the scripts, it's likely that these days, it is expected to contain: DISPLAYMANAGER=GNOME I have a desktop.old and desktop.back file containing "GNOME" btw. I dislike these 'silly playful' new icons with a vengance. I want my old icons back :(
I'm not sure what gdm can do here; you have a broken system config file (/etc/sysconfig/desktop) and a broken user config file (.xinitrc). You just have to fix them... I don't know how /etc/sysconfig/desktop was broken, but as we don't support upgrades to/from betas, and we don't support systems with Red Carpet packages, I think it's fair to say it's due to some random bogon in the history of this system and not something that's happening to people in general.