Need help with Xmonad setup and login from tty

Need help with Xmonad setup and login from tty

[Disseminate Dissent via]

To whom this may concern,

Hello, I have a relatively good understand of GNU/Linux. Just moved from Arch after using it for several months, looking for more GNU. However, I'm having some serious difficult with two things that I imagine are simple.

During installation I opted out of setting up the default DEs and display managers since I prefer to login through TTY. I'm also using xmonad but am having trouble with getting it up and running. When invoking `startx` the screen goes black and then I'm unable to back out or even switch to another TTY. How would I go back solving these two issues?

Thanks for any help in advance.
All the best

Re: Need help with Xmonad setup and login from tty

[jbranso]

October 27, 2021 6:08 PM, "Disseminate Dissent via" <help-guix@gnu.org> wrote:

> To whom this may concern,
> 
> Hello, I have a relatively good understand of GNU/Linux. Just moved from Arch after using it for
> several months, looking for more GNU. However, I'm having some serious difficult with two things
> that I imagine are simple.
> 
> During installation I opted out of setting up the default DEs and display managers since I prefer
> to login through TTY. I'm also using xmonad but am having trouble with getting it up and running.
> When invoking `startx` the screen goes black and then I'm unable to back out or even switch to
> another TTY. How would I go back solving these two issues?

What hardware do you have?  Graphics card?  That sort of thing.

Guix System doesn't support any proprietary graphics drivers or binary blobs.  

> 
> Thanks for any help in advance.
> All the best

Re: Need help with Xmonad setup and login from tty

[Mekeor Melire]

Hello :)

I also start XMonad from the terminal/TTY. I use the following command
which I found in some Guix mailing list:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
xinit -- ~/.guix-profile/bin/Xorg :0 vt1 \
  -keeptty \
  -configdir ~/.guix-profile/share/X11/xorg.conf.d \
  -modulepath ~/.guix-profile/lib/xorg/modules
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

I then have a ~/.xsession file which in particular contains this line:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
exec ~/.xmonad/xmonad-x86_64-linux
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

I'm not sure but I think these were the packages which I installed as
user in order to make XMonad work/compile:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
gcc-toolchain
ghc
ghc-xmonad-contrib
glibc
ld-wrapper
libxinerama
xf86-input-libinput
xf86-video-fbdev
xf86-video-intel
xinit
xorg-server
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

I also have a ~/.xmonad/build script with the following content:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
#!/bin/sh
ghc -dynamic "$HOME/.xmonad/Main.hs" -i"$HOME/.xmonad" -o "$1"
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

Hope this helps!

Goodbye
Mekeor



2021-10-27 / 22:02 / help-guix@gnu.org:

> To whom this may concern,
>
> Hello, I have a relatively good understand of GNU/Linux. Just moved from Arch after using it for several months, looking for more GNU. However, I'm having some serious difficult with two things that I imagine are simple.
>
> During installation I opted out of setting up the default DEs and display
> managers since I prefer to login through TTY. I'm also using xmonad but am
> having trouble with getting it up and running. When invoking `startx` the screen
> goes black and then I'm unable to back out or even switch to another TTY. How
> would I go back solving these two issues?
>
> Thanks for any help in advance.
> All the best

Re: Need help with Xmonad setup and login from tty

[Mekeor Melire]

Oops, I gotta correct a detail!

2021-10-30 / 19:22 / mekeor@posteo.de:

> Hello :)
>
> I also start XMonad from the terminal/TTY. I use the following command
> which I found in some Guix mailing list:
>
> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
> xinit -- ~/.guix-profile/bin/Xorg :0 vt1 \
>   -keeptty \
>   -configdir ~/.guix-profile/share/X11/xorg.conf.d \
>   -modulepath ~/.guix-profile/lib/xorg/modules
> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>
>
> I then have a ~/.xsession file which in particular contains this line:

It's not a ~/.xsession file which I use, but a ~/.xinitrc file!

> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
> exec ~/.xmonad/xmonad-x86_64-linux
> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>
>
> I'm not sure but I think these were the packages which I installed as
> user in order to make XMonad work/compile:
>
> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
> gcc-toolchain
> ghc
> ghc-xmonad-contrib
> glibc
> ld-wrapper
> libxinerama
> xf86-input-libinput
> xf86-video-fbdev
> xf86-video-intel
> xinit
> xorg-server
> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>
>
> I also have a ~/.xmonad/build script with the following content:
>
> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
> #!/bin/sh
> ghc -dynamic "$HOME/.xmonad/Main.hs" -i"$HOME/.xmonad" -o "$1"
> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>
> Hope this helps!
>
> Goodbye
> Mekeor
>
>
>
> 2021-10-27 / 22:02 / help-guix@gnu.org:
>
>> To whom this may concern,
>>
>> Hello, I have a relatively good understand of GNU/Linux. Just moved from Arch after using it for several months, looking for more GNU. However, I'm having some serious difficult with two things that I imagine are simple.
>>
>> During installation I opted out of setting up the default DEs and display
>> managers since I prefer to login through TTY. I'm also using xmonad but am
>> having trouble with getting it up and running. When invoking `startx` the screen
>> goes black and then I'm unable to back out or even switch to another TTY. How
>> would I go back solving these two issues?
>>
>> Thanks for any help in advance.
>> All the best

Re: Need help with Xmonad setup and login from tty

[Mekeor Melire]

I should also note that the reason, why I use `xinit` is that I did not
want to run Xorg as root but rather as user. That's why I didn't add
Xorg to my system services. Instead, I start Xorg using the
below-mentioned xinit-command as user.

2021-10-30 / 19:35 / mekeor@posteo.de:

> Oops, I gotta correct a detail!
>
> 2021-10-30 / 19:22 / mekeor@posteo.de:
>
>> Hello :)
>>
>> I also start XMonad from the terminal/TTY. I use the following command
>> which I found in some Guix mailing list:
>>
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
>> xinit -- ~/.guix-profile/bin/Xorg :0 vt1 \
>>   -keeptty \
>>   -configdir ~/.guix-profile/share/X11/xorg.conf.d \
>>   -modulepath ~/.guix-profile/lib/xorg/modules
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>>
>>
>> I then have a ~/.xsession file which in particular contains this line:
>
> It's not a ~/.xsession file which I use, but a ~/.xinitrc file!
>
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
>> exec ~/.xmonad/xmonad-x86_64-linux
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>>
>>
>> I'm not sure but I think these were the packages which I installed as
>> user in order to make XMonad work/compile:
>>
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
>> gcc-toolchain
>> ghc
>> ghc-xmonad-contrib
>> glibc
>> ld-wrapper
>> libxinerama
>> xf86-input-libinput
>> xf86-video-fbdev
>> xf86-video-intel
>> xinit
>> xorg-server
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>>
>>
>> I also have a ~/.xmonad/build script with the following content:
>>
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
>> #!/bin/sh
>> ghc -dynamic "$HOME/.xmonad/Main.hs" -i"$HOME/.xmonad" -o "$1"
>> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
>>
>> Hope this helps!
>>
>> Goodbye
>> Mekeor
>>
>>
>>
>> 2021-10-27 / 22:02 / help-guix@gnu.org:
>>
>>> To whom this may concern,
>>>
>>> Hello, I have a relatively good understand of GNU/Linux. Just moved from Arch after using it for several months, looking for more GNU. However, I'm having some serious difficult with two things that I imagine are simple.
>>>
>>> During installation I opted out of setting up the default DEs and display
>>> managers since I prefer to login through TTY. I'm also using xmonad but am
>>> having trouble with getting it up and running. When invoking `startx` the screen
>>> goes black and then I'm unable to back out or even switch to another TTY. How
>>> would I go back solving these two issues?
>>>
>>> Thanks for any help in advance.
>>> All the best