On Wednesday 07 January 2004 10:10, you wrote:
> On Wednesday 07 January 2004 00:21, Michael Havens wrote:
> > After I login and x is running for around 3 minutes it starts saying that
> > klauncher can't be reached via DCOP. Last I tried using kmail it didn't
> > work either (this is webmail right now).
> > Also (after my last upgrade) the only window managers at my disposal are
> > KDE3 and Failsafe. One is to big the other to basic. Geesh!
> >
> > :-)Mike(-:
>
> Hey Mike,
>      I've sometimes noticed problems with the desktop and launchers, more
> so with older distributions. In some cases, I think these are due to some
> of the software updates I've applied -- updating a key piece of software
> may "depend" on another piece I don't know about and so the update may not
> be 100% successful. And the more software that is upgraded, the more likely
> this will happen. This is what makes the creation of a major distribution
> so difficult. Everything has to be cross-tested and, if a problem develops,
> the appropriate pieces replaced and then everything re-cross-tested because
> that "fix" may have broken something else.
>      A related possibility is that there are some "leftovers" in the /tmp
> filesystem. I've seen this often enough, and the "fix" is much easier to do
> and much less problematic than the upgrade situation. You might want to try
> cleaning out the /tmp filesystem. Do this:
> 1) Log-off.
> 2) Press Ctrl-Alt-F1 to get a simple console prompt (actually, you could
> use any of the first six function keys to get to any of six console
> prompts, and Ctrl-Alt-F7 will take you back to X-land).
> 3) Login (through the console prompt) as the root user.
> 4) CAREFULLY do this command:
>      rm -rf /tmp/*
>     MAKE SURE YOU TYPE THIS EXACTLY RIGHT. IN PARTICULAR,
> THERE MUST BE *no* SPACES in "/tmp/*". (IF THIS IS DONE WRONG,
> THE ENTIRE SYSTEM MAY NEED TO BE RE-INSTALLED!)

Being a bit of a spastic typist, I like to do the dangerous stuff in multiple 
steps:
 	cd /tmp
	ls (make sure I'm in the right place)
	rm -rf *
Just my two cents.
Vaughn

> 5) And do this command:
>      sync
> 6) Now, reboot the system. On my machine I use the following command:
>      reboot
> 7) Log-in normally and see if things are better.
>
>      The /tmp filesystem, in theory at least, "can be" discarded every time
> the system is rebooted. In practice, however, this doesn't always happen
> (but "why" I don't know). My theory is that the desktop, among other tools,
> sometimes leaves behind information in /tmp and attempts to use it when you
> login again. By manually cleaning out /tmp, the desktop is forced to use
> default values again.
>
>      Good luck!