Your message dated Wed, 14 Sep 2016 19:30:02 +0200 (CEST)
with message-id <[email protected]>
and subject line Re: "/etc/inittab" seems to be disabled due to the switch to
systemd, but does not make this clear
has caused the Debian Bug report #782327,
regarding "/etc/inittab" seems to be disabled due to the switch to systemd, but
does not make this clear
to be marked as done.
This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with.
If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the
Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith.
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--
782327: http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=782327
Debian Bug Tracking System
Contact [email protected] with problems
--- Begin Message ---
Package: base
Version: 8
Severity: minor
I installed Debian recently using the stable DVD, not installing the
GUI desktop option. I then set APT to use Testing, ran apt-get update,
dist-upgrade, and installed cinnamon. I noticed than, although logging
in at the command-line and typing startx allowed me to log in to the
GUI, adding "sx:45:once:/bin/su -c /usr/bin/startx -l bateman" to
/etc/inittab and setting the run-level to 5 with "id:5:initdefault:"
did not automatically start the GUI at boot.
I asked at
http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/194625/startx-does-not-run-in-etc-inittab
for advice, and I was first advised that the reason this didn't work
was because I was not logged in at the console, and therefore did not
have permission to run startx. I then asked why nothing I did to
/etc/inittab seemed to have any effect, since I'd tried changes like
setting the tty1 command to
1:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty -a bateman 38400 tty1
and commenting out entirely
3:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty3
and didn't notice anything happening. I was told that it was because
Jessie uses systemd, not SysV init, and therefore "some or all of
inittab may not be used". If this is correct, please could a note be
added at the top of /etc/inittab, indicating that it is [partially]
disabled?
/etc/os-release gives
PRETTY_NAME="Debian GNU/Linux 8 (jessie)"
NAME="Debian GNU/Linux"
VERSION_ID="8"
VERSION="8 (jessie)"
ID=debian
HOME_URL="http://www.debian.org/";
SUPPORT_URL="http://www.debian.org/support/";
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.debian.org/";
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
On Fri, 10 Apr 2015, George Bateman wrote:
> Package: base
> Version: 8
> Severity: minor
>
> I installed Debian recently using the stable DVD, not installing the
> GUI desktop option. I then set APT to use Testing, ran apt-get update,
> dist-upgrade, and installed cinnamon. I noticed than, although logging
> in at the command-line and typing startx allowed me to log in to the
> GUI, adding "sx:45:once:/bin/su -c /usr/bin/startx -l bateman" to
> /etc/inittab and setting the run-level to 5 with "id:5:initdefault:"
> did not automatically start the GUI at boot.
>
> I asked at
> http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/194625/startx-does-not-run-in-etc-inittab
> for advice, and I was first advised that the reason this didn't work
> was because I was not logged in at the console, and therefore did not
> have permission to run startx. I then asked why nothing I did to
> /etc/inittab seemed to have any effect, since I'd tried changes like
> setting the tty1 command to
>
> 1:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty -a bateman 38400 tty1
>
> and commenting out entirely
>
> 3:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty3
>
> and didn't notice anything happening. I was told that it was because
> Jessie uses systemd, not SysV init, and therefore "some or all of
> inittab may not be used". If this is correct, please could a note be
> added at the top of /etc/inittab, indicating that it is [partially]
> disabled?
Hello.
[ Sorry for all the time you waited before receiving a reply, there are
not many people answering to bugs in "base", and we really prefer bugs
regarding real packages ].
That's a interesting suggestion, but there are some practical problems
that make it not really feasible:
In Debian 8, systemd is the default init system, but sysvinit is still
available for those who still want to use Debian 8 with sysvinit.
So if we add a note saying that the file is disabled, users of
sysvinit would be greatly confused by the note, because the note would
not say the truth, as the file would still work.
You may ask, then: why can't we put a note in the file *only* when the
file is not being used? There are several problems with that:
* In the first place, we don't really know if the file is used or not!
You can have systemd and sysvinit installed at the same time, and choose
one or another at boot time by having different menu entries in GRUB.
* In the second place, the note would probably have to be added by
systemd, but /etc/inittab is a configuration file for the "sysvinit"
package (or one of its relatives), and there is a rule in Debian
saying that a package should never modify a configuration file for
another package.
So, as you can see, it's not so simple as adding a note in the file.
I suggest, therefore, that you consider this instead as a
documentation bug in whatever manual you followed that told you to
modify /etc/inittab.
A good written manual should not just say "modify /etc/inittab in this
way blah blah" but instead "If you are still using sysvinit, modify
/etc/inittab in this way blah blah".
Hope this helps.
BTW: By default, newly installed Debian 8 systems do not even have a
/etc/inittab file at all, so in some way this is not a problem anymore.
Now if a user tries to modify /etc/inittab and the file does not exist,
it should be natural to think that the file will not be used.
Thanks.
--- End Message ---
