After the latest stable update (2024-02-21) my Xfce session no longer started. I got the lightdm login prompt instead. I could not login though; I ended back at the login prompt. After looking for errors I finally found one in ~/.xsession-errors:
/etc/lightdm/Xsession: line 71: syntax error near unexpected token `fi'
/etc/lightdm/Xsession: line 71: `fi'
The /etc/lightdm/Xsession file looks as follows:
#!/bin/sh
#
# LightDM wrapper to run around X sessions.
echo "Running X session wrapper"
# From https://github.com/sddm/sddm/blob/develop/data/scripts/Xsession
# Note that the respective logout scripts are not sourced.
case $SHELL in
*/bash)
[ -z "$BASH" ] && exec $SHELL --login $0 "$@"
shopt -q login_shell || exec $SHELL --login $0 "$@"
set +o posix
;;
*/zsh)
[ -z "$ZSH_NAME" ] && exec $SHELL --login $0 "$@"
[[ -o login ]] || exec $SHELL --login $0 "$@"
emulate -R sh
;;
*/csh|*/tcsh)
# [t]cshrc is always sourced automatically.
# Note that sourcing csh.login after .cshrc is non-standard.
xsess_tmp=`mktemp /tmp/xsess-env-XXXXXX`
$SHELL -c "if (-f /etc/csh.login) source /etc/csh.login; if (-f ~/.login) source ~/.login; /bin/sh -c 'export -p' >! $xsess_tmp"
. $xsess_tmp
rm -f $xsess_tmp
;;
*/fish)
[ -f /etc/profile ] && . /etc/profile
[ -f $HOME/.profile ] && . $HOME/.profile
xsess_tmp=`mktemp /tmp/xsess-env-XXXXXX`
$SHELL --login -c "/bin/sh -c 'export -p' > $xsess_tmp"
. $xsess_tmp
rm -f $xsess_tmp
;;
*) # Plain sh, ksh, and anything we do not know.
[ -f /etc/profile ] && . /etc/profile
[ -f "$HOME/.profile" ] && . "$HOME/.profile"
;;
esac
[ -f /etc/xprofile ] && . /etc/xprofile
[ -f /usr/local/etc/xprofile ] && . /usr/local/etc/xprofile
[ -f "$HOME/.xprofile" ] && . "$HOME/.xprofile"
# Load resources
for file in "/etc/X11/Xresources" "$HOME/.Xresources"; do
if [ -f "$file" ]; then
echo "Loading resource: $file"
xrdb -merge "$file"
fi
done
# Load keymaps
for file in "/etc/X11/Xkbmap" "$HOME/.Xkbmap"; do
if [ -f "$file" ]; then
echo "Loading keymap: $file"
setxkbmap `cat "$file"`
XKB_IN_USE=yes
fi
done
# Load xmodmap if not using XKB
if [ -z "$XKB_IN_USE" ]; then
for file in "/etc/X11/Xmodmap" "$HOME/.Xmodmap"; do
if [ -f "$file" ]; then
echo "Loading modmap: $file"
xmodmap "$file"
fi
done
fi
unset XKB_IN_USE
# Run all system xinitrc shell scripts
xinitdir="/etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.d"
if [ -d "$xinitdir" ]; then
for script in $xinitdir/*; do
echo "Loading xinit script $script"
if [ -x "$script" -a ! -d "$script" ]; then
. "$script"
fi
done
fi
# Run user xsession shell script
script="$HOME/.xsession"
if [ -x "$script" -a ! -d "$script" ]; then
echo "Loading xsession script $script"
. "$script"
fi
echo "X session wrapper complete, running session $@"
exec $@
After commenting out various sections of the file, I found that the problematic section is actually this:
*/bash)
[ -z "$BASH" ] && exec $SHELL --login $0 "$@"
shopt -q login_shell || exec $SHELL --login $0 "$@"
set +o posix
;;
The only related change I can think of is that during the latest stable update the login shell of my user changed from /bin/bash to /usr/bin/bash.
$BASH and $SHELL both contain /usr/bin/bash
Does anyone understand this? I get the error by simply executing the /etc/lightdm/Xsession file.
The original problem was fixed by commenting out the lines above, but I don’t understand why and would of course like to revert to the original file.
Thanks in advance!