Which program manages the GUI for logging in (including picking a desktop environment)? Where and when is the $PATH environment variable set?

[gonzofy]

I’m trying to understand better the boot and desktop environment loading sequence in order to understand where I can edit the $PATH available to the desktop environment before it loads.

I have Manjaro’s XFCE minimal distribution. I have installed Xmonad as a window manager.

In Manjaro’s login screen, I can choose XFCE or Xmonad. When picking one or the other, a basic $PATH is set somewhere, likely by whatever is launching the login menu program, and this $PATH is not influenced by .bashrc or .bash_profile.

What program is the GUI login screen? It doesn’t seem to depend on .xession or the like. How can I configure it?

Thank you!

[andreas85]

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[cscs]

I think you mean the Display Manager, which if you have not changed anything, should be LightDM for the XFCE edition. See more about it here: LightDM - ArchWiki

[maycne.sonahoz]

@gonzofy

I’m trying to understand better the boot and desktop environment loading sequence in order to understand where I can edit the $PATH available to the desktop environment before it loads.

PATH is an environment variable. See how you can edit it.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Environment_variables#Defining_variables

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@gonzofy

When picking one or the other, a basic $PATH is set somewhere, likely by whatever is launching the login menu program, and this $PATH is not influenced by .bashrc or .bash_profile.

.bashrc and .bash_profile only affect the user’s bash, so the terminal.

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@gonzofy

What program is the GUI login screen?

The display manager for Xfce is lightdm, with the GTK+ greeter. You can configure it with lightdm-gtk-greeter-settings.
But that is likely irrelevant to your PATH issue.

[gonzofy]

Thank you @cscs and @maycne.sonahoz !!!