[TriLUG] Re: RH 7.1 on ThinkPad T21 hanging

[Jonathan Magid]

My experience shows that the lockups on late-model thinkpads is just the
console. You can login remotely and (usually) reboot the machine. Just
killing X doesn't clear it. After hearing about problems with gpm
alongside X on these machines, I've tried it without it and I've had few
problems since.

Since I like gpm when i'm using the console, i nuke it when I start X. I
put this in my .xinitrc:

/usr/local/bin/switchgpm stop
xterm -iconic &
xclock &
# etc. clients
fvwm # or whatever windowmanager
/usr/local/bin/switchgpm start

This is switchgpm (it's installed setuid root: chmod 4755):

#!/usr/bin/suidperl

if ( $#ARGV != 0 ) {
        exit(1);
}
$startorstop = $ARGV[0];
$< = $>;
$ENV{PATH} = "";
system("/etc/rc3.d/S85gpm", $startorstop);

It basically starts or stops the gpm service (assuming the proper init
script is S85gpm. Your mileage may, of course vary.

cheers,
jem.

-- 
Global Village Idiot
Email: jem at sunsite^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hmetalab^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hibiblio.org
http://ibiblio.org/jem/