I am currently using Suse 10 with the graphical interface KDE, what I want to know is how do I swap the GUI for the Text interface so when I boot the box up it does'nt use the GUI. i.e. during installation you get asked the question as to wether you use a GUI or Text based system. 2nd question afer you are using the text based interface what is the command to start the GUI interface/desktop. I think you can just type xwindow at the shell prompt??? Thanks
First of all: Hi again. Have been off for a while, not answering questions ;-). 2. To start from the bottom up: You start kde or X in general by typing "startx" or "X" (capitalised) or "/etc/init.d/kdm start" or maybe there is even another way. If you can start X with the init script, that way is preferable, because you can manage user sessions that way. 1. To stop the X server from starting at boot-time, you need to change your init scripts in a distribution-specific way. In Debian, you can install a program called rcconf for that (to make it easier). There must be program for Suse as well. Browse the docs. A good idea, if you're starting with linux is to install a packet manager such as apt-get or yum (in Suse and Fedora/RadHat). If you google for yum, you should find something. You can always do the linux way and update init-scripts by hand, but this can break things in your distro and I can't quite recall exactly what to do. Also, distros have different directories. But usually, init-scripts should be under /etc/rc.d /etc/init.d and so on. Just have a look and you will find them. I don't have time to look up everything and describe here now. You should google for init-scripts and suse and I'm sure you'll find a lot.
mphayesuk, In SUSE, there is a simple way to get it to boot to text mode. Edit the file /etc/inittab and change the "5" in the following line to a "3" id:5:initdefault: After the computer boots, just log in and you're good to go. If you later decide you want to start an X session, just type "startx" (without the quotes) and you're all set. To shut down or reboot the computer you will need to use the shutdown command as root. Those commands are: shutdown -h now or shutdown -r now To restore default behavior (booting directly to the GUI) replace the "3" with a "5" in the initdefault line of your inittab file. HTH, Jim
