[xubuntu-users] Failed upgrade

[Ralf Mardorf]

One of the trillion issues I've got with Quantal, is a broken MUA. It
often sends using the wrong account. However, my reply is at the bottom.

-------- Forwarded Message --------
From: Ralf Mardorf <ralf.mardorf at rocketmail.com>
To: xubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
Subject: Re: [xubuntu-users] Failed upgrade
Date: Wed, 28 Nov 2012 22:55:34 +0100

On Wed, 2012-11-28 at 21:45 +0000, Tim wrote:
> On 28/11/12 20:55, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> > On Wed, 2012-11-28 at 20:43 +0000, Tim wrote:
> >> I had xubuntu 10.04lts which I upgraded to 12.04 lts. The server was set
> >> to boot to cli and then startx if I needed a gui. Now when I type startx
> >> and press return a couple of seconds later a small box appears in the
> >> middle of the screen with a large red no entry sign and the words Failed
> >> to load session "gnome"  the only option is to click a button that says
> >> log out.
> >>
> >> Can anybody please advise
> >>
> >> Tim
> > Tim, I'm not sure, but I suspect that such an update will cause a
> > mess-up regarding to a switch from GNOME2 to GNOME3 and from init to
> > upstart. I'm not aware when there were the transitions and if this can
> > be handled by a version upgrade, but I suspect this as a possible risk.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Ralf
> >
> >
> >
> >
> Well I found my way into xfce but it is not happy.
> 
> After some more googling somebody wrote (they had a similar problem) 
> that typing startxfce4 at the cli allowed him into xfce. I tried it and 
> I am in to my desktop but it is not happy, I have clicked on a couple of 
> program in the main menu and the program has opened but hung with a 
> spinning mouse cursor, one of those programs is the user manager which I 
> know is a gnome program. Looks like I will be wiping it and starting 
> again :(
> 
> Tim

I guess an update won't overwrite configurations. And services might not
be started by "/etc/init.d/foo_old_name start" but by "service
foo_new_name start", so it might be possible to repair it, by editing
some configs and starting some services. However, install the last LTS
(Precise) and not Quantal, if you should reinstall Xubuntu.

2 Cents,
Ralf