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On 27/01/11 20:23, Philip Hudson wrote: > > Nothing newly installed or updated that I can think of since the last > working boot. The machine is used by all four members of my family but > only I can run apt* or sudo. > > What should I do? Look in /var/log/messages (also worth peeking in Xorg.0.log and other logs) for relevant errors. If nothing shows in logs, try logging in on console as root, /etc/init.d/gdm stop (to get rid of gdm), and then "su - username" and "startx" to see if you can run desktop session without gdm running. This will (a) give you a workaround (b) point the finger more closely at gdm. I'm not sure when Debian went from gdm to gdm3 so substitute "gdm3" for "gdm" in the stuff below if relevant. I'd check out /etc/gdm and /var/lib/gdm for recent changes, or obvious corruption. I believe /var/lib/gdm contents (all hidden files) can be blown away reasonably safely - but back it up just in case I'm wrong(!). GDM looks at user data to construct menus, this is a potential source of failing without software change. So did perhaps you load images into their GNOME personal data? Did you change the list of users, group settings or similar? -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq