1 Check whether the user remembered his password correctly before you start
debugging the whole authentication mechanism. If the user may not remember
his password correctly, use the YaST User Management module to change
the user's password. Pay attention to the [Caps Lock] key and unlock it, if
necessary.
2
Log in as root and check /var/log/messages for error messages of the login
process and of PAM.
3 Try to log in from a console (using [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [F1]). If this is successful,
the blame cannot be put on PAM, because it is possible to authenticate this
user on this machine. Try to locate any problems with the X Window System
or the desktop (GNOME or KDE). For more information, refer to Section A.2.4.4,
“Login Successful but GNOME Desktop Fails” (page 255) and Section A.2.4.5,
“Login Successful but KDE Desktop Fails” (page 256).
4 If the user's home directory has been used with another Linux distribution,
remove the Xauthority le in the user's home. Use a console login via [Ctrl]
+ [Alt] + [F1] and run rm .Xauthority as this user. This should eliminate X
authentication problems for this user. Try graphical login again.
5 If graphical login still fails, do a console login with [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [F1]. Try to
start an X session on another display—the rst one (:0) is already in use:
startx -- :1
This should bring up a graphical screen and your desktop. If it does not, check
the log les of the X Window System (/var/log/Xorg.
displaynumber
.log) or
the log le for your desktop applications (.xsession-errors in the user's home
directory) for any irregularities.
6 If the desktop could not start because of corrupt conguration les, proceed
with Section A.2.4.4, “Login Successful but GNOME Desktop Fails” (page 255)
or Section A.2.4.5, “Login Successful but KDE Desktop Fails” (page 256).
The following are some common reasons why network authentication for a particular
user may fail on a specic machine:
• The user may have entered the wrong password.
• The username exists in the machine's local authentication les and is also pro-
vided by a network authentication system, causing conicts.
• The home directory exists but is corrupt or unavailable. Perhaps it is write pro-
tected or is on a server that is inaccessible at the moment.
• The user does not have permission to log in to that particular host in the authen-
tication system.
• The machine has changed hostnames, for whatever reason, and the user does
not have permission to log in to that host.
Help and Troubleshooting 253
