Bug#497339: gdm: Login disappears when switching user

[Russell Weatherburn]

Package: gdm
Version: 2.20.7-1
Severity: grave
Justification: causes non-serious data loss

I'm unsure that this is actually a gdm problem, but it does seem
relevant.

The situation I have found is that I have two users who switch between
VT7 and VT8.  Since changing to Lenny, I have found that VT7 appears to
be stable, but the user who logs into VT8 can run the session for a
period of time, however if the users xscreensaver comes on and locks the
screen and the switch user button is clicked the VT8 session will
disappear.

This has the potential to lose data for the second user and, of course,
potential marital disharmony (which I would like to avoid as much as
possible...)

A similar situation I have also seen when using vnc4server, however it
occurred with VT7.  VT7 became unusable, however switching users and
using VT10 was possible.

If this bug should be pointed elsewhere, please let me know.

Regards,

Russell.


-- System Information:
Debian Release: lenny/sid
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (650, 'testing')
Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.25-2-686 (SMP w/2 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_AU, LC_CTYPE=en_AU (charmap=ISO-8859-1)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash

Versions of packages gdm depends on:
ii  adduser                3.110             add and remove users and groups
ii  debconf [debconf-2.0]  1.5.22            Debian configuration management sy
ii  gksu                   2.0.0-5           graphical frontend to su
ii  gnome-session [x-sessi 2.22.3-1          The GNOME 2 Session Manager
ii  gnome-terminal [x-term 2.22.3-2          The GNOME 2 terminal emulator appl
ii  icewm [x-window-manage 1.2.35-1          wonderful Win95-OS/2-Motif-like wi
ii  konsole [x-terminal-em 4:3.5.9.dfsg.1-5  X terminal emulator for KDE
ii  libart-2.0-2           2.3.20-2          Library of functions for 2D graphi
ii  libatk1.0-0            1.22.0-1          The ATK accessibility toolkit
ii  libattr1               1:2.4.43-1        Extended attribute shared library
ii  libc6                  2.7-13            GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  libcairo2              1.6.4-6           The Cairo 2D vector graphics libra
ii  libdbus-1-3            1.2.1-3           simple interprocess messaging syst
ii  libdbus-glib-1-2       0.76-1            simple interprocess messaging syst
ii  libdmx1                1:1.0.2-3         X11 Distributed Multihead extensio
ii  libfontconfig1         2.6.0-1           generic font configuration library
ii  libfreetype6           2.3.7-1           FreeType 2 font engine, shared lib
ii  libglade2-0            1:2.6.2-1         library to load .glade files at ru
ii  libglib2.0-0           2.16.4-2          The GLib library of C routines
ii  libgnomecanvas2-0      2.20.1.1-1        A powerful object-oriented display
ii  libgtk2.0-0            2.12.11-3         The GTK+ graphical user interface 
ii  libpam-modules         1.0.1-3           Pluggable Authentication Modules f
ii  libpam-runtime         1.0.1-3           Runtime support for the PAM librar
ii  libpam0g               1.0.1-3           Pluggable Authentication Modules l
ii  libpango1.0-0          1.20.5-1          Layout and rendering of internatio
ii  librsvg2-2             2.22.2-2          SAX-based renderer library for SVG
ii  librsvg2-common        2.22.2-2          SAX-based renderer library for SVG
ii  libselinux1            2.0.65-2          SELinux shared libraries
ii  libwrap0               7.6.q-15          Wietse Venema's TCP wrappers libra
ii  libx11-6               2:1.1.4-2         X11 client-side library
ii  libxau6                1:1.0.3-3         X11 authorisation library
ii  libxdmcp6              1:1.0.2-3         X11 Display Manager Control Protoc
ii  libxext6               2:1.0.4-1         X11 miscellaneous extension librar
ii  libxi6                 2:1.1.3-1         X11 Input extension library
ii  libxinerama1           2:1.0.3-2         X11 Xinerama extension library
ii  libxml2                2.6.32.dfsg-2     GNOME XML library
ii  lsb-base               3.2-19            Linux Standard Base 3.2 init scrip
ii  metacity [x-window-man 1:2.22.0-1        A lightweight GTK2 based Window Ma
ii  xfce4-session [x-sessi 4.4.2-6           Xfce4 Session Manager
ii  xfce4-terminal [x-term 0.2.8-5           Xfce terminal emulator
ii  xfwm4 [x-window-manage 4.4.2-5           window manager of the Xfce project
ii  xterm [x-terminal-emul 235-1             X terminal emulator
ii  zlib1g                 1:1.2.3.3.dfsg-12 compression library - runtime

Versions of packages gdm recommends:
ii  dialog                    1.1-20080316-1 Displays user-friendly dialog boxe
ii  gdm-themes                0.6            Themes for the GNOME Display Manag
ii  whiptail                  0.52.2-11.3    Displays user-friendly dialog boxe
ii  xserver-xephyr            2:1.4.2-3      nested X server
ii  xserver-xorg              1:7.3+15       the X.Org X server
ii  zenity                    2.22.1-1       Display graphical dialog boxes fro

Versions of packages gdm suggests:
ii  libpam-gnome-keyring          2.22.3-1   PAM module to unlock the GNOME key
ii  locales                       2.7-13     GNU C Library: National Language (
ii  uswsusp                       0.7-1.2    tools to use userspace software su

-- debconf information:
  gdm/daemon_name: /usr/bin/gdm
* shared/default-x-display-manager: gdm