[Info-vax] 8.4 and DECwindows CDE login box not coming up

[David Froble]

Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) wrote:
>> Get a list of the PQL* SYSGEN parameters from an earlier system disk. 
>> Then a list from the 8.4 disk.  Compare them.
> 
> On 8.4, most are the same as on 7.3-2, some are larger.
> 
>> What you need to do is to find out what the problem is.  Now, I could be 
>> wrong, but I doubt DECwindows requires more of anything on 8.4 than it 
>> did on earlier versions of VMS.  I doubt anyone has touched the product 
>> for years.
> 
> Right.  Well, probably no-one has touched it much.  This makes it all 
> the more puzzling why it no longer works.
> 
>> Actually, if you get the total list of SYSGEN parameters from an earlier 
>> system disk, and the list from the 8.4 disk, you can compare them for 
>> lower values on the 8.4 disk.  Even write a program to search for lower 
>> values.  That's a starting place.
>>
>> What I'm thinking is the 8.4 distribution has a lower value for 
>> something than what you had previously.
> 
> Comparing SETPARAMS.DAT, many are the same, some are (usually only 
> slightly) larger on 8.4, some are a bit smaller on 8.4.  I don't think 
> that using the previous values as MIN_ values for a newer version is a 
> good idea.  VMS itself checks whether the parameters for DECwindows are 
> sufficient, and sets MIN_ values during the upgrade.
> 
> Yes, if my system were badly configured, it could be a parameter 
> problem, but a) it's not and b) in such cases there is usually an error 
> message.
> 
> I'm thinking now it is some UAF parameters which need increasing.  Is 
> SYSTEM or DEFAULT relevant?
> 

When you attempt a DECwindows login, you need to consider what's 
actually happening, and no, I don't know all the details.

For example, when you're on a terminal and hit a couple of <CR> and get 
the login prompts, in what context is LOGINOUT.EXE running?  It's very 
likely a process, but at this time it sure isn't a process with 
information from your SYSUAF record.  So, it's got to have some quota 
and other info.  Where does this information come from?  Ask the wizard.

Similarly, when you attempt a DECwindows login, some process is created 
to do so, but, it's not using your SYSUAF info.  Not until you 
successfully log in.  What quota and other info is being used, where 
does it come from?  Don't assume the SYSTEM user account.

When I was first developing some code to create detached processes I ran 
into some interesting things.  Good learning experience.  (Probably 
still learning.)  From my feeble memory, some of the quotas for the 
created process were defaulted from the PQL* SYSGEN parameters, if I 
didn't specify them when creating the process. I found out the default 
values were woefully inadequate.  Thus my suggestion to check those 
SYSGEN parameters.  Maybe compare them against the values in say, the 
SYSTEM SYSUAF record.