runlevels?

[crashandburn0420]

What is the differene between different runlevels?

[spoon!]

varies somewhat, typically:
0 - halt / shutdown
1 - single-user mode
2 - multi-user command-line, no network
3 - multi-user command-line
4
5 - multi-user with X (GUI)
6 - reboot

[smolloy]

Gentoo appears to be different. I don't think there is a difference between run levels 3, 4, or 5. I've got X running at runlevel 3 at the moment. Maybe there are differences I'm not aware of??

[Cabhan]

Gentoo does not automatically make a runlevel 4 or 5.

If you want 5 to be GUI and 3 to be commandline, you might add xdm (or whatever your login manager is) to be added to 5 only, not all:

rc-update del xdm default
rc-update add xdm runlevel5

You can still run X from a commandline, just it isn't started automatically.

[smolloy]

rc-update del xdm default
rc-update add xdm runlevel5
* runlevel runlevel5 not found; skipping

A similar thing happens when I do,

rc-update add xdm 5
* runlevel 5 not found; skipping

Do I need to edit something in inittab to do this??

[budman7]

If you do

rc-update add xdm default

That will override your inittab.

This is my entry in inittab, and I boot straight into X.

id:3:initdefault:

[smolloy]

But Cabhan implied that it is possible to make a difference between runlevel 3 and 5 in gentoo by adding xdm to run level 5. When I tried this I got the errors listed in my previous post, and I was wondering what I would need to change in my inittab (or elsewhere) to get this working??

[Cabhan]

My apologies. I kinda spoke without testing.

I found an excellent thread on the Gentoo Forums that describes what you want. You could basically define your own runlevel (call it 5, 17, 42, whatever you want). Then copy whatever services you want in (probably all of the same, except with/out X), and have all the fun.

The thread is:

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t...ighlight-.html

[smolloy]

Thanks Cabhan -- that's good stuff!

I found a link off that thread to the gentoo handbook's explanation of initscripts that has a slightly different explanation (only slightly tho) which is probably more official. I think I might set up a couple of my own runlevels for networkless working, etc. for when I'm on the road.