Bugzilla – Bug 841719
KDE first login after installation fails because user needs to be selected
Last modified: 2014-03-14 15:14:09 UTC
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:23.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/23.0 openSUSE 13.1 Beta1: With the new branding it is hard to recognize, that the (one and only created) user shown there is not selected before the first login. That means, users (like me) will enter there password and get error messages like "login failed", because only the password is sent, but no username. For a successful login it is necessary to select the username by clicking on it, but this is not obvious. Either this should be told somehow to the person in front of the screen, or the login name of the user, created during the installation should be selected by default for the first login. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Install openSUSE 13.1 Beta1 with KDE as desktop environment 2. try to login without first clicking on the username 3. Actual Results: error messages about a failed login Expected Results: The unsuspecting user should be able to see, that he/she needs to select a username before entering the password.
It's an usual behaviour of KDM, look at this previous screen as an example: http://en.opensuse.org/File:OS11.2M7-kdm.png In this case too the single user in list isn't selected, the difference is the presence of the username field. Sure, it redundantly highlights the need to select the user in this particular case. The current theme is built around the idea to avoid precisely that visual repetition (user in list and in username field) in fact it shows the userlist or the username field, not both. Currently I don't think the theme can workaround this KDM behaviour and it correctly shows the selection (green) rectangle (and a mouse over effect too) for the userlist, so there is a visual feedback for selection/no selection. I agree KDM should automatically select the user in case of a single one in list.
The current openSUSE 13.1 Beta1 login screen is considerably more confusing than the one shown in comment 1. The older screen (1) shows an empty username box, and it is obvious something needs to go there, and (2) the cursor is in the username box to receive the input. The latest login screen (1) displays the username, as if that is what the system is going to use (no empty box), and (2) the cursor is in the password box, implying that is all that is needed to log in. The latest login screen would be quite user-friendly if KDM would automatically select the user in case of a single one in list. Best regards, Howard
I have two installations of 13.1. One from the milestones M1 to M4 to beta1, the otherone from network image for beta1. The login-manager (KDM) of the updated suse (one user) shows this one user, who writes his password and then getting his desktop. The originally installed beta1 shows the one user, who enters his password and this login fails. First to select the user's name and then to enter the password is an absolute unexspected behaviour. This should be corrected. XDM shows this behaviour too. Not really good.
@Giacomo is there any scriptable way to handle the case of one user in the list ? (yeah I know how much I'm dreaming :-) For example based on the cookbook http://docs.kde.org/stable/en/kde-workspace/kdm/kdm.pdf If we (only in case of new installation) setup last-login to true, and also tell that's user 1000, which is the default uid people will have. We should be able to covers 98% of the complain I saw here. Any ideas how to do this ?
From a theme point of view (the only one I know since I did just that :-)) I'm sure there is no way, the maximum level of customization available for userlist is color changes :/ About the interesting approach you described I found KDM saves the previous successful user logged in the file /var/lib/kdm/kdmsts and it saves the username, not the uid. The PreselectUser=Previous option is already default in kdmrc.
Too bad they pick the username. So we have to face to a one time trouble (only new fresh install with kde4 will be impacted) by this little annoyance) and keep a great theme for the rest of 13.1 live. We at least make it poeminent in the Release note so its documented that you need to click one time on the first new login for kdm. Or we have to reintroduce the ugly username forced field. @Howard + @Hendrik + @Helga : could we have your feedback too. ps:added coolo as release manager in cc list
"only new fresh install with kde4 will be impacted" This is exactly, what newbies to openSUSE + KDE will do. Will they read the releas notes carefully ? Experience tells me: rather not. What will they say/write about openSUSE after they walk into this trap? This design decision could give openSUSE a bad reputation. My suggestion (if this is technically possible): Display a text "please select a user" somewhere as long as none is selected.
@Hendrik okay you make a point about new users (I'm definitively not anymore one, so can't think about that). @Caig did you think we could find quickly a way to have this text box only appear if none of previous username exist ? Arrrr qml is missing :-)
Sadly no, this is the kdm theming reference http://docs.kde.org/stable/en/kde-workspace/kdm/theme-format.html ... very limited possibilities. Yes, I want too much sddm :/
This 13.1 beta1 KDE login design has already proven confusing to a number of experienced users (including me) as reported here and in the openSUSE forum. I agree it will be even more of a problem for new users. Almost all login screens I use have a username box and a password box. An empty box gives a clear message "Something has to go here for login to succeed." The beta1 design with the username displayed and no box gave me the message "The system will use this displayed username for login". The need to highlight the username is a mystery. Having "a great theme" is certainly nice, but it has to work. If this requires reintroducing "the ugly username forced field", then that's what I vote for. I never thought of the username box as ugly; just my opinion. Putting a comment in the Release Notes probably won't do the job. For example, the forum is full of discussions about Network Manager not working after an fresh installation until the system is rebooted. That behavior is clearly stated in the Release Notes, but lots of people missed it. Regards, Howard
How about changing in kdmrc PreselectUser to "Default" if only one user exists? And setting DefaultUser to the one and only username? If more users get added through YaST this could be changed to PreselectUser=Previous.
There's also another way, remove the userslist by default. So username appear empty first time and it become evident you have to write down something in it. Having the userslist back is one click away in systemsettings.
Closing as invalid. Automatic login is enabled by default, so users deselecting it should know what they are doing, and referencing a click more in release notes is more than enough.
@Bruno, what about this one? %post if [ ! -e /var/lib/kdm/kdmsts ]; then cat >> /var/lib/kdm/kdmsts << EOF [PrevUser] :0=$(grep 1000 /etc/passwd | grep -w "100" | awk -F':' '{ print $1}') EOF fi maybe the regexp could be more elegant though ;-)
Base:Sytem/openSUSE-branding upgrade rev 184 will have a username field
I'm glad openSUSE 13.1 will have a username field for login. I see no way that someone deselecting automatic login would know to highlight a displayed username. And unfortunately, experience has shown that users tend to not read Release Notes, so that approach would not be enough. Thanks for keeping the login screen looking like almost all others in existence. Howard
*** Bug 845756 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
This is an autogenerated message for OBS integration: This bug (841719) was mentioned in https://build.opensuse.org/request/show/224048 Factory / branding-openSUSE
*** Bug 845460 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***