Well, I got X running the hard way, by reading the man pages!

The man page for xdm includes some sample procedures, including one for 
.xsession, while the man page for startx has some examples for the 
.xinitrc file.

If you type `man xdm' and it doesn't find the man page, you'll need to 
update your MANPATH variable to include /usr/X11R6/man directory.

On Sat, 31 Aug 1996, John Ostrowick wrote:

> feeling really roasted, exhausted, depressed and miserable after being so
> badly flamed, the brave unix newbie continues his mission...
> 
> ok. I thought I'd summarise the findings for you all.
> 1. Ok, so I'm not a unix boff. that's why i'm messing with netbsd - so i
> can become one.
> 2. xinit *is* finding .xinitrc. It was originally reporting syntax errors
> in that file, as i found by eliminating the offending line.
> 3. xinit, whether run directly, or from startx, nevertheless still reports
> an error (it orginally reported 2 errors, it now only reports one). The
> error it reports for all users trying to run startx, is: server not found
> - or words to that effect.
> 4. it fills the screen with the desktop, shows the x cursor, flashes the
> error at the bottom of the screen momentarily as well as scrolls the
> desktop pattern up the screen. It then clears the screen and shows a blank
> console prompt, not running x.
> 5. if I run xdm it behaves a bit better. But i have been advised by people
> on this list that there is something wrong with doing it that way, and, if
> i do it that way, the .xinitrc file does not get read. It only reads the
> .xinitrc file if i run it by using startx or xinit. 
> 6. I understand that startx is a shell script which ultimately runs xinit
> anyway.
> 
> >From all the evidence, I can only presume that
> 1. there is something wrong with xinit or startx (ie, netbsd problem)
> 2. there is something wrong with something somewhere else. I have
> discovered that for some reason, the tar file did not contain the standard
> settings files, esp those in /usr/X11R6/lib/x11/xdm/. I presume part of
> the problem lies there. Has anyone else had this problem? I installed the
> tar file from root, so i cannot see why these files should be missing,
> except that they may have not been in that tar file. I have not been able
> to find them anywhere on the disk, despite running find, and have not
> found them in the original tar file, depsite doing a tar tvf x11.tar |
> grep etc... which i had previously used to find and extract a new copy of
> xinit (just in case it was broken). No luck. Are these settings files
> missing from the distribution? I presume not, but maybe they were missing
> from the distribution *I* downloaded. Has anyone had this problem? Has
> everyone had to build their x settings files from absolute scratch?
> 
> If no-one has had such a problem, then i can only presume there is
> something wrong with my setups and this is not a netbsd issue, in which
> case i'll give up and go somewhere where i hopefully will not get as badly
> flamed as i have been. Not sure where. On other lists i'll prolly get told
> to go away because my OS version is wrong... Anyway, I really appreciate
> the help i get from people who have helped. I mean that.
> 
> still shaking from the shocking reactions sent to me...
> :-(
> 
> _________________________________________________________________________
> John Ostrowick
> Computer Science Department, University of the Witwatersrand
> 1 Jan Smuts Ave, Johannesburg, South Africa. 1st Floor, Senate House 1012
> Phone: +27 (011) 716-3783
> jon@cs.wits.ac.za or jon@macenroe.cs.wits.ac.za or jon@is.co.za
> My web page is on my server's: http://macenroe.cs.wits.ac.za/
> My ftp site: ftp://macenroe.cs.wits.ac.za/public partition/
> My listserv: subscr@macenroe.cs.wits.ac.za (any message with a body)
> On Fri, 30 Aug 1996, Colin Wood wrote:
> 
> > Did you in fact redirect standard error to the file as well as stdout?  
> > You might have to do this using sh instead of csh, since I think that the 
> > startx script is a sh script.  You might want to hack the startx script 
> > to echo everything it does as well, just so you know where it dies.
> > 
> > Later.
> > 
> > -- 
> > Colin Wood                                      ender@is.rice.edu
> > Consultant                                        Rice University
> > Information Technology Services                       Houston, TX
> > 
> 
>