Administering Login Manager

When the login server starts, one dtlogin process is started. The dtlogin process reads the Xconfig file to determine the initial login server configuration and locate other login server configuration files. The login server then reads the Xservers file to see if it has any displays to explicitly manage, and also reads the Xaccess file to control access to the login server.

If the login server finds from the Xservers file that it needs to manage a local display, it will start an X server as instructed in the Xservers file and then display a login screen on that display.

If the login server finds from the Xservers file that it needs to manage a network display, it will assume an X server is already running with the specified display name and display a login screen on that display.

The login server will then wait for XDMCP requests from the network.

For each display managed, the login server first creates a new dtlogin process for that display. This means if the login server is managing n displays, there will be n+1 dtlogin processes. The login server will run the Xsetup script, load the Xresources file, then run dtgreet to display the login screen. Once the user has entered a username and password and has been authenticated, the login server will run the Xstartup script and then the Xsession or Xfailsafe script. When the user has exited the session, the login server will run the Xreset script.

If the login server gets an XDMCP-indirect request, it will run dtchooser to present a list of login server hosts on the display. When the user selects a host from the list, the login server on that host will manage the display.

For the Xaccess, Xconfig, Xfailsafe, Xreset, language/Xresources, Xservers, Xsetup, and Xstartup configuration files, the login server will by default look first in /etc/dt/config, then /usr/dt/config, and use the first file found.