13

I installed various window managers (Awesome, dwm, etc.) from which I am not able to log out back to the login screen (gnome-session) in order to switch to another window manager. I need to reboot to do that, which is a waste of time (and can lead to data corruption).

Question How can you log out via the terminal? didn't work..

dbus-send --session --type=method_call --print-reply --dest=org.gnome.SessionManager /org/gnome/SessionManager org.gnome.SessionManager.Logout uint32:1

..neither did this:

gnome-session-save --force-logout

..nor that:

gnome-session-quit --force-logout

they all returned:

Failed to call logout: The name org.gnome.SessionManager was not provided by any .service files

Is there a quick way to log out back into Gnome's session manager from a non-Gnome desktop manager using a terminal emulator? I know that CTRL+ALT+BACKSPACE can be configured to restart X, but I'm looking for the easiest way to log out.

Community
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octosquidopus
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6 Answers6

15

You could restart the desktop manager, which is similar to restarting X.

On Ubuntu 11.10:

sudo service lightdm restart

On earlier versions:

sudo service gdm restart

If that fails or you are on a very old system, try:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm restart

One of these should take you back to the login screen. Be aware that you will not be prompted, so save any work before running this command!

fader
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10

<modkey> + shift + q is the default command for killing the wm client on dwm and awesome. This effectively returns to the logout screen. Tested on a MacBook Air XUbuntu 12.10 with dmw, where it is alt + shift + q.Tested on a ThinkPad running Debian Stretch with awesome 3.5.

Casper Gerritsen
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ignis
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2

On Ubuntu 12.04 you can use

/usr/lib/indicator-session/gtk-logout-helper --logout

It opens a dialog box. I use it with Awesome Window Manager.

To directly logout, you can also (softly) kill your window manager.

Anwar
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Markus Roth
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1

Have you tried

/usr/bin/gnome-session-quit  --logout --no-prompt

This works for me in an Awesome WM Gnome session. Since GNOME 3.10 or so the --logout --no-prompt is now needed because I guess the dialog box is gone.

Ibrahim
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-2

I don't think it's a good way of doing it, but:

kill -9 -1
Jens Erat
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user483715
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-4

Try this::

killall -u username

Silvio Bandeira
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