How to start X without a display manager?

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1

I have been trying to get a minimal QubesOS setup using i3wm. In doing so, I also disabled the awful looking (and unnecessary) sddm (login/display manager).

However, as I reported here, I am having errors when issuing the startx command. I have been reading various forum posts on remedies to this (plus have been reading on the X itself) but so far I couldn’t resolve my issue and start my X on QubesOS.

Anybody can help me with this? How can I start X after logging into my user without a display manager, from a text console?

2

OK. I found a solution. It seems like the problem was my minimal QubesOS i3wm ISO setup was lacking an .xinitrc file in my user’s home folder. That file should’ve been calling the i3wm. And without that file, there simply isn’t any window manager to utilize the X server after calling the startx command.

I simply created a .xinitrc file in my home folder and typed exec i3 on it.

Then I reissued the startx command and now I have my i3wm with my i3status bar and all the QubesOS widgets (Network Manager, etc.) working there.

Here is the Q&A I read for this:

Edit: Here’s an explainer blog post

In light of this, my current ~/.xinitrc file contents are as follows:

#!/bin/sh
#
# source xinitrc-common
. /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc-common

# start the i3 window manager
exec i3
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