I successfully installed Ubuntu Linux, and I am new to it. When I boot up, I log into a shell, from there, how do I start GNOME or KDE??

thanks

At that point, you should be able to type "startx" and get Gnome up and running as the command should get XF86 up and running.

I am suprised that you ask this however, as Ubuntu should be running at level 5, not 3, so that you will get a graphical login client.

Are you sure that you installed the full meal deal?

what he means by the full meal deal is...

At the beginning, when you put the disc in and booted off the CD...did you type 'server' or did you just hit enter? By default, Ubuntu will install the destkop and normally works right away...but if you typed 'server' you won't have all the stuff installed...it's barebones for a server so no desktop is installed.

Or if the installer crashed during installation, or if something weird happened....

I personally have had weird problems with Debian based installers, both with Ubuntu and Debian. I just can't get through the install cleanly.

'startx' didn't work, I'm gonna do a re-install, we'll see how that goes.

No, the default runlevel in recent (gutsy, feisty) Ubuntu Desktop is 2, and runlevels 2, 3, 4, and 5 are identical and graphical. There is no "text-only" runlevel 3 as there is in RedHat.

If you want (sane) RedHat-like runlevels in Ubuntu, you have to configure them yourself and replace/edit the /event.d/rc-default Upstart script.

I wrote a little HOWTO for Proper Runlevels in Ubuntu.

Sorry, I didn't intend to resurrect this old thread (never looked at the date!). No harm done: this question about Ubuntu runlevels is coming up quite a lot.

yeah i was just about to say that, but dont worry about resurrecting it, your post will hopefully help people

If anybody will have this problem in future, try /etc/init.d/gdm start to start gnome display manager. Of course, with super user privileges.

*gdm can be replaced with kdm, xdm. Depends on your login manager.