Booting into non-graphical mode

PelleLV
PelleLV Posts: 4
in LFS201 Class Forum - Discontinued

In Lab 3.1 I have a problem booting to non-graphical mode from GRUB in Ubuntu 16.04.

I hit "e" on the GRUB interface and change "quiet splash" to "text" in the linux line, then boot (F10) but it still boots to the desktop GUI.

Is there a different way to do this?

Comments

  • saqman2060
    saqman2060 Posts: 777

    Yes there is another way. I am not very skilled at entering commands on the kernel line but I know how to change runlevels from /etc. Apparently, 16.04 is using systemd to start and stop services and to the boot behavior. 

    Have a look at this link. Becuase Ubuntu 16.04 is using systemd as the service startup manager, to make any service changes, you will have to use systemd's utility "systemctl". 

    Have a look at this site.

    http://askubuntu.com/questions/788323/change-runlevel-on-16-04

  • FToledano
    FToledano Posts: 27
    edited July 2016
    Hi,

    If your system is using a systemd based init process, you can switch between graphical/non-graphical runlevel at boot, editing grub (e) and adding to the linux kernel line

    systemd.unit=NAME_OF_DESIRED_RUNLEVEL

    The runlevel names may be:

    multi-user.target (for runlevel 3)
    graphical.taget (for runlevel 5)
  • PelleLV
    PelleLV Posts: 4
    edited July 2016 

    sudo systemctl isolate muti-user.target

    - Should kill X and get me a login prompt, right? But similar to my reply below, it just hangs on a black screen.

  • PelleLV
    PelleLV Posts: 4

    I am running systemd and your suggestion makes sense but I'm not getting a command prompt. the GUI is not loading as expected but I end up with a blank screen similar to this:


    /dev/sd8: recovering journal
/dev/sda8: clean, 346887/1818624 files, 1865910/7268864 blocks
_

    It just hangs there with a blinking prompt.

  • FToledano
    FToledano Posts: 27
    Sometimes when I start into multi-user, the system not shows me the login propmt, but is there. Only for test, can you try to enter in this blinking prompt your user name and press enter?
  • PelleLV
    PelleLV Posts: 4
    edited August 2016

    I get nothing - it doesn't recognize input from the keyboard at all. 

  • JeffM
    JeffM Posts: 2
    edited January 2017

    This problem still has me flummoxed.  I've learned much about Linux over the years from youtube videos.  'Twould be *awesome* if someone who had solved this puzzle would post a demo. 

     

  • coop
    coop Posts: 917

    In ubuntu16.04 appending "text" does not work; instead append "3" (like you would with other distros) to the end of the linux kernel line in grub.  It will then boot into a terminal.  To get it to go do full graphic mode after that you can do sudo systemctl start lightdm

  • zoomm10
    zoomm10 Posts: 5
    edited January 2017

    Hi,

    try number 3 after quiet:  quiet 3 splash

  • SerchMX
    SerchMX Posts: 1
    edited August 2017

    That did the trick, thank you!!

Categories

Upcoming Training