gconf (?) makes X take 6 minutes to start

["David Morse" <dcmorse gmail com>]

If you look at the attached logfile (user2.log), you'll see a 198
second lag between the last and second-to-last loading of the last two
addresses: xml:readonly:/var/lib/gconf/defaults and
xml:readwrite:/home/dave/.gconf .  This corresponds to a 198 second
slowdown in time it takes to log in.  Sometimes this lag is up to 10
minutes!  I'm trying to figure out how to cut this time down to ~1
second.

Notice too how the "position"s in the log ramp
0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,...wait...for...it...0.  Could that be related?

_
I'm using the current stable Ubuntu (5.10) on ibook G3.
gconftool-2 --version claims 2.12.0
synaptic claims gconf v1 is not installed
gconf sanity check prints no output and returns code 0
_

I'm not sure its gconf that's eating all the time.  Nothing is loading
the processor.  X is just a black->brown gradient filling the screen,
and a movable mouse cursor.
_
This is a fresh ubuntu install, there's not much I could have broken
yet, EXCEPT, when I was installing from CD I skipped the "configure
network interfaces" phase because I knew it would fail.  Perhaps as a
result the first time I went to log in Gnome complained at me that it
would be brain-damaged since its own host name in /etc/hosts.  I
cliked "Yeah ok whatever, keep going", but it wasn't kidding about
brokenness - I couldn't even sudo to fix the problem!  I manually
added hostname and hostname.domain.name to 127.0.0.1 using the rescue
CD.  There was a brief span with no problems, then I fetched security
updates, and blammo: this long login delay appears.

_

After waiting the appointed time, X starts and the vast majority of
applications work OK.  (Gnome network-admin appears to have a bug with
its "location" management)

Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): starting (version 2.12.0), pid 5404 user 'dave'
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/etc/gconf/gconf.xml.mandatory" to a read-only configuration source at position 0
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/usr/share/gconf/local.mandatory" to a read-only configuration source at position 1
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readwrite:/home/dave/.gconf" to a writable configuration source at position 2
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/etc/gconf/gconf.xml.defaults" to a read-only configuration source at position 3
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/usr/share/gconf/local.defaults" to a read-only configuration source at position 4
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/usr/share/gconf/cdd.defaults" to a read-only configuration source at position 5
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/usr/share/gconf/debian.defaults" to a read-only configuration source at position 6
Feb 25 14:47:32 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readonly:/var/lib/gconf/defaults" to a read-only configuration source at position 7
Feb 25 14:50:50 localhost gconfd (dave-5404): Resolved address "xml:readwrite:/home/dave/.gconf" to a writable configuration source at position 0