Paul Whiting wrote:
> 
> A small but annoying problem is that I can't delete things that I mistype. Often the
> 'Delete' key does not work, displaying '^?'. Typing 'stty erase ^h' does not help at
> these times. The problem is however intermittent - and seems not to affect me so
> much if I log on as 'root'.

Instead of ^h, try actually pressing the delete key. (As from your
description ^? rather than ^h would be more suitable). so
stty erase <delete key>

> Which I did. Typing /usr/.../startx causes the machine to complain that it can't
> find xinit. I know that it exists though as I can see it with 'ls /usr/X11R6.1/bin'.

Is /usr/X11R6.1/bin in your path? Try
echo $PATH
If it isn't, try (I'm assuming sh shell)
PATH=$PATH:/usr/X11R6.1/bin

The reason for this is that startx is a script. The last thing it does
is to call xinit, but doesn't call it by a full path. An alternative
would be to edit startx and change the last line to

/usr/X11R6.1/xinit $clientargs -- /usr/X11R6.1/bin/X $serverargs

Good luck,

 Patrick