xterm Error: Couldn't find per display information

[Pietro Barizza]

Hi all,
I'm having problems with xterm on b2000 with hp-ux 11.00

oboh124:/#xhost +
access control disabled, clients can connect
from any host

oboh148:/#export DISPLAY=oboh124:0.0
oboh148:/#xterm
Error: Can't open display: oboh124:0.0
Error: Couldn't find per display information

any other program (dtterm,hpterm) works fine!

if I use ip address xterm works. No DNS/NIS problems:

oboh148:/#nslookup oboh124
Name Server: oboh135.r22.netact.vodafoneomnitel.it
Address: 10.192.66.131

Trying DNS
Trying NIS
Name: oboh124.omnitel.it
Address: 10.44.3.24
Aliases: oboh124

oboh148:/#

xterm use old libc.1 library... but on other workstation with same library it works

oboh148:/#ldd /usr/bin/X11/xterm
/usr/lib/libc.1 => /usr/lib/libc.1
/usr/lib/libdld.1 => /usr/lib/libdld.1
/usr/lib/libcurses.1 => /usr/lib/libcurses.1
/view/x_r5may01_1020/vobs/swdev/pvt/r5may01_1020/X11R5/lib/libX11.1 => /usr/lib/libX11.1
/view/x_r5may01_1020/vobs/swdev/pvt/r5may01_1020/X11R5/lib/libXext.1 => /usr/lib/libXext.1
/view/x_r5may01_1020/vobs/swdev/pvt/r5may01_1020/X11R5/lib/libXt.1 => /usr/lib/libXt.1
oboh148:/#

could be X11R5 libXt (Xintrinsics). I found this bug note http://lists.debian.org/debian-x/2003/05/msg00063.html.

Thanks
Pietro

[Steven E. Protter]

X will never work unless you set a DISPLAY variable in .profile or /etc/profile

Best guess is that you have the wrong hostname/ip address in that variable.

Also, for Linux to act as an X client or Vice versa, the default firewall needs to be altered.

SEP

[Muthukumar_5]

We can not use hostname of FQDN of DISPLAY setting and using it for xterm.

Man page says as,

he X server stores network addresses, not host names. This is not
really a bug. If somehow you change a host's network address while
the server is still running, xhost must be used to add the new address
and/or remove the old address.

We have to set DISPLAY the IP-Address:

I have tested too. It is getting same error on using hostname. :)

HTH.
+muthu+

[Pietro Barizza]

Thanks both,
it 's no wrong ip error o similar (nis, dns, resolv.conf). It happens with a few application only (xterm, xdialog); hpterm works fine!
Again, on a similar workstation (same os, same apps, etc) xterm works fine too.

Pietro

[Elmar P. Kolkman]

Have you checked with the FQDN in the DISPLAY var? Or the IP address instead of the hostname?

And have you checked xclock? (should use Xt too).

[Pietro Barizza]

The same with FQDN;
xclock doesn't work too.

Pietro


Name Server: oboh135.r22.netact.vodafoneomnitel.it
Address: 10.192.66.131

Trying DNS
Trying NIS
Name: oboh124.omnitel.it
Address: 10.44.3.24
Aliases: oboh124

oboh148:/m/home/pbarizz (102) pbarizz% ksh -o emacs
$ export DISPLAY=oboh124.omnitel.it
$ xterm
Error: Can't open display: oboh124.omnitel.it
Error: Couldn't find per display information
$ xlock
ksh: xlock: not found
$ xclock
Error: Can't open display: oboh124.omnitel.it
$ xclock
Error: Can't open display: oboh124.omnitel.it
$ hpterm
Error: Can't open display: oboh124.omnitel.it
Error: Couldn't find per display information
$
$ echo $DISPLAY
oboh124.omnitel.it
$ export DISPLAY=oboh124
$ xclock
Error: Can't open display: oboh124
$
$ ping oboh124
PING oboh124.omnitel.it: 64 byte packets
64 bytes from 10.44.3.24: icmp_seq=0. time=3. ms

----oboh124.omnitel.it PING Statistics----
1 packets transmitted, 1 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip (ms) min/avg/max = 3/3/3
$ xclock
Error: Can't open display: oboh124
$ export DISPLAY=oboh124
$ xclock
Error: Can't open display: oboh124
$ export DISPLAY=10.44.3.24:0.0
$ xclock
Warning: Missing charsets in String to FontSet conversion
Warning: Unable to load any usable fontset

$ export DISPLAY=oboh124
$ xclock
Error: Can't open display: oboh124

[Elmar P. Kolkman]

In your latest post, you miss the :0 extensions to DISPLAY... It should be oboh124:0

[Pietro Barizza]

I 'm sorry. I have issued the command in a rush.
xterm does not work. xclock yes.


$ export DISPLAY=oboh124.omnitel.it:0.0
$ xterm
Error: Can't open display: oboh124.omnitel.it:0.0
Error: Couldn't find per display information

$ xclock
$

[Ermin Borovac]

Do you have /etc/nsswitch.conf on oboh148?

I think that applications linked with libc.1 have switch search terminate if the name service returns a result of NOTFOUND or TRYAGAIN. In your case oboh124 is not in DNS, and thus search is terminated without going to NIS.

To follow libc.2 behaviour you should insert NOTFOUND=continue and TRYAGAIN=continue clauses in between your sources in nsswitch.conf. For example

hosts: dns [NOTFOUND=continue TRYAGAIN=continue] nis [NOTFOUND=continue TRYAGAIN=continue] files

[Pietro Barizza]

I have a nsswitch.conf

oboh148:/#cat /etc/nsswitch.conf
#
# /etc/nsswitch.nis:
#
# An example file that could be copied over to /etc/nsswitch.conf; it
# uses NIS (YP) in conjunction with files.
#

passwd: compat
group: compat
#hosts: nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
hosts: dns [NOTFOUND=continue] nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
networks: nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
protocols: nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
rpc: nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
publickey: nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
netgroup: nis [NOTFOUND=return] files
automount: files nis
aliases: files nis
services: nis files
oboh148:/#export DISPLAY=oboh124:0.0
oboh148:/#xterm
Error: Can't open display: oboh124:0.0
Error: Couldn't find per display information
oboh148:/#nslookup oboh124
Name Server: oboh135.r22.netact.vodafoneomnitel.it
Address: 10.192.66.131

Trying DNS
Trying NIS
Name: oboh124.omnitel.it
Address: 10.44.3.24
Aliases: oboh124

[Ermin Borovac]

On the second thought if it was related to the fact that xterm was linked with libc.1 then hpterm (too linked with libc.1) wouldn't work either. You said that hpterm works fine with hostname:0.0.

You also mentioned that xterm works ok on some other workstation. Can you find any relevant differences (patches, nsswitch.conf etc) between two systems?

Have you tried tracing xterm with tusc? It might give you some further clues. If you don't have it installed get it here.

ftp://ftp.cup.hp.com/dist/networking/tools/tusc..shar

# tusc -fv -o /tmp/tusc.log.1 /usr/bin/X11/xterm -display oboh124:0.0
# tusc -fv -o /tmp/tusc.log.2
/usr/bin/X11/xterm -display 10.44.3.24:0.0

Check tusc.log.[12] to see if you can find anything significant.

Hope this helps.

[Kang Sun]

Greetings,
I had exactly the same problem. It turned out you don't need nsswitch.conf at all. Leave the file blank and xterm -display works. But I don't know if it will break anything else.
-- Kang