Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!gumby!smaug!cs.hope.edu!jipping
From: jipping@cs.hope.edu (Mike Jipping)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.open-look
Subject: Re: openwin forgets hostname
Message-ID: <1991Apr9.124329.11217@cs.hope.edu>
Date: 9 Apr 91 12:43:29 GMT
References: <1991Apr2.222314.9821@cbnewsd.att.com>
Sender: news@cs.hope.edu
Reply-To: jipping@cs.hope.edu
Organization: Hope College Dept. of Computer Science
Lines: 25

> I've seen the discussion of the openwin script wanting to
> have the DISPLAY variable start with a colon.  Well that
> is just fine, but I've noticed that after a while the
> server forgets what the host is and tells me that it
> can't open the DISPLAY (:0.0).  This is really a pain.
> It  works for a while, then it stops.  Anybody else seen
> this?  Any work arounds (other than forcing the hostname
> into the DISPLAY variable)?

Using the ":0.0" form makes OpenWindows use sockets that are kept in /tmp
under ".NeWS-unix" and ".X11-unix".  Using the "<hostname>:0.0" puts the
socket into a different namespace.

We had this problem and ours was the fault of a cron job that deleted
/tmp entries that were older than 3 days.  Hence, our users could remain
logged in and have OpenWIndows up for three days -- then things ran
amuck.  Fixing this cron script fixed the problem. 

      Mike Jipping
      Hope College Department of Computer Science
      jipping@cs.hope.edu  (BITNET: JIPPING@HOPE)

      "If is was so, it might be, and if it were so, it would be.
       But as it isn't, it ain't.  That's logic."
                                              -- Lewis Carroll