Can't create .Xauthority for users
I'm setting up a new machine with 2.6.8-2-686 kernel on sarge. Things
seem to be working except for one thing: Users can't start the x
server (root has no problem).
When user does startx, the nVidia splash screen appears momentarily,
but I'm thrown back to the console. The startx messages only say that
.Xauthority is being created. However, no .Xauthority shows up in the
user's home directory.
In ~/Xsession-errors, I get:
Xsession: X session started for brownh at ...
open: Permission denied
I assume the lack of permission is the result of their being no
.Xauthority file actually created in user's account.
/var/log/auth.log records that a session has opened for user, but no
errors are reported.
I tried
# su - user
$ startx
xauth: creating new authority file /home/user/.Xauthority
/usr/bin/X11/startx: line 132: cannot create temporary file for here
document: Permission denied
X: user not authorized to run the X server, aborting
xinit: Server error.
xauth: craeting new authority file /home/user/.Xauthority
Couldn't get a file descriptor referring to the console
The section in /usr/bin/X11/startx:
for displayname in $authdisplay $hostname$authdisplay; do
if ! xauth list ""displayname" | grep "$displayname "
>/dev/null 2>&1; then
xauth << EOF
Line 132 is this last line. The /etc/X11/Xsession is writable by
anyone. At this point I get in way over my head and don't see any
creation of a temporary file.
When root does:
$ xauth list
teufel.hartford-hwp.com/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
localhost.localdomain:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
hartford-hwp.com/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
64.227.154.66:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
teufel/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
teufel.hartford-hwp.com:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
127.0.1.1:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
When root does:
# xauth list
teufel.hartford-hwp.com:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
teufel/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
192.168.1.1:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
it is clear something is wrong with network configuration, for on an
old running machine with same configuration:
$ xauth list
teufel.hartford-hwp.com/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
localhost.localdomain:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
hartford-hwp.com/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
64.227.154.66:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
teufel/unix:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
teufel.hartford-hwp.com:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
127.0.1.1:0 MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ...
Missing on the new machine is the loopback device and other lines. I
suspect the lack of loopback might prevent creation of the user
.Xauthority files.
The /etc/hosts and /etc/hostname files on the two machines are the
same. A difference is that the old machine uses /etc/resolv.conf,
while the new machine uses the resolvconf utility.
A clue may come from the result of running # ifconfig -a , for there
are two ethN interfaces listed (I'm using only the MAC on my Asus A8N
motherboard and no NIC. The two machines address a hardware
firewall).
The eth0 interface is down, and so lacks the lines:
Link encap: Ethernet HWadd... and the line
inet addr: ...
Interrupt:NNN Base address:NNN
In /etc/network/interfaces I must use "iface eth1 inet dhcp" because
the eth0 is down and does not support communications.
--
Haines Brown
KB1GRM
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