Re: segmentation fault on startup

Robert Leach wrote: It isn't that root can't run the X server; it's that the existing X server process refuses the connection. Typically, clients have to authenticate themselves to the X server. They do this by passing the authentication data which is stored in either the file specified by $XAUTHORITY or (if that isn't set) $HOME/.Xauthority. The account under which the client runs is irrelevant. Typically, the error which you report occurs because $HOME isn't the home directory of the user for whom the X server was started (by e.g. xdm), and so $HOME/.Xauthority doesn't contain suitable authentication data. If I am running X under my user account ("glynn"), and I want to be able to use X programs from within a shell which is running as root, I need to do: XAUTHORITY=/home/glynn/.Xauthority export XAUTHORITY X clients will then be able to obtain the necessary authentication data and connect to the server. OTOH, you state that: Is your home directory mounted via NFS? If so, then the "root" account on your system probably doesn't have root access to the NFS filesystem, including your home directory. In which case, you would have to manually copy the authentication data to a file which is accessible to the local root account. -- Glynn Clements <glynn.clements(a)virgin.net&gt;