Ethereal-users: Re: [Ethereal-users] Installation Error - Gtk-WARNING **: cannot open display

Note: This archive is from the project's previous web site, ethereal.com. This list is no longer active.

From: Bob Perry <rperry@xxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2005 11:36:01 -0400
On Sun, 2005-08-21 at 23:57 -0700, Guy Harris wrote:
> Bob Perry wrote:
> > I just installed ethereal-0.10.12 onto my server-type FreeBSD 5.4 box
> > and apparently did a poor job.  Ran into the following error trying to
> > run the app from the command line:
> > 
> > "ethereal:xxxx: Gtk-WARNING **: cannot open display"
> > 
> > This box does not have gnome or X11 Windows installed yet and I'm
> > guessing one, or both are necessary.
> 
> X11 is absolutely necessary.  Ethereal is a GUI application, and the way 
> GUI applications work, on most UN*Xes, is through X11.  (And on the one 
> exception - the UN*X and UN*X desktop environment developed in buildings 
> on Infinite Loop in Cupertino - it's *still* an X11 application and 
> requires X11.)
> 
> However, if you're logging in to your server box from a client that has 
> X11 installed, you already have X11.  In order to run an X11 application 
> on the server, you have to set the DISPLAY environment variable (in your 
> session on the server) to refer to your client machine.
> 
> > Thought I would get a warning during installation.
> 
> It's not necessarily an error to install an X11 GUI application on your 
> server, even if the server doesn't have an X11 server installed on it; 
> you might have installed it so that you can run it with its windows 
> displayed on a desktop client machine that *does* have an X11 server.
  
Guess I'll load up X11.  Thanks much for your response.
Bob