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X Application Server System.

Copyright (c) by various people. This software is licensed under the terms of the GPL, read the COPYING file for more.

Contents

1. Introduction 2. Troubleshooting

1. Introduction

XASS consists of two main applications: xassd and xrun. xassd should be run on 'application servers', and xrun can be used from any client. An application server actually runs the X-based application, but it is displayed on the client specified by the $DISPLAY environment variable where xrun was called. xrun will attempt to 'complete' the $DISPLAY variable if it is only partially complete.

Each application will typically run as the same user (and group) as the requesting user. To confirm the identity of a user, a file '.xrun' is placed in their home directory which contains a 256-bit key. Authentication is performed using 256-bit challenge-response.

Applications that are served by xassd are controlled by ${sysconfdir}/apps.conf. Global settings are in xassd.conf. Please see the man page for those files for more information on configuring application servers.

Servers that are queried are listed in ${sysconfdir}/xrun.conf. Please see the man page for that file for more information on configuring clients.

2. Troubleshooting

XASS can be troublesome to configure for people who aren't used to it. It will not substitute the requirement to have your X system configured correctly, for instance, and this seems to be the major problem for users at the moment.

Please read this section before submitting your problems to the mailing list. If you have been through this section, please do send to the list, because your problem may be the same problem as somebody else is having.

1. If you recieve the message 'No hosts currently serve...'
   • Is the package listed in a server's apps.conf file?
   • If you've just added it, have you restarted the server?
   • Is the server in xrun.conf's query list?
   • Is the server allowed to handle this user/group/host/display?
   • Is the client allowed to handle this server?
   • Is the server too heavily loaded, ie., above limitusage (default=10.00)?
   • Are you requesting too many applications at once (default=1000 apps)
2. If you recieve the message 'Requesting...to run...'
   • Is the program at the path you entered in apps.conf?
   • Does your remote DISPLAY environment variable make sense (at the server)?
   • Does the server have access to your display?
   • Are the ~/.xass files identical between the client and server?
   • Does the app depend on a nonexistent environment variable being configured?
   • Does the user and group exist on the server?