showeq: cannot connect to X server

[DarkOne]

I've compiled and ran ShowEQ in other distributions but i've recently installed SuSE 9.1 (not the personal version). I've completed the usual steps:

make -f Makefile.dist
./configure
make
make install

These completed fine however when I actually try to run ShowEQ I get simply:
"showeq: cannot connect to X server"

Are there any ideas? Perhaps I missed an rpm that's needed for running but not compiling? I appreciate the help.

[Alethal]

What user are you trying to run ShowEQ with? It "needs" to be run as root.
I assume you are running ShowEQ from a XSession.

[purple]

Large hammer:
xhost +

If you login as a normal user and start X (or you use *dm to go straight into X) then su to root to run showeq, your normal user needs to allow X connections that it doesn't start. You can do this using the command xhost + from your normal user account. There are more fine grained and nicer solutions, but if it's just your personal box and you have a firewall up, xhost + will do the job.

[Alethal]

I believe the exact command to be xhost +local:
That will allow x connections to every local users.

[Cryonic]

either xhost +localhost or xhost +127.0.0.1

[DarkOne]

When I installed I chose to have it auto login to my user. When I was attempting to start ShowEQ I use su - from the terminal to change to root before starting. Should I have installed without the auto login?

[Alethal]

That does not really matter, you are not even entering a password to log-in?
Anyway, if you only use that box for showeq then it really does not matter.

[purple]

No, you're fine. Just do the xhost thing so that X allows connections from processes started by the root user on the desktop owned by whomever you log in as. Any of the above commands will work. xhost + just turns off access control, which if you have a firewall isn't gonna be problem. You can be more exact about your xhost line to control exactly what you're doing. Read man xhost for more information.

I've never heard of xhost +local unless you have an /etc/hosts entry or dns record that points local to loopback or your local machine. xhost +localhost or xhost +127.0.0.1 as Cryonic said should work to just allow connections from the local machine.

[fryfrog]

Instead of "su -" you can use "su" and it should work. The - takes on the environmental variables of the user you are becoming, so leaving it off lets you become root with your other users env variables.