Torsdag 21 oktober 2004 14:08 kvad Anders Johansson:

On Thursday, 21 October 2004 13.51, Johnny Ernst Nielsen wrote:

...

Good day,

SUSE 9.0

How do I get a GUI program (kdialog) to show on the X screen by a script in /etc/ppp/ip-up.d? It has to happen on the screen of whatever user is logged into KDE.

Note: Untested

I think this should work for any user other than root, but then root should never be starting X anyway

Unfortunately, as you point out yourself, root must be the user that the system chooses to run the scripts in /etc/ppp/ip-up.d when the IP comes up. So root is the user that must display kdialog on the screen.

USER=`last :0|grep still|awk '{print $1}'` DISPLAY=:0.0 XAUTHORITY=/home/$USER/.Xauthority

Quite right -- it does not work for this situation, since it is not the las logged in user that runs the script.

/opt/kde3/bin/kdialog --msgbox "this is a test"

...

A test script looks like this:

#!/bin/bash

#Test if the script is activated -- write to a file. echo "Script activated." > /root/test.txt

#See what user the script is started as. echo "User: $USER" >> /root/test.txt

If this works then the user must be root, since that is the only user allowed to write to /root/

I think you are right. Thank you for your effort. :o) Any other ideas? Best regards Johnny :o)

Torsdag 21 oktober 2004 15:50 kvad Anders Johansson:

On Thursday, 21 October 2004 15.44, Johnny Ernst Nielsen wrote:

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Quite right -- it does not work for this situation, since it is not the las logged in user that runs the script.

It should work (if you put 'export' in front of DISPLAY and XAUTHORITY), I just tried it. It doesn't grab "the last logged in user", it grabs the last logged in user on :0

Try this

#!/bin/bash

USER=`/usr/bin/last :0|grep still|/usr/bin/awk '{print $1}'` export DISPLAY=:0.0 export XAUTHORITY=/home/$USER/.Xauthority

/opt/kde3/bin/kdialog --msgbox "this is a test"

I tried it and it works

It does not work here precisely the way you suggest. It says $HOME not set. However it works if construct and export a $HOME variable like this: export HOME=/home/$USER And then the kdialog pops up on the screen. :o)))) Thank you for your help Anders. :o) Best regards Johnny :o)

Torsdag 21 oktober 2004 14:19 kvad Ti Kan:

Johnny Ernst Nielsen writes:

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How do I get a GUI program (kdialog) to show on the X screen by a script in /etc/ppp/ip-up.d? It has to happen on the screen of whatever user is logged into KDE. ...

It is the kdialog command that will not work.

Both $USER and $DISPLAY are empty when the script is running, but all, except the call to kdialog, works as it is supposed to.

kdialog fails with this message: "kdialog: cannot connect to X server"

What you're trying to do is not quite right. The stuff that gets run in /etc/ppp/* (or for that matter, any of the rc or network startup/shutdown scripts) can happen without anyone even being logged in. A system may not even be running X at all... Their output can only be directed to the console which is the only "terminal" device that is guaranteed to be there, with or without a user actually logged in.

Are you saying that it is absolutely, totally, technically impossible to run a GUI application from the script the way I am trying to -- even if X IS up? On this computer, connection to the internet should not happen unless I specifically clicked the kinternet icon to make my modem dial out. As far as I understand, scripts in /etc/ppp/ip-up.d is run only when the IP comes up on a ppp connection being established, i.e. when the line is ready to transfer user information. Have I misunderstood that? If not, could you give an example of when the script in /etc/ppp/ ip-up.d would be run WITHOUT me first clicking the kinternet icon?

If you want to be informed of certain events in the system while you're logged in under KDE, the proper way to do it is to write a script or program to monitor for such an event in the background, which you start up during or after you log in. It will then have the proper output context (login name, terminal, $DISPLAY environment, permissions, etc) on which to produce output.

Event driven action was somewhat what I tried, through the use of / etc/ppp/ip.up.d. And it works, except for X. Do you have any other suggestions as to how I can make kdialog appear on the logged in user's screen when the ppp internet line is ready? Thank you for your effort. :o) Best regards Johnny :o)