Aha - that's sorted it for me, at least. Will I have to do this each time I log in / reboot? If so, can I put these commands into an automatically run file somewhere?
All you really have to do is to issue:
xhost +
one time during a boot session as a normal user. And you're good to go.
I have placed this in the .bashrc file for the user I normally log in as. (and now people are going to hound me that it is a security breach)
i figure you'll get enough comments about the security, so i'll refrain.. however, i would like to point out that your .bashrc isn't really a good place to put that to have it run automatically. you should put it either in your .xinitrc or .xsession. if you have it in your bashrc, it's run every time you open a new shell (including if you login remotely). the xinitrc is run when you start x from the console and the xsession is run when you log in via xdm/kdm/gdm/whatever. -- trey