FAILED TO establish the default connection to the WindowServer

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FAILED TO establish the default connection to the WindowServer

Hi there,

I am connected to a server running OS X 10.5 from my MacBook Pro (running 10.4.11) via X11, using ssh -Y. Some programs I run on the remote machine successfully open windows on my screen (nedit, for example) but with others (Safari, Firefox, fslview) I get the following error:

_RegisterApplication(), FAILED TO establish the default connection to the WindowServer, _CGSDefaultConnection() is NULL.

I've looked around on forums for a fix, and it seems certain programs use aqua and not x11 and thus can not be accessed using a remote terminal connection.

But there MUST be some fix for this, right?

Thanks in advance.

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.4.11), server running OS X 10.5

Posted on Nov 14, 2008 8:53 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 14, 2008 9:54 AM in response to rignyc

Hi,

One workaround would be to try the command line browser, lynx. Not sure how to view images on the server, though. Maybe add an alias to your image folder on the server in your apache config then use a local web browser(?).

--
Cole

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Answer 2

BobHarris

Level 9

56,021 points

Nov 14, 2008 10:42 AM in response to rignyc

As far as I know, the best you can do is to enable Screen Sharing on the server and give it a VNC password.

Since you are using Tiger, get a VNC client (JollysFastVNC, Chicken of the VNC, etc...) and connect to the server that way.

An alternative to the Mac OS X Screen Sharing component would be to install your own VNC server, such as Vine Server (aka OSXvnc).

However, to the best of my knowledge, the Mac OS X GUI subsystem is NOT designed like the X11 client/server model. So all you can do is ship the entire display via VNC, not just a single application's window.

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FAILED TO establish the default connection to the WindowServer