On Wed, 2005-10-19 at 22:22 +0100, Manuel López-Ibáñez wrote: > Thanks very much. However, for several reasons, I cannot apply that > "trick" in my case. Apart from those reasons, there is no X server on > middle or target at all. [...] And what should I put in $DISPLAY?
Graphical programs find the appropriate X server on which to show their windows via the $DISPLAY variable. When you log into X, $DISPLAY is automatically set to a code for your display, often :0.0, in the environment of all programs started via X. Conveniently enough, X programs communicate with X servers through sockets and ports, and SSH already has code to forward ports. When SSH does "X forwarding", it sets up a virtual display of sorts on the remote machine and points the remote $DISPLAY to this display. When you run a remote graphical program, it reads $DISPLAY and connects to the corresponding port; SSH is watching this port and redirects the program to the real X server port on your machine. In short, you can just tell SSH to do X forwarding and remote graphical programs will show their windows on "source". You need not set $DISPLAY yourself, nor do you need an X server on any machine but "source". > Moreover, which password-prompting program > should I use? middle is an OpenBSD machine. SSH usually comes with one of these programs, and it is called "ssh-askpass" or similar. My system has a "gnome-ssh-askpass" and even sets $SSH_ASKPASS automatically to this program. Failing that, a little program called Zenity can be scripted to pop up simple dialog boxes; you might be able to find a BSD version and use "zenity --entry" as your $SSH_ASKPASS command. > Finally, I am not sure if your first paragraph means that this is > impossible and it won't be implemented in rsync. I guess an option /could/ be added to rsync to have it send some data across the network before it begins its protocol, but rsync's job isn't to handle SSH authentication; it expects to be provided with a working transport of some kind so that it can synchronize files. Rsync is not the only tool that sometimes makes SSH connections without a terminal at which the user can input the password, which is why there are alternate techniques like this one, public key authentication, and ssh-agent. -- Matt McCutchen, ``hashproduct'' [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- http://mysite.verizon.net/hashproduct/ -- To unsubscribe or change options: https://lists.samba.org/mailman/listinfo/rsync Before posting, read: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html