DISPLAY environment variable

danahata · 02-26-2004, 01:48 PM

If, as a user, I type 'echo $DISPLAY', I get :0.0. Though, if I type su - , and then 'echo $DISPLAY', I get nothing. This doesn't seem normal. Is this the same behavior for others? The reason I ask is that I think it's related to a problem I am having with a screensaver which grabs an image of the desktop not functioning properly.

Dana

david_ross · 02-26-2004, 02:12 PM

That is the correct behaviour. If you want to start an application on a specific X server you just need to change the DISPLAY variable.

danahata · 02-26-2004, 03:30 PM

Well I've got another machine with Linux and it's got it's DISPLAY varibale pre-set, I guess my question is, how can I make su - start up with its DISPLAY variable preset?

Dana