Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

[Roland Roberts]

I have a new, company-supplied Windows 10 laptop, using Cygwin to do 
development. I’m having a problem getting XWin to launch apps. XWin 
appears to be mostly working normally, meaning if I launch a Cygwin 
mintty instance, I can manually set DISPLAY=:0.0 and start up X 
application from the shell prompt. But trying to launch from my .XWinrc, 
the application never displays and I can’t find a useful error log to 
track down the issue. I’m pretty sure it’s some permission someplace my 
account doesn’t have (and I can probably get IT to change that if I can 
just identify what it is).

Here’s the XWin.0.log

     Welcome to the XWin X Server

     Vendor: The Cygwin/X Project
     Release: 1.20.11.0
     OS: CYGWIN_NT-10.0-18363 CS-LT-RROB-02 3.1.4-340.x86_64 2020-02-19 
08:49 UTC x86_64
     OS: Windows 10  [Windows NT 10.0 build 18363] (Win64)
     Package: version 1.20.11-1 built 2021-04-27

     XWin was started with the following command line:

     /usr/bin/XWin :0 -multiwindow -auth
     /home/rrobert1/.serverauth.403

     ddxProcessArgument - Initializing default screens
     winInitializeScreenDefaults - primary monitor w 2560 h 1440
     winInitializeScreenDefaults - native DPI x 96 y 96
     [  1456.031] (II) xorg.conf is not supported
     [  1456.031] (II) See 
http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/cygwin-x-faq.html for more information
     [  1456.031] LoadPreferences: Loading /home/rrobert1/.XWinrc
     [  1456.031] LoadPreferences: Done parsing the configuration file...
     [  1456.031] winDetectSupportedEngines - RemoteSession: no
     [  1456.046] winDetectSupportedEngines - DirectDraw4 installed, 
allowing ShadowDDNL
     [  1456.062] winDetectSupportedEngines - Returning, supported 
engines 00000005
     [  1456.062] winSetEngine - Multi Window or Rootless => ShadowGDI
     [  1456.062] winScreenInit - Using Windows display depth of 32 bits 
per pixel
     [  1456.062] winAllocateFBShadowGDI - Creating DIB with width: 2560 
height: 1440 depth: 32
     [  1456.062] winFinishScreenInitFB - Masks: 00ff0000 0000ff00 000000ff
     [  1456.062] winInitVisualsShadowGDI - Masks 00ff0000 0000ff00 
000000ff BPRGB 8 d 24 bpp 32
     [  1456.078] MIT-SHM extension disabled due to lack of kernel support
     [  1456.078] XFree86-Bigfont extension local-client optimization 
disabled due to lack of shared memory support in the kernel
     [  1456.078] glWinSelectGLimplementation: Loaded 'cygnativeGLthunk.dll'
     [  1456.187] (II) AIGLX: Testing pixelFormatIndex 1
     [  1456.203] GL_VERSION:     4.6.0 - Build 27.20.100.8853
     [  1456.203] GL_VENDOR:      Intel
     [  1456.203] GL_RENDERER:    Intel(R) Iris(R) Xe Graphics
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_SGI_make_current_read
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_SGI_swap_control
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_MESA_swap_control
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_SGIX_pbuffer
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_ARB_multisample
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_SGIS_multisample
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_ARB_fbconfig_float
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_EXT_fbconfig_packed_float
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_ARB_create_context
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_ARB_create_context_profile
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_ARB_create_context_robustness
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_EXT_create_context_es2_profile
     [  1456.203] (II) GLX: enabled GLX_ARB_framebuffer_sRGB
     [  1456.203] (II) AIGLX: enabled GLX_MESA_copy_sub_buffer
     [  1456.203] (II) 110 pixel formats reported by 
wglGetPixelFormatAttribivARB
     [  1456.218] (II) 74 fbConfigs
     [  1456.218] (II) ignored pixel formats: 0 not OpenGL, 0 unknown 
pixel type, 36 unaccelerated
     [  1456.218] (II) GLX: Initialized Win32 native WGL GL provider for 
screen 0
     [  1456.453] winPointerWarpCursor - Discarding first warp: 1280 720
     [  1456.453] (--) 16 mouse buttons found
     [  1456.453] (--) Setting autorepeat to delay=500, rate=31
     [  1456.453] (--) Windows keyboard layout: "00000409" (00000409) 
"US", type 7
     [  1456.453] (--) Found matching XKB configuration "English (USA)"
     [  1456.453] (--) Model = "pc105" Layout = "us" Variant = "none" 
Options = "none"
     [  1456.453] Rules = "base" Model = "pc105" Layout = "us" Variant = 
"none" Options = "none"
     [  1456.453] [  1456.453] winInitMultiWindowWM - DISPLAY=:0.0
     winMultiWindowXMsgProc - DISPLAY=:0.0
     [  1456.656] winInitMultiWindowWM - xcb_connect () returned and 
successfully opened the display.
     [  1456.656] winProcEstablishConnection - winInitClipboard returned.
     [  1456.656] winClipboardThreadProc - DISPLAY=:0.0
     [  1456.656] winMultiWindowXMsgProc - xcb_connect() returned and 
successfully opened the display.
     [  1456.656] winClipboardProc - xcb_connect () returned and 
successfully opened the display.
     [  1456.656] Using Composite redirection
     [  1490.390] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 772
     [  1902.312] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 1200

You can see the last two things that were launched. And here’s the 
process list

     29267 rrobert1> ps -ef
          UID     PID    PPID  TTY        STIME COMMAND
     rrobert1     610       1 ?        08:31:58 /usr/bin/mintty
     rrobert1     471       1 ?        08:31:46 /usr/bin/gpg-agent
     rrobert1     772     605 ?        08:32:24 /usr/bin/XWin
     rrobert1    1205     611 pty0     08:39:31 /usr/bin/ps
     rrobert1     403       1 cons0    08:31:42 /usr/bin/sh
     rrobert1     442       1 ?        08:31:44 /usr/bin/ssh-agent
     rrobert1     611     610 pty0     08:31:58 /usr/bin/bash
     rrobert1     604     403 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/xinit
     rrobert1    1200     605 ?        08:39:16 /usr/bin/XWin
     rrobert1     605     604 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/XWin
     rrobert1     609     604 ?        08:31:50 /usr/bin/sh

where you can see those processes are launch, but they show as 
additional instances of XWin and mintty was never started. My .XWinrc 
contain this

     menu root {
             "Cygwin Terminal" exec  "/bin/mintty"
                 "Emacs"           exec     "/bin/emacs"
             // […]
     }

Any suggestions on where to poke to diagnose this? My home Windows 10 
machine has no problem at all. Oh, and cygcheck report version 3.1.4. 
Yes, that’s a little old, but we are stuck there until we can work out 
an issue with our build environment and the change for 3.1.5+ in how 
symlinks are handled.

-- 
Roland Roberts, PhD
Brooklyn, NY USA
https://astrofoto.org

Re: Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

[Roland Roberts]

On 8/10/2021 8:58 AM, Roland Roberts wrote:
> I have a new, company-supplied Windows 10 laptop, using Cygwin to do 
> development. I’m having a problem getting XWin to launch apps. XWin 
> appears to be mostly working normally, meaning if I launch a Cygwin 
> mintty instance, I can manually set DISPLAY=:0.0 and start up X 
> application from the shell prompt. But trying to launch from my 
> .XWinrc, the application never displays and I can’t find a useful 
> error log to track down the issue. I’m pretty sure it’s some 
> permission someplace my account doesn’t have (and I can probably get 
> IT to change that if I can just identify what it is).
>
> [...]
>     [  1490.390] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 772
>     [  1902.312] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 1200
>
> You can see the last two things that were launched. And here’s the 
> process list
>
>     29267 rrobert1> ps -ef
>          UID     PID    PPID  TTY        STIME COMMAND
>     rrobert1     610       1 ?        08:31:58 /usr/bin/mintty
>     rrobert1     471       1 ?        08:31:46 /usr/bin/gpg-agent
>     rrobert1     772     605 ?        08:32:24 /usr/bin/XWin
>     rrobert1    1205     611 pty0     08:39:31 /usr/bin/ps
>     rrobert1     403       1 cons0    08:31:42 /usr/bin/sh
>     rrobert1     442       1 ?        08:31:44 /usr/bin/ssh-agent
>     rrobert1     611     610 pty0     08:31:58 /usr/bin/bash
>     rrobert1     604     403 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/xinit
>     rrobert1    1200     605 ?        08:39:16 /usr/bin/XWin
>     rrobert1     605     604 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/XWin
>     rrobert1     609     604 ?        08:31:50 /usr/bin/sh
>
> Any suggestions on where to poke to diagnose this? My home Windows 10 
> machine has no problem at all. Oh, and cygcheck report version 3.1.4. 
> Yes, that’s a little old, but we are stuck there until we can work out 
> an issue with our build environment and the change for 3.1.5+ in how 
> symlinks are handled.
>
So, no suggestions :-(

I'm looking for anything at all that I could put into my .XWinrc that 
might produce some diagnostic output short of running XWin under a 
debugger. I'm completely guessing that it's a permission thing.

As I mentioned, I *can* launch X applications from a Cygwin mintty shell 
console after setting DISPLAY, including being able to launch things 
like Emacs, so whatever is stopping these from displaying, it's only 
affecting things launched from my .XWinrc.

roland

-- 
Roland Roberts, PhD
Brooklyn, NY USA
https://astrofoto.org

Re: Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

[Eliot Moss]

On 8/18/2021 7:19 PM, Roland Roberts wrote:
> On 8/10/2021 8:58 AM, Roland Roberts wrote:
>> I have a new, company-supplied Windows 10 laptop, using Cygwin to do development. I’m having a 
>> problem getting XWin to launch apps. XWin appears to be mostly working normally, meaning if I 
>> launch a Cygwin mintty instance, I can manually set DISPLAY=:0.0 and start up X application from 
>> the shell prompt. But trying to launch from my .XWinrc, the application never displays and I can’t 
>> find a useful error log to track down the issue. I’m pretty sure it’s some permission someplace my 
>> account doesn’t have (and I can probably get IT to change that if I can just identify what it is).
>>
>> [...]
>>     [  1490.390] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 772
>>     [  1902.312] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 1200
>>
>> You can see the last two things that were launched. And here’s the process list
>>
>>     29267 rrobert1> ps -ef
>>          UID     PID    PPID  TTY        STIME COMMAND
>>     rrobert1     610       1 ?        08:31:58 /usr/bin/mintty
>>     rrobert1     471       1 ?        08:31:46 /usr/bin/gpg-agent
>>     rrobert1     772     605 ?        08:32:24 /usr/bin/XWin
>>     rrobert1    1205     611 pty0     08:39:31 /usr/bin/ps
>>     rrobert1     403       1 cons0    08:31:42 /usr/bin/sh
>>     rrobert1     442       1 ?        08:31:44 /usr/bin/ssh-agent
>>     rrobert1     611     610 pty0     08:31:58 /usr/bin/bash
>>     rrobert1     604     403 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/xinit
>>     rrobert1    1200     605 ?        08:39:16 /usr/bin/XWin
>>     rrobert1     605     604 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/XWin
>>     rrobert1     609     604 ?        08:31:50 /usr/bin/sh
>>
>> Any suggestions on where to poke to diagnose this? My home Windows 10 machine has no problem at 
>> all. Oh, and cygcheck report version 3.1.4. Yes, that’s a little old, but we are stuck there until 
>> we can work out an issue with our build environment and the change for 3.1.5+ in how symlinks are 
>> handled.
>>
> So, no suggestions :-(
> 
> I'm looking for anything at all that I could put into my .XWinrc that might produce some diagnostic 
> output short of running XWin under a debugger. I'm completely guessing that it's a permission thing.
> 
> As I mentioned, I *can* launch X applications from a Cygwin mintty shell console after setting 
> DISPLAY, including being able to launch things like Emacs, so whatever is stopping these from 
> displaying, it's only affecting things launched from my .XWinrc.

A wondering:

- How are the programs mentioned in the .XWinrrc file?

- Is /usr/bin on the PATH when XWin is started?

I recall having issues around the PATH at some point ...

Regards - Eliot Moss

Re: Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

[Roland Roberts]

On 8/19/2021 2:41 PM, Eliot Moss wrote:
> On 8/18/2021 7:19 PM, Roland Roberts wrote:
>> On 8/10/2021 8:58 AM, Roland Roberts wrote:
>>> I have a new, company-supplied Windows 10 laptop, using Cygwin to do 
>>> development. I’m having a problem getting XWin to launch apps. XWin 
>>> appears to be mostly working normally, meaning if I launch a Cygwin 
>>> mintty instance, I can manually set DISPLAY=:0.0 and start up X 
>>> application from the shell prompt. But trying to launch from my 
>>> .XWinrc, the application never displays and I can’t find a useful 
>>> error log to track down the issue. I’m pretty sure it’s some 
>>> permission someplace my account doesn’t have (and I can probably get 
>>> IT to change that if I can just identify what it is).
>>>
>>> [...]
>>>     [  1490.390] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 772
>>>     [  1902.312] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 1200
>>>
>>> You can see the last two things that were launched. And here’s the 
>>> process list
>>>
>>>   [...processes show XWin starting, never spawns child mintty...]
>>>
>>> Any suggestions on where to poke to diagnose this? My home Windows 
>>> 10 machine has no problem at all. Oh, and cygcheck report version 
>>> 3.1.4. Yes, that’s a little old, but we are stuck there until we can 
>>> work out an issue with our build environment and the change for 
>>> 3.1.5+ in how symlinks are handled.
>>>
>> So, no suggestions :-(
>>
>> I'm looking for anything at all that I could put into my .XWinrc that 
>> might produce some diagnostic output short of running XWin under a 
>> debugger. I'm completely guessing that it's a permission thing.
>>
>> As I mentioned, I *can* launch X applications from a Cygwin mintty 
>> shell console after setting DISPLAY, including being able to launch 
>> things like Emacs, so whatever is stopping these from displaying, 
>> it's only affecting things launched from my .XWinrc.
>
> A wondering:
>
> - How are the programs mentioned in the .XWinrrc file?


I've tried both with "mintty" and with "/bin/mintty". Makes no visible 
difference. And yes, that path is correct. /bin/emacs -> 
/etc/alternatives/emacs -> /usr/bin/emacs-X11


> - Is /usr/bin on the PATH when XWin is started?

Yes.

> I recall having issues around the PATH at some point ...

I almost certainly did, too, which is why my launch shortcut looks like this

C:\cygwin64\bin\run.exe --quote /usr/bin/bash.exe -l -c "cd; exec 
/usr/bin/startxwin"

That gives me a login shell which means my .bashrc gets executed. That's 
a bit heavy and has it's own potential pitfalls. But... I have moved 
aside my .bashrc and it makes no difference.

In fact, I cna run startxwin from a mintty/bash shell and it works 
flawlessly. The above Windows 10 launch shortcut is what I'm using on 
both my work machine (where nothing will launch) and my home machine 
(where it works just fine)

My problem sounds a lot like the Cygwin/X FAQ 
https://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/cygwin-x-faq.html#q-startxwin-no-windows

Except that starting it from a mintty/bash windows works so that sheds 
no light on the failure :-(

roland


-- 
Roland Roberts, PhD
Brooklyn, NY USA
https://astrofoto.org

Re: Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

[Jon Turney]

On 10/08/2021 13:58, Roland Roberts wrote:
> I have a new, company-supplied Windows 10 laptop, using Cygwin to do 
> development. I’m having a problem getting XWin to launch apps. XWin 
> appears to be mostly working normally, meaning if I launch a Cygwin 
> mintty instance, I can manually set DISPLAY=:0.0 and start up X 
> application from the shell prompt. But trying to launch from my .XWinrc, 
> the application never displays and I can’t find a useful error log to 
> track down the issue. I’m pretty sure it’s some permission someplace my 
> account doesn’t have (and I can probably get IT to change that if I can 
> just identify what it is).

I'm not sure what the evidence for this hypothesis is?

>      [  1490.390] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 772
>      [  1902.312] executing '/bin/mintty', pid 1200
> 
> You can see the last two things that were launched. And here’s the 
> process list
> 
>      29267 rrobert1> ps -ef
>           UID     PID    PPID  TTY        STIME COMMAND
>      rrobert1     610       1 ?        08:31:58 /usr/bin/mintty
>      rrobert1     471       1 ?        08:31:46 /usr/bin/gpg-agent
>      rrobert1     772     605 ?        08:32:24 /usr/bin/XWin
>      rrobert1    1205     611 pty0     08:39:31 /usr/bin/ps
>      rrobert1     403       1 cons0    08:31:42 /usr/bin/sh
>      rrobert1     442       1 ?        08:31:44 /usr/bin/ssh-agent
>      rrobert1     611     610 pty0     08:31:58 /usr/bin/bash
>      rrobert1     604     403 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/xinit
>      rrobert1    1200     605 ?        08:39:16 /usr/bin/XWin
>      rrobert1     605     604 cons0    08:31:49 /usr/bin/XWin
>      rrobert1     609     604 ?        08:31:50 /usr/bin/sh
> 
> where you can see those processes are launch, but they show as 
> additional instances of XWin and mintty was never started. My .XWinrc 
> contain this
> 
>      menu root {
>              "Cygwin Terminal" exec  "/bin/mintty"
>                  "Emacs"           exec     "/bin/emacs"
>              // […]
>      }

The process being created, but not changing command is usually 
symptomatic of problems with cygwin's fork emulation (i.e. the child 
process gets stuck during the complex synchronization it does with the 
parent, before exec gets called)

> Any suggestions on where to poke to diagnose this? My home Windows 10 
> machine has no problem at all. Oh, and cygcheck report version 3.1.4. 
> Yes, that’s a little old, but we are stuck there until we can work out 
> an issue with our build environment and the change for 3.1.5+ in how 
> symlinks are handled.

There are some suggestions about dealing with fork problems in the FAQ, 
but sometimes nothing works and we don't know why.

Re: Cygwin/X on Windows 10 won't launch apps from .XWinrc menus

[Roland Roberts]

On 8/21/2021 10:49 AM, Jon Turney wrote:
> On 10/08/2021 13:58, Roland Roberts wrote:
>> I have a new, company-supplied Windows 10 laptop, using Cygwin to do 
>> development. I’m having a problem getting XWin to launch apps. XWin 
>> appears to be mostly working normally, meaning if I launch a Cygwin 
>> mintty instance, I can manually set DISPLAY=:0.0 and start up X 
>> application from the shell prompt. But trying to launch from my 
>> .XWinrc, the application never displays and I can’t find a useful 
>> error log to track down the issue. I’m pretty sure it’s some 
>> permission someplace my account doesn’t have (and I can probably get 
>> IT to change that if I can just identify what it is).
>
> I'm not sure what the evidence for this hypothesis is?

You're right, it was a complete guess since that's been where most of my 
problems have been with the new machine.


> [...]
> The process being created, but not changing command is usually 
> symptomatic of problems with cygwin's fork emulation (i.e. the child 
> process gets stuck during the complex synchronization it does with the 
> parent, before exec gets called)
>
>> Any suggestions on where to poke to diagnose this? My home Windows 10 
>> machine has no problem at all. Oh, and cygcheck report version 3.1.4. 
>> Yes, that’s a little old, but we are stuck there until we can work 
>> out an issue with our build environment and the change for 3.1.5+ in 
>> how symlinks are handled.
>
> There are some suggestions about dealing with fork problems in the 
> FAQ, but sometimes nothing works and we don't know why.

Thanks, I'll look through those suggestions. I'm still trying to figure 
out what the key difference in my two environments is that on Windows 10 
machine works fine for this and the other doesn't. And the one where it 
doesn't, it only doesn't work when launched from the XWinrc menu, it 
works fine when launched from mintty.

roland


-- 
Roland Roberts, PhD
Brooklyn, NY USA
https://astrofoto.org