Sometimes it is necessary to run an X-windows application on a server
other than the one you are currently logged into. Most commonly, a software
application is only licensed to run on one or a few servers. This problem
can easily be solved by logging into the licensed server and setting the
X11 display to your terminal or workstation.
Say for example that you are logged into brassica.cc, but want to run SAS. To find out which servers can run sas, you run the machines command, as shown below:
{brassica:/home/psgendb/public_html}machines -p sas
The package sas can be found on the following systems:
antares located in A C N
blish located in 524 Eng
bova located in 115A Machray
castor located in A C N
gibson located in 524 Eng
herbert located in 524 Eng
keyes located in 524 Eng
pollux located in A C N
sas can be started by typing: sas
Next, log into any of the servers listed above, using telnet. It is probably
best to open a new command tool window to do this in. An example of logging
in with telnet is shown below:
{brassica:/home/plants/frist}telnet castor
Trying 130.179.16.20...
Connected to castor.cc.umanitoba.ca.
Escape character is '^]'.
UNIX(r) System V Release 4.0 (castor) (pts/18)
login: frist
Password:
Last login: Mon Feb 24 15:25:24 from brassica.cc.uman
Sun Microsystems Inc. SunOS 5.5.1 Generic November 1995
castor [Alpha Geminorum] brightest star in the constellation Gemini
For pointers to useful information, type: help
To change your password, type: passwd
You have mail.
usage: tset [-IQrSs] [-] [-e ch] [-i ch] [-k ch] [-m mapping] [terminal]
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
B I R C H ANNOUNCEMENTS
19 Jul 96 GenBank 95.0 is now online.
BIRCH WWW site: http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~psgendb
For a current list of PROGRAMS see: $doc/MASTER.doc
For a list of recent CHANGES, updates etc. see: $doc/WHATSNEW.doc
NEWSGROUP: man.molbio - discussions of BIRCH, general mol. bio. in Manitoba
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
{castor:/home/plants/frist}
Next, set the environment variable DISPLAY to the name of your terminal
or workstation. This variable tells any X11 command launched from this
shell to display back to your device.
{castor:/home/plants/frist}setenv DISPLAY ncd1.plants.umanitoba.ca:0.0
This command will cause all subsequent X11 programs launched in this shell
to display on the screen of the X terminal called ncd1. Note that DISPLAY
must be in all uppercase.
Finally, launch sas:
{castor:/home/plants/frist}sas &
Note the ampersand (&) after the command. Putting an ampersand after
any Unix command causes it to run in the background. This does two things.
First, it frees up the command window to let you do other things while
the application is running. Secondly, if you wanted to, you could log out,
and the application would still be running.
If you're running VNC,
the display is hostname:vnc_screen.0. For example, if you were logged into
brassica.cc.umanitoba.ca, and your VNC screen was 4, the setenv command
should be:
setenv DISPLAY brassica:4.0