Re: X11 forwarding with headless Ubuntu host with podman

On Mon, May 25, 2026 at 03:47:14PM +0930, Christian Gelinek wrote:
> Dear group,
> 
> 1. My workstation "gar" is running Debian 12 with XFCE.
> 
> 2. I have another PC "marlin" running Ubuntu 24.04 LTS with XFCE.
> 
> 3. I recently added a PC "octopus" running Ubuntu 26.04 LTS Server, without
> desktop environment.
> 
> 4. Both "marlin" and "octopus" have a user "localadmin", on "gar" my
> username is "cgelinek".
> 
> 5. I'd like to `ssh -Y localadmin@octopus` from "gar" and then start a
> podman container with `xeyes` in it and be able to see it on my screen on
> "gar".

(
  Here  a `ssh -X  server` user.
  According `man ssh` are  `ssh -X`  and `ssh -Y` simular.
)
 

Acknowledge on 'podman container with `xeyes` in it'



> 6. I can do that with "marlin" (i.e. `ssh -Y localadmin@marlin`), but not
> with "octopus".
> 
> Some debugging suggests that when I `ssh -Y localadmin@octopus`, on octopus
> 
>  * $DISPLAY is localhost:10.0,
>  * /home/localadmin/.Xauthority has the date of connection but
>  * $XAUTHORITY is empty.
>  * Unsurprisingly, when I try to run `xeyes` from within a container (with
> DISPLAY and XAUTHORITY being forwarded), it stops with `Error: Can't open
> display: localhost:10.0`.
> 
> I have checked that xauth is installed on octopus and have run out of ideas
> what to try next, any ideas?


Ideas:

* Compare working and non-working setup further
* Tell more about the actual use case.
   

 
> Thanks for your time,
> Christian
> 


Groeten
Geert Stappers