I installed xfig on a Sun Ultra-60 server tonight. This was not without
difficulty; some files are not where I (nor the computer!) expected
them to be. I finally got the source code to compile, but had the
following error when I tried to run it:

myHomeMac:~> ssh -X -l myaccount myserver.address.edu
myaccount@myserver.address.edu's password: 
Last login: Sat Sep 24 01:14:46 2005 from my-adsl-connexion
Sun Microsystems Inc.   SunOS 5.9       Generic May 2002
bash-2.05$ echo $DISPLAY
myserver:10.0
bash-2.05$ xfig
X Error of failed request:  BadAccess (attempt to access private resource denied
)
  Major opcode of failed request:  102 (X_ChangeKeyboardControl)
  Serial number of failed request:  65
  Current serial number in output stream:  72
bash-2.05$


I have not seen this error before. Searching on the web, I found that I
was not the first person to have an error like this. 

I assumed that the problem was due to a faulty compilation, since I've been
struggling with getting the code compiled all night. I re-compiled, but this
did not help. I also installed xv from the source code tonight, and was able
to run it remotely without a problem. Both programs use X windows, and
running these from home means that I had to set up the graphics. That is,
I had to tell my computer at home to accept graphic windows from my remote
server (with the command "xhost +myserver.address.edu"). Then I had to
specify where to open the window while logging into the sever
("ssh -X -l myaccount myserver.address.edu"). Next, I checked it by
"echo $DISPLAY" to make sure it was correct. This is nicer than the "old"
days when you had to set the DISPLAY variable yourself.
The xv program worked (running on the sever), and opened a window on
my home computer. The xfig program tried to run, then gave the error above.
A faulty compile could produce such behavior...but actually, that's not
the problem!

Finally, I found the answer on the internet (under a FAQ for Cygwin/X at 
http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/cygwin-x-faq.html#q-ssh-no-x11forwarding )

The problem has to do with the X11 forwarding. See the above link for 
more info, but essentially the "-X" option for ssh corresponds to untrusted
forwarding. Using "-Y" instead corresponds to trusted forwarding.

bash-2.05$ exit
logout
Connection to myserver.address.edu closed.
myHomeMac:~> ssh -Y -l myaccount myserver.address.edu
myaccount@myserver.address.edu's password: 
Last login: Sat Sep 24 03:01:03 2005 from my-adsl-connexion
Sun Microsystems Inc.   SunOS 5.9       Generic May 2002
bash-2.05$ echo $DISPLAY
myserver:10.0
bash-2.05$ xfig

...and it worked just fine.

(-Michael Weeks, September 24, 2005)