If you run this command: xmessage "this is a test" You don't see the message "this is a test". You instead get an empty widget where the text is supposed to be. The "Okay" button comes out fine however. This does not appear to be an X resource problem with fg/bg colors. Trying various combinations of xmessage on RH 6.2 and RH 7 with X servers on RH 6.2 and RH 7 I narrowed the problem to xmessage on RH 7 and not a problem with the X server or its resource settings.
Try enlarging the window. It seems that xmessage doesn't draw or clips the message if the window is too small, and it sets the default size to something which is too small.
Yup - sizing is the problem. If I increase the vertical size then the text appears. In the man page it says "Unless a size is specified, xmessage sizes itself to fit the message, up to a maximum size." So something broke in this auto-sizing between RH 6.2 and RH 7. I tried it with a couple of different window managers just to make sure that the WM wasn't overriding the application's requested size. The choice of WM had no effect. Anyway now I have my workaround and my original priority setting of "low" stands!
This appears to be a bug in Xaw. A problem has come up in the Xaw widget set form resizing which looks suspiciously relevant.
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 18982 ***
Created attachment 13409 [details] Screenshot of xmessage working.
The above screenshot is from XFree86 4.0.3 in rawhide. She be workin.