On a system with no X installed, logging in via ssh with X forwarding enabled displays: sh: /usr/X11R6/bin/xauth: No such file or directory Patch attached, salt to taste.
Created attachment 6682 [details] check that xauth is there before running it
The situation should not be silently ignored. A better warning message would be in order though.
This problem seems to still be in 7.1 release. At times the circuit is dropped after seeing the message. I have not been able to identify the exact sequence needed to characterize the conditions in which a drop happens or just the message but the connect succeeds. The system that I connect to has none of the XFree86 rpms installed but I see that DISPLAY=host.domain:11.0. that doesn't seem right. I can also unset DISPLAY on the client side and the message no longer appears. The client systems that I have tested with are 7.0 with 2.2.17-14 and 2.2.16-22. the ssh packages are 2.5.2p2. Due to the erratic nature of the dropped connections, I would elevate the priority and mark the severity. Dave Thiede
openssh-2.9p1-2 in Rawhide disables xauth in a more graceful manner if the xauth binary cannot be found.