Loss of ptys

[jsmith at alum.mit.edu]

On 3/18/08, Ben Scott <dragonhawk at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 18, 2008 at 4:36 AM, jsmith at alum.mit.edu
> <jsmith at alum.mit.edu> wrote:
> > Note that it was working until yesterday.
>
>  So, what happened yesterday?  :)  Any reboots, software
> install/updates, configuration changes, etc.?

I shut down and restarted the system (actually shut down for the day -
I normally turn off - let's see them script kiddies get into a dead
system ;).  I had also installed xdmx & xdmx-tools to start spreading
my window across both of my systems  - but removing that doesn't solve
the problem, so I don't think that's the problem.   One config change
I had to make for xdmx was setting X to listen for tcp connections.
>
> >  When I attempt to open a new terminal from within X (regardless of
> >  window manager) I get a message about being unable to open a pty.
>
>  Can you try a different terminal emulator?  For example, if you're
> using GNOME Terminal or Konsole, try xterm (or vice versa).

Failure with Konsole, rxvt, xterm.  Failed under WindowMaker, KDE,
xfce4 for sessions.  Same problem.  Running the logs I see each window
manager also gives a failure to open /dev/null -most likely related,
but not certain how.  WIll run see if I can run strace on this stuff
as soon as possible.

My other system with Debian Testing, Kernel 2.6.23, doesn't show the
problem.  WIll see if I can log in from there via ssh and strace.



>
> -- Ben

jeff