[FreeNX-kNX] nx-libs RPM on linux messes up normal X

[Alex Aminoff]

Hi folks. I am wading into the world of library dependencies, dynamic 
linking, and ldconfig.

Summary: We installed freenx-server on our RHEL clone (Scientific Linux 
6.2) and eventually this caused some regular X software to break.

The nx-libs rpm is 3.5.0.22-1.el6 from epel. It includes a bunch of 
libraries in /usr/lib64/nx/, including special (?) versions of libX11.so 
and libXext.so. The rpm also installs a file 
/etc/ld.so.conf.d/nx-libs-x86_64.conf , which tells ldconfig to add 
/usr/lib64/nx to the path in which to look for libraries. In fact after 
installing you can also see this with
strings /etc/ld.so.cache | grep nx .

The trouble with this is that NX's versions of these libraries are also 
then used by normal X programs, so I see

[aminoff at perlw2 /etc]$ ldd /usr/bin/gedit | grep X11
  libX11.so.6 => /usr/lib64/nx/libX11.so.6 (0x00007fc84f3f4000)

And then gedit will not run with an error message about _XGetRequest symbol.


My question is: Does NX require regular X programs to be linked against 
NX's special libs? Or are those libs only necessary for the nxserver itself?

If the former, is it possible to set things up so that LD_LIBRARY_PATH 
is set when you are logged in over NX and running stuff, but not have 
ld.so.conf.d/nx-libs... pollute normal X operations?

Our goal is to enable freenx (for remote WAN users) without impacting 
our existing X users, who connect over the LAN using X over ssh.

Any pointers appreciated.

  - Alex Aminoff
    NBER