Re: pkg/38226: startx locks waiting for /dev/random while generating an Xauth cookie

[Tobias Nygren <tnn%NetBSD.org@localhost>]

The following reply was made to PR pkg/38226; it has been noted by GNATS.

From: Tobias Nygren <tnn%NetBSD.org@localhost>
To: gnats-bugs%NetBSD.org@localhost
Cc: sd4dfg2%hotmail.com@localhost
Subject: Re: pkg/38226: startx locks waiting for /dev/random while
 generating an Xauth cookie
Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:13:09 +0100

 On Wed, 12 Mar 2008 09:55:00 +0000 (UTC)
 sd4dfg2%hotmail.com@localhost wrote:
 
 > >Number:         38226
 > >Category:       pkg
 > >Synopsis:       startx locks waiting for /dev/random while generating an 
 > >Xauth cookie
 > >Confidential:   no
 > >Severity:       serious
 > >Priority:       medium
 > >Responsible:    pkg-manager
 > >State:          open
 > >Class:          sw-bug
 > >Submitter-Id:   net
 > >Arrival-Date:   Wed Mar 12 09:55:00 +0000 2008
 > >Originator:     Rob Quinn
 > >Release:        Current with pkgsrc modular X.org xinit
 > >Organization:
 > >Environment:
 > >Description:
 > startx often locks up on me and I have to control-C and try again.  
 > Control-T says I'm waiting on hexdump, but I think it's actually because 
 > /dev/random is "empty".
 > 
 > %grep hexdump `which startx`
 > mcookie=`dd if=/dev/random bs=16 count=1 2>/dev/null | hexdump -e \\"%08x\\"`
 > 
 > >How-To-Repeat:
 > 
 > >Fix:
 > Switch to /dev/urandom?  Are there other places (like xdm?) that might lock 
 > up the same way?
 > 
 
 I have this line in my x11/xinit/Makefile:
 
 CONFIGURE_ENV+=                ac_cv_path_MCOOKIE='dd if=/dev/urandom bs=16 
count=1 2>/dev/null | hexdump -e \\\"%08x\\\"'
 
 I don't know if that's appropriate or not.
 (but OpenBSD has urandom by default for cookie generation.)