UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

I'm ssh'ing into a remote machine, and I'm trying to set up a cron job on it. The cron job requires a graphical program (Open Office), but the ssh host is a virtual host that isn't letting me open Open Office. I can open it via the terminal in a ssh session with X11 forwarding, but I get this error when the cron job tries to run:

X-Cron-Env: <SHELL=/bin/sh>
X-Cron-Env: <HOME=/root>
X-Cron-Env: <PATH=/usr/bin:/bin>
X-Cron-Env: <LOGNAME=root>

/usr/lib/openoffice/program/soffice.bin X11 error: Can't open display: localhost
:10.0
Set DISPLAY environment variable, use -display option
or check permissions of your X-Server
(See "man X" resp. "man xhost" for details)

The DISPLAY environment variable is set to localhost:10.0 during the cron job, so that isn't the problem.

It is a really bad idea for a cronjob to require access to an Xterminal. An Xprinter maybe but not a graphical terminal.

What are you trying to achieve?

I need to run an open office script to get open office to convert some documents into PDFs for me. I'm running "ooffice -invisible", but this still tells me it needs X11 (I can't do it in a ssh session that doesn't have X11 forwarding).

The you would need to set up an Xprt server, this is like an X server for a video terminal, except it's output goes to a printer.

I don't need to print. The script simple takes documents from one location and saves them as PDFs into another location.

You don't need to show anything on the screen either, but openoffice still wants to connect to an X server.

that's correct