Error: Can't open display: :0

[bjt-user]

Windows Version

10.0.22631.4317

WSL Version

2.3.25.0

Are you using WSL 1 or WSL 2?

• WSL 2
• WSL 1

Kernel Version

5.15.153.1-microsoft-standard-WSL2

Distro Version

Arch Linux

Other Software

No response

Repro Steps

Try to start a graphical X-program.

Like

dbeaver

or

xeyes

$ xeyes
Error: Can't open display: :0
$ echo $DISPLAY
:0

This used to work.
I recently upgraded to a later WSL version.
This might be the cause of the bug.

Expected Behavior

WSL should start a graphical window.

Actual Behavior

No window is started.

Diagnostic Logs

weston.log

[bjt-user]

weston.log
This is the log file.

[github-actions]

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Invoke-WebRequest -UseBasicParsing "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/microsoft/WSL/master/diagnostics/collect-wsl-logs.ps1" -OutFile collect-wsl-logs.ps1
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.\collect-wsl-logs.ps1

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View similar issues

Please view the issues below to see if they solve your problem, and if the issue describes your problem please consider closing this one and thumbs upping the other issue to help us prioritize it!

Open similar issues:

• Cannot open display :0. Installed wsl on W11 and try to start grafical application kstars but say Cannot open display :0 (#12184), similarity score: 0.76

Closed similar issues:

• WSL 2 Error: Can't open display: localhost:0.0 (#6430), similarity score: 0.77
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• Error: Can't open display: :0 on Win11 22000 (#9078), similarity score: 0.76
• WSL2 can't open display (#6181), similarity score: 0.76

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[bjt-user]

Log file was attached to this issue.

[sirredbeard]

• Have you tried wsl.exe --shutdown (which will reset WSLg as well) and trying again?
• Can you reproduce this in another distro you have installed?

[bjt-user]

Thank you @sirredbeard for the answer.

For some reason, executing these commands will make GUI applications work again:

sudo umount /tmp/.X11-unix
sudo rm -rf /tmp/.X11-unix
sudo ln -s /mnt/wslg/.X11-unix /tmp/.X11-unix

Since I am using a wsl distro that I exported from a docker container - is this link something new that you have to set in order for wslg to work? (probably baked into the default distros that you can use?)

I could not reproduce it in another distro.
In my debian wsl container GUI applications still work.

[sirredbeard]

That is odd, I haven't experienced that with distros exported from existing Docker or Podman containers. Which one is it, if you don't me asking? Does it have X and related packages already pre-installed?