Configuring the Java Desktop System to Use One Instance of the GConf Daemon

By default, the Java Desktop System creates multiple instances of the GConf daemon when users log in to more than one system. You can configure the Java Desktop System to use only one instance of the GConf daemon when a user logs in to more than one system. The user must have an Network File System (NFS) home directory.

When a user uses one instance of the GConf daemon on more than one system, and the user changes the value of a preference, the change is applied to all of the sessions to which the user is logged in. For example, if the user selects to show only icons in toolbars in the Menus & Toolbars preference tool in one session, the toolbars on all open applications are updated instantly in all sessions to which the user is logged in.

Users can only use a single instance of the GConf daemon for multiple sessions if all of the sessions can access the home directory of the user.

The Java Desktop System uses Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA). CORBA enables application objects to communicate with one another regardless of what programming language the applications are written in, and regardless of what operating system the applications are running on.

In CORBA, an Object Request Broker (ORB) communicates between servers and clients. One of the ORBs in the Java Desktop System is ORBit2. GConf uses the TCP protocol in ORBit2 to communicate between the GConf daemon and the sessions to which the user is logged in.

To configure a system to use one instance of the GConf daemon for each user, perform the following steps:

1. For all the systems that the users log in to, ensure that the file /etc/orbitrc contains the following line:

   ORBIIOPIPv4=1

2. Set the value of the GCONF_GLOBAL_LOCKS environment variable to 1. This ensures that GConf creates locks in the home directory of the user, and not in a directory on the local system.

3. Restart the GConf daemon.

To configure the system to use multiple instances of the GConf daemon for each user, unset the value of the GCONF_GLOBAL_LOCKS environment variable. Then restart the GConf daemon.

The TCP protocol in ORBit2 is not completely secure because the communications between servers and clients are not encrypted.