I agree. For some reason it had not been setup during the installation process, in fact /etc/hosts was completely empty,
  but this was the only thing that didn't work, and as a result I had not spotted it before.

  Thought it was worth posting in case it caught someone else out.

Michael Mansour wrote:
> Hi Alex,
> 
>> Hi,
>>
>>   Thanks for that. I  had all that set already, it isn't the cause 
>> of the problem. I think the point is that the route back for the 
>> forwarded X11 is via a port called localhost:6011, but if the 
>> machine can not work out what localhost is then it fails. You need 
>> either one of
>>
>> 127.0.0.1       localhost.localdomain   localhost
>> or
>> ::1 localhost
>>
>> in /etc/hosts
> 
> I personally don't see why anyone would ever remove 127.0.0.1 from their 
> hosts file. This is a required entry in any UNIX environment (tru64, hp-ux, 
> solaris, aix, linux) and has been that way for 30 years.
> 
> I guess this is why others haven't experienced the "bug" you've reported, as 
> most people don't touch that entry - unless of cours they're asking for 
> trouble :) 
> 
> Michael.


-- 
  Alex Finch, Research Fellow, Physics Department, Lancaster University.
+44 (0) 1524 593618   http://www.lancs.ac.uk/depts/physics/staff/ajf.htm