Try running the rsh program from the command line. For example: "rsh servername cvs -v" should print CVS version information. If this doesn't work, you need to fix it before you can worry about CVS problems.

You don't need a command line rsh program to use this access method, but if you have an rsh program around, it may be useful as a debugging tool. Follow the directions given for :ext:.

One good debugging tool is to "telnet servername 2401". After connecting, send any text (for example "foo" followed by return). If CVS is working correctly, it will respond with

cvs [pserver aborted]: bad auth protocol start: foo

If this fails to work, then make sure inetd is working right. Change the invocation in inetd.conf to run the echo program instead of cvs. For example:

2401  stream  tcp  nowait  root /bin/echo echo hello

After making that change and instructing inetd to re-read its configuration file, "telnet servername 2401" should show you the text hello and then the server should close the connection. If this doesn't work, you need to fix it before you can worry about CVS problems.

On AIX systems, the system will often have its own program trying to use port 2401. This is AIX's problem in the sense that port 2401 is registered for use with CVS. I hear that there is an AIX patch available to address this problem.