answering my own question ...

on one machine I had (god knows why) some of the variables from the
init.d/firebird script exported namely :
ISC_USER=sysdba
ISC_PASSWORD was not exported
and there was, also a variable '_=ISC_USER' visible when doing a SET
command.

removing those variables made all of the above work happily

Hope this can help someone,
and thanks to Bert for his help
Didier
--- In ib-support@yahoogroups.com, "Didier Gasser-Morlay
<Didiergm@n...>" <Didiergm@n...> wrote:

> It works!
>
> but I am VERY puzzled
>
> home: fb 1.00 Linux RH 7, fb running as root .... gbak without
> username & password is just fine logged as root
>
> Hosting: home: fb 1.00 upgraded to 1.02 Linux RH 7, fb running as root
> .... gbak has got to have -user -password
>
> any clues anyone ?
> Didier
>
>
> >