How to turn your box into a Xvnc Terminal Server

borchi · n00b Joined: 05 Dec 2002 Posts: 44

Hi!

firstly, this is a great thread!

i'm now able to get to my home desktop from anywhere :-)

i know that i really should run vnc through ssh and even manage to make it work. from my work computer i do:

evers310 · Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2003 4:55 pm Post subject:

I cannot get XDMCP to Listen on port 177, I have tried everything in your tutorial as well as the one on tldp.org. Here is my output from nmap:

evers310 · Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2003 5:08 pm Post subject:

I forgot to mention that I do not have any firewalls running or installed. Anyone know what I am doing wrong?
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evers310 · Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2003 6:02 pm Post subject:

Ok, I've got it partly figured out. I had to start the vncserver, now I get the vnc ports open but I'm not able to connect from my Win2K box with tightvnc, the error I get is failed to connect to server. Here are my open ports.

Gentoo etc # nmap localhost

Starting nmap 3.45 ( http://www.insecure.org/nmap/ ) at 2003-10-08 09:54 EDT
Interesting ports on localhost (127.0.0.1):
(The 1653 ports scanned but not shown below are in state: closed)
PORT STATE SERVICE
22/tcp open ssh
5801/tcp open vnc-http-1
5901/tcp open vnc-1
6001/tcp open X11:1

Nmap run completed -- 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 1.886 seconds
G
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evers310 · Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2003 6:17 pm Post subject:

Ok, I switched from tightvnc to real vnc and I can connect now but I was getting twm as my WM. I changed the last line in ~/.vnc/xstartup to gdm & but I'm only getting the dreaded grey screen...

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evers310 · Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2003 7:38 pm Post subject:

Ok, I finally got it!! For some reason ~/.vnc/xstartup does not like gdm so I just made it /etc/X11/gdm/Sessions/Gnome and i goes directly to Gnome now. Dont know why just putting gdm doesnt work though...

Thanks for all the help!!
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evers310 · Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2003 7:51 pm Post subject:

Your welcome

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Eowyn · n00b Joined: 01 Jun 2002 Posts: 21

whos ~/.vnc directory is it looking in? after all ~/ meens the users home directory and xinetd starts vnc as nobody
does it alway look it roots?

Nylle · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2003 9:36 am Post subject:

This is great stuff. I just set up one of my unused machines as a gentoo Xvnc server, now some of my friends who are curious about linux can access it from the comfort of their windows machines and see what linux is about.

Btw, for me it works flawlessly with gdm.
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JonnieDago · n00b Joined: 25 Apr 2003 Posts: 11

Great walkthrough...

Got it up and running with the walkthrough. At first I was affected by the Grey Screen and X and couldnt figure out what was happening. Checked everything and restarted everything I could think of.

Finally started working after a reboot. Just a thought for others not getting past the grey screen.

Question : Does anyone know how to remove the identifying information from the kdm logon screen. Basically I dont want it to display the usernames in that left side pane. I would also prefer that it didnt tell you the system name at the prompt.

Athrawn17 · n00b Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 42 Location: Des Moines IA

Check out the kdm manual

http://docs.kde.org/en/3.1/kdebase/kdm/

There is a section that shows how to configure a the list of users that it will display. Just remove those users from the config file and it won't display them.

I'm not at my gentoo box atm, but I think that if you look at the GreetString, you should see why it is displaying the hostname. Change that string and you should be all set.
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LowFuel · n00b Joined: 18 Oct 2003 Posts: 7 Location: San Diego, CA

LowFuel · n00b Joined: 18 Oct 2003 Posts: 7 Location: San Diego, CA

In regards to my last post, it does indeed work.

So, now for my dumb question - I'd like to be able to connect through VNC to a persistent desktop. With this setup, everytime I connect I get a login prompt. Is there a way to disconnect, and then reconnect and have things be right where I left them? Maybe I mis-understood the jist of this tutorial.

ferris5 · n00b Joined: 02 Sep 2003 Posts: 32

maybe a stupid question but here it is:

what should i put in the windowsxp tightvnc viewer to get connected to the linux vnc server?

EagleClaw · n00b Joined: 24 Oct 2003 Posts: 1

Guys;

I am new to Linux, so some things that are easy, for me it's not.

I tried to follow the steps on this tutorial, but I didn't get anything. Even when I tried using vncviewer, terminal gave me an library error. Could not locate some libraries. I tried to connect usind a Mac OS, but it didn't find the server. Can PLEASE, somebody help me????

I am using a fresh Red Hat 9.0 install, installed with the server options.

Thanks.

digitalamish · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2003 Posts: 43

HomerSimpson · l33t Joined: 25 Jan 2003 Posts: 869 Location: Ohio, USA

lines Thanks for the instructions. They worked great!

rojaro Thanks for the ipv6 comment. That was my problem too and I would have never figured it out on my own. Thanks!
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lines · n00b Joined: 29 Jul 2003 Posts: 20

This thread is still active

EagleClaw:

This tutorial is for gentoo. I'm sorry.

You should get the needed rpm packages and use redhat tools like service. But I don't think this is the place for RedHat questions.

You can pm me if you like.

cmay4 · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 18 May 2002 Posts: 109

I also get the gray screen (using XDM and fluxbox). I may be able to look into kdm or gdm, but I'd like to keep it light. Did anyone get straight XDM to work? Any idea how I can track down the problem?

Chuck

cmay4 · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 18 May 2002 Posts: 109

Looked into this furthur and still can't get xdm to work. I'm really trying not to install kdm. xdm is running, but I don't see port 177 in use. Any have any ideas?

Chuck

revoohc · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 12 Oct 2002 Posts: 128

Ok, let start by saying thanks for this tutorial.

However, I am having a problem. When I connect to my server via vnc, I get my kdm login screen. When I put my userid and password into kdm and click login, the vnc session terminates. Any idea what is going on? I have looked for some logs, but have not found anything yet.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Chris

revoohc · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 12 Oct 2002 Posts: 128

Ok, I got it to work. I was trying to have it log me in via my xsession file. Apperently, this was causing the problem since choosing kde-3.1.4 worked.

Here is my .xsession file on the server:
/usr/bin/xscreensaver &
#/usr/kde/3.1/bin/startkde
/usr/bin/gkrellm2 -s localhost &
/usr/bin/gnome-session

Any reason why this should cause the abend?

Thanks

geoffwa · n00b Joined: 05 Nov 2003 Posts: 6 Location: AU

@people with the KDE problem

Just append :1 to the front of the Xvnc args line to get Xvnc to start from display 1 rather than display 0.

This happens when Xvnc tries to open display 0 which is 'supposed' to the be the console display and a whole heap of crap in Xsetup_0 gets executed which seems to be dependent on KDE being installed (aiee)

[edit]

Appending :1 just mangled the IP address for some weird reason, instead I just deleted console = display 0 line in Xservers to allow Xvnc to use all the available consoles.

volrathxp · n00b Joined: 24 Apr 2003 Posts: 33

Just wanted to say thanks, this is a killer article. I've been passing this info around to some of my buddies and they really enjoy it.

Worked like a charm, very little problems at all and I now have the same remote access from home to my gentoo machine here at work as I did with my windows machine.

Great job!!!

-Anders · n00b Joined: 02 Sep 2003 Posts: 50

I can't believ how simple this was

I have been using gentoo for less than a week, and this was so straight forward for me, i got it working without any problems at all.

Thanks for a killer guide