Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-21 Thread Terry Coles
On Monday 20 Apr 2015 21:42:25 Peter Merchant wrote:
 On 18/04/15 16:58, Terry Coles wrote:
  Hi,
  
  I retired on Friday :-)
 
 How long before we see you at Stewarts Broomhill between 9 and 10
 enjoying the 2for1 coffee and reading the papers?

I don't like coffee much.

 There's more to life than linux (I think).

Are you sure?

-- 

Terry Coles



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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-21 Thread Peter Merchant

On 21/04/15 07:21, Terry Coles wrote:

On Monday 20 Apr 2015 21:42:25 Peter Merchant wrote:

On 18/04/15 16:58, Terry Coles wrote:

Hi,

I retired on Friday :-)

How long before we see you at Stewarts Broomhill between 9 and 10
enjoying the 2for1 coffee and reading the papers?

I don't like coffee much.


There's more to life than linux (I think).

Are you sure?


Absolutely. It's a beautiful day for a cycle ride.
P.

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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-20 Thread John Carlyle-Clarke
Using the RDP server on Linux doesn't really gain you much over VNC (other
than making it easier for Windows clients to connect). The best thing about
RDP on Windows is that it hooks the graphics layer to send drawing
primitives and instructions instead of just updating rectangles of pixels,
which is very efficient. It has several levels of protocol though, and the
lowest is pretty much VNC (remote framebuffer). The smarter versions of the
protocol have never been implemented on Linux and so the RDP server just
wraps VNC and tells the client to fall back to the lowest protocol level.

I agree that remote X11 is very useful but I've always found that it works
best for simple (dare I say old fashioned?) X11 apps like xterm and worst
for graphically complex things like browsers. It's just about usable over a
good WAN connection for simple jobs but seems to be very sensitive to
latency, and the effect is multiplied for complex applications.

One tool that I've found to work very well is x2go. I'm not sure if it's
available for the Pi but I've used it quite a lot on desktop machines.
There's a Windows client which works well too.

http://wiki.x2go.org/doku.php

It's not faultless. Not all features seem to work perfectly, but it's
pretty good.

On 19 April 2015 at 10:54, Ralph Corderoy ra...@inputplus.co.uk wrote:

 Hi Terry,

  I fixed my problem by completely removing xrdp from the Pi (including
  a purge) and re-installing it.

 That seems to match http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1314336 and
 the bugs it links to.  Something about whether xrdp pulls in vnc4server,
 bad, or tightvncserver, good.

 There should also be /var/log/sesman.* or similar that would hopefully
 give more details than that dreary `error - problem connecting' in the
 GUI.

 WRT xrdp's and sesman's status, if you find a process ID then you can
 list what IPv4 interfaces and sockets they are listening on, e.g.
 perhaps it's only loopback.  Here's an example with part of Postfix,
 showing it listening for incoming SMTP connections only on the loopback
 interface.

 $ sudo lsof -a -p `pidof master` -i 4
 COMMAND  PID USER   FD   TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
 master  1304 root   12u  IPv4   8665  0t0  TCP
 localhost.localdomain:smtp (LISTEN)
 $

 Not the problem this time as a re-install wouldn't have helped.  The
 purge removed /etc configuration files;  perhaps there was something
 there amiss.

 Cheers, Ralph.

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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-20 Thread TimA

Hi John

On 20/04/15 13:14, John Carlyle-Clarke wrote:

Using the RDP server on Linux doesn't really gain you much over VNC (other
than making it easier for Windows clients to connect). The best thing about
RDP on Windows is that it hooks the graphics layer to send drawing
primitives and instructions instead of just updating rectangles of pixels,
which is very efficient. It has several levels of protocol though, and the
lowest is pretty much VNC (remote framebuffer). The smarter versions of the
protocol have never been implemented on Linux and so the RDP server just
wraps VNC and tells the client to fall back to the lowest protocol level.

That's very interesting. I'd noted that xrdp relied on VNC for the 
backend and that had pushed it back to must try this one day status. 
The only test I'd run in the past was RDP client to Windows XP, and your 
description explains the impressive speed.



I agree that remote X11 is very useful but I've always found that it works
best for simple (dare I say old fashioned?) X11 apps like xterm and worst
for graphically complex things like browsers. It's just about usable over a
good WAN connection for simple jobs but seems to be very sensitive to
latency, and the effect is multiplied for complex applications.

One tool that I've found to work very well is x2go. I'm not sure if it's
available for the Pi but I've used it quite a lot on desktop machines.
There's a Windows client which works well too.

http://wiki.x2go.org/doku.php

It's not faultless. Not all features seem to work perfectly, but it's
pretty good.



I see that uses NX - will definitely be giving it a try. But it looks 
like nxagent needs a major rewrite to stay compatible with modern desktops.



Cheers

Tim




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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-20 Thread John Carlyle-Clarke
That's possibly true. The machine I connect in to normally uses dwm, but
I've never got that working. I tend to install and use LXDE for remote
sessions. That seems to work fine.

On 20 April 2015 at 14:22, TimA t...@ls83.eclipse.co.uk wrote:

 Hi John

 On 20/04/15 13:14, John Carlyle-Clarke wrote:

 Using the RDP server on Linux doesn't really gain you much over VNC (other
 than making it easier for Windows clients to connect). The best thing
 about
 RDP on Windows is that it hooks the graphics layer to send drawing
 primitives and instructions instead of just updating rectangles of pixels,
 which is very efficient. It has several levels of protocol though, and the
 lowest is pretty much VNC (remote framebuffer). The smarter versions of
 the
 protocol have never been implemented on Linux and so the RDP server just
 wraps VNC and tells the client to fall back to the lowest protocol level.

  That's very interesting. I'd noted that xrdp relied on VNC for the
 backend and that had pushed it back to must try this one day status. The
 only test I'd run in the past was RDP client to Windows XP, and your
 description explains the impressive speed.

  I agree that remote X11 is very useful but I've always found that it works
 best for simple (dare I say old fashioned?) X11 apps like xterm and worst
 for graphically complex things like browsers. It's just about usable over
 a
 good WAN connection for simple jobs but seems to be very sensitive to
 latency, and the effect is multiplied for complex applications.

 One tool that I've found to work very well is x2go. I'm not sure if it's
 available for the Pi but I've used it quite a lot on desktop machines.
 There's a Windows client which works well too.

 http://wiki.x2go.org/doku.php

 It's not faultless. Not all features seem to work perfectly, but it's
 pretty good.


 I see that uses NX - will definitely be giving it a try. But it looks like
 nxagent needs a major rewrite to stay compatible with modern desktops.


 Cheers

 Tim





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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-20 Thread Terry Coles
On Monday 20 Apr 2015 13:14:47 John Carlyle-Clarke wrote:
 Using the RDP server on Linux doesn't really gain you much over VNC (other
 than making it easier for Windows clients to connect). The best thing about
 RDP on Windows is that it hooks the graphics layer to send drawing
 primitives and instructions instead of just updating rectangles of pixels,
 which is very efficient. It has several levels of protocol though, and the
 lowest is pretty much VNC (remote framebuffer). The smarter versions of the
 protocol have never been implemented on Linux and so the RDP server just
 wraps VNC and tells the client to fall back to the lowest protocol level.

That is interesting and explains why access to the Pi isn't as snappy as 
access to Windows boxes that are some distance from the user.  This may also 
explain why LXF only described SSH and VNC and never mentioned xrdp.

No matter; I'm satisfied that it works well enough to try things out and I can 
use SCP and plain ol' network browsing to exchange files if need be.

 I agree that remote X11 is very useful but I've always found that it works
 best for simple (dare I say old fashioned?) X11 apps like xterm and worst
 for graphically complex things like browsers. It's just about usable over a
 good WAN connection for simple jobs but seems to be very sensitive to
 latency, and the effect is multiplied for complex applications.
 
 One tool that I've found to work very well is x2go. I'm not sure if it's
 available for the Pi but I've used it quite a lot on desktop machines.
 There's a Windows client which works well too.

Strangely enough, only the client and the Mozilla plugin appear to be in the 
repository.

I might have a look at this in more detail sometime and see if anyone has had 
any success porting it to the Pi.

-- 

Terry Coles



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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-20 Thread Ralph Corderoy
Hi Terry,

 No matter; I'm satisfied that it works well enough to try things out
 and I can use SCP and plain ol' network browsing to exchange files if
 need be.

Did you see
https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/remote-access/vnc/ ?

Cheers, Ralph.

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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-19 Thread Terry Coles
On Saturday 18 Apr 2015 23:09:08 Tim Allen wrote:
 Terry - here are a few links which indicate you're not alone in the
 problem you are getting and which may provide a lead:
 
 
 http://c-nergy.be/blog/?p=5305
 
 (see first comment)
 
 
 http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jimblizzard/archive/2015/02/25/rdp-to-ubuntu-linux-v
 m-in-azure.aspx
 
 http://blogs.msdn.com/b/plankytronixx/archive/2013/11/12/running-a-remote-de
 sktop-on-a-windows-azure-linux-vm.aspx

Thanks for that Tim.  As you may have seen from my earlier post, I've now fixed 
it by re-installing xrdp on the Pi.

The only problem is that I may never know what was wrong originally ;-)

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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-19 Thread Ralph Corderoy
Hi Terry,

 I fixed my problem by completely removing xrdp from the Pi (including
 a purge) and re-installing it.

That seems to match http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1314336 and
the bugs it links to.  Something about whether xrdp pulls in vnc4server,
bad, or tightvncserver, good.

There should also be /var/log/sesman.* or similar that would hopefully
give more details than that dreary `error - problem connecting' in the
GUI.

WRT xrdp's and sesman's status, if you find a process ID then you can
list what IPv4 interfaces and sockets they are listening on, e.g.
perhaps it's only loopback.  Here's an example with part of Postfix,
showing it listening for incoming SMTP connections only on the loopback
interface.

$ sudo lsof -a -p `pidof master` -i 4
COMMAND  PID USER   FD   TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
master  1304 root   12u  IPv4   8665  0t0  TCP 
localhost.localdomain:smtp (LISTEN)
$

Not the problem this time as a re-install wouldn't have helped.  The
purge removed /etc configuration files;  perhaps there was something
there amiss.

Cheers, Ralph.

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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-19 Thread Terry Coles
On Saturday 18 Apr 2015 22:07:26 Bob Dunlop wrote:
 Hi,
 
 On Sat, Apr 18 at 07:35, Martin Hepworth wrote:
  So whats wrong with ssh on its own, or if need a gui x11 tunnelled over
  ssh
  to an x-server on the remote?
 
 Can I also just say Duh?

Can I just say that I now feel properly put in my place.  Why didn't you just 
say RTFM and we can all feel nostalgic for the 1970/80s and the Flame wars on 
the Newsgroups?

You should also write to Linux Format about this; their latest set of articles 
on the Pi include one on Remote access.  They don't mention X either (although 
they do advocate VNC, which I think is a crock, so maybe they deserve a bit of 
criticism).

 What's wrong with using X11 or as often known X-windows.  It's a client/
 server system designed from day one to allow remote machines to display
 graphics on another remote server.  It's the default on most Unix/Linux
 boxes, all be it with remote and local systems being the same machine on
 todays PCs.

There's nothing wrong with using X11 except:

1.  It never occurred to me.  This may be because the last time I used X11 for 
anything serious it was in conjunction with Cygwin to get access to a 
SparcStation.  I can't say the performance was particularly scintillating, so 
I might have rejected it anyway in favour of RDP, since, unlike the Sun boxes, 
modern computers (including the Pi) can run RDP.

2.  I need to access the full desktop, not just some graphical utilities.  I 
have read that this can be done over X, but see below.

3.  My recollection is that X is a bit of a faf to get working, due to having 
set the DISPLAY environment etc.  I'm sure that once it's working, it's very 
easy to do, but it was a piece of p**s to get RDP working (until it broke), so 
I used it.

4.  Performance.  This may be only a perception, but I see that Tim has 
expressed the same opinion.  When I first learned about X some 20 or so years 
ago, my understanding was that bandwidth was the main problem, so again I 
probably wouldn't have tried it, even if I'd thought of it.

5.  I have used RDP in a number of scenarios for years, so I know what it can 
do and felt it to be the right approach.

6.  I can also access the Pi from a Windows box, should I wish to.

Anyway, rant over.  If anyone's interested, I fixed my problem by completely 
removing xrdp from the Pi (including a purge) and re-installing it.

-- 

Terry Coles



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[Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-18 Thread Terry Coles
Hi,

I retired on Friday :-)

To give myself something to do, I decided to get one of the new Raspberry Pis 
(the Pi 2), with 
the intention of picking up on learning Python where I left off some time ago.  
(The intention 
being that I would have something to use that would be a bit more 'physical' 
than the last 
time I did it.)

However, before I could start anything serious, I wanted to sort out remote 
access, so that I 
could program on the  Pi while still having full access to my normal machine - 
without 
resorting to a KVM Switch.  I thought about using VNC, but my experience on 
Windows lead 
me towards Remote Desktop because it is more responsive.  I installed it, it 
worked, I shut 
down the Pi, it no longer works.

Here is what I did:

On the Pi which is running Raspbian:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install xrdp

After processing, I got a message to say that xrdp had been successfully 
installed and started.

On this box, which is running Kubuntu:

I Opened KRDC ( a VNC/RDP client) and typed in the IP address of the Pi.

After a brief login dialog, including a request for the password, I was in.

On the Pi:

Reconfigured Raspbian to boot straight into the desktop instead of the shell.
Restarted.
Waited until the Pi was booted again.

On this box:

Tried to login to the Pi again using KRDC
see http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel1.png.[1]

I then got _http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel1.png_ 
(no request for a password).  I then got 
_http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel2.png_ and 
_http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel3.png._  The last screenshot 
shows the error.

I then logged into the Pi with SSH, and proved that xrdp is running
see _http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel4.png_ 

I get the same result from a Windows box and this time I did have to type the 
password.  If I 
reconnect the mouse, keyboard and monitor to the Pi, the desktop is still 
running, so what 
gives?

-- 

Terry Coles




[1] http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel1.png
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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-18 Thread Martin Hepworth
So whats wrong with ssh on its own, or if need a gui x11 tunnelled over ssh
to an x-server on the remote?

On Sat, 18 Apr 2015 at 16:59, Terry Coles d-...@hadrian-way.co.uk wrote:

 Hi,

 I retired on Friday :-)

 To give myself something to do, I decided to get one of the new Raspberry
 Pis (the Pi 2), with
 the intention of picking up on learning Python where I left off some time
 ago.  (The intention
 being that I would have something to use that would be a bit more
 'physical' than the last
 time I did it.)

 However, before I could start anything serious, I wanted to sort out
 remote access, so that I
 could program on the  Pi while still having full access to my normal
 machine - without
 resorting to a KVM Switch.  I thought about using VNC, but my experience
 on Windows lead
 me towards Remote Desktop because it is more responsive.  I installed it,
 it worked, I shut
 down the Pi, it no longer works.

 Here is what I did:

 On the Pi which is running Raspbian:

 sudo apt-get update
 sudo apt-get install xrdp

 After processing, I got a message to say that xrdp had been successfully
 installed and started.

 On this box, which is running Kubuntu:

 I Opened KRDC ( a VNC/RDP client) and typed in the IP address of the Pi.
 After a brief login dialog, including a request for the password, I was in.

 On the Pi:

 Reconfigured Raspbian to boot straight into the desktop instead of the
 shell.
 Restarted.
 Waited until the Pi was booted again.

 On this box:

 Tried to login to the Pi again using KRDC
 see http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel1.png.[1]

 I then got _http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel1.png_
 (no request for a password).  I then got
 _http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel2.png_ and _
 http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel3.png._  The last
 screenshot shows the error.

 I then logged into the Pi with SSH, and proved that xrdp is running
 see _http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel4.png_

 I get the same result from a Windows box and this time I did have to type
 the password.  If I
 reconnect the mouse, keyboard and monitor to the Pi, the desktop is still
 running, so what
 gives?

 --

 Terry Coles



 
 [1] http://www.hadrian-way.co.uk/Misc/My_Control_Panel1.png
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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-18 Thread Bob Dunlop
Hi,

On Sat, Apr 18 at 07:35, Martin Hepworth wrote:
 So whats wrong with ssh on its own, or if need a gui x11 tunnelled over ssh
 to an x-server on the remote?

Can I also just say Duh?

What's wrong with using X11 or as often known X-windows.  It's a client/
server system designed from day one to allow remote machines to display
graphics on another remote server.  It's the default on most Unix/Linux
boxes, all be it with remote and local systems being the same machine on
todays PCs.

At work I just ssh to a remote box, local net or other side of the world.
Behind the scenes ssh tells the remote where the graphics display is
located.  Then any graphics utility I fire off appears in my local
machine's desktop, fully intergrated, no problem.

Been doing that since 1986 at least.  Remote desktop and the like are just
tools to help Microsoft Windows to catch up with Unix common practice.

If you have firewalls or similar in the way just add -X to your ssh
parameters to create an automatic tunnel.


ps. Yes I have run X11 over 64kbps ISDN links.  It was not zippy but it
did work.

-- 
Bob Dunlop

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Re: [Dorset] Remote Desktop to a Raspberry Pi

2015-04-18 Thread Tim Allen

Hi Bob

On 18/04/15 22:07, Bob Dunlop wrote:

Hi,

On Sat, Apr 18 at 07:35, Martin Hepworth wrote:

So whats wrong with ssh on its own, or if need a gui x11 tunnelled over ssh
to an x-server on the remote?


Can I also just say Duh?

What's wrong with using X11 or as often known X-windows.  It's a client/
server system designed from day one to allow remote machines to display
graphics on another remote server.  It's the default on most Unix/Linux
boxes, all be it with remote and local systems being the same machine on
todays PCs.

At work I just ssh to a remote box, local net or other side of the world.
Behind the scenes ssh tells the remote where the graphics display is
located.  Then any graphics utility I fire off appears in my local
machine's desktop, fully intergrated, no problem.

Been doing that since 1986 at least.  Remote desktop and the like are just
tools to help Microsoft Windows to catch up with Unix common practice.

If you have firewalls or similar in the way just add -X to your ssh
parameters to create an automatic tunnel.



X through SSH is OK on local network, but I've always found it unusably 
slow for remote access. And if you want an entire desktop then as far as 
I know the only pure X option is XDMCP and into Xephyr. Again no good 
for slow connections as this is both slow and insecure into the bargain 
(unless you're going to run Xephyr on the remote and tunnel that). And 
you can't cut and paste to/from Xephyr. Ironically, Windows is better 
catered for than Linux with X servers that can handle a remote desktop 
(Xming, Cygwin/X, Mobaxterm, but they are all sensitive to the remote 
desktop and local video drivers, all handle cut and paste well).


Then there's NX. When I tried this a few years back it was unbelievably 
fast over a slow link and seemed to be the answer, but seems to have 
been largely abandoned.


VNC is (IMHO) messy to set up. Certainly with the servers I experimented 
with you have to define all the resolutions you think you'll need on 
different ports. But it works well over slow links. I've never had 
cut/paste work.


Then there's RDP. Fast over slow links, secure. I haven't tried XRDP so 
don't know if there are other factors, but I think there are good 
reasons to use it over pure XDMCP (also, should give remote audio, cut 
and paste).




Terry - here are a few links which indicate you're not alone in the 
problem you are getting and which may provide a lead:



http://c-nergy.be/blog/?p=5305

(see first comment)


http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jimblizzard/archive/2015/02/25/rdp-to-ubuntu-linux-vm-in-azure.aspx

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/plankytronixx/archive/2013/11/12/running-a-remote-desktop-on-a-windows-azure-linux-vm.aspx




Cheers

Tim

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