Thanks to Dave for pointing out that my HTML message was stripped. I am trying this again.Hi All,I'm using FreeBSD as a workstation trying to keep everything as lightweight and segregated as possible. So I am running GUI applications inside a jail. My current solution to this is null mounting the Xorg socket inside the jail which allows the GUI applications to run on the host Xorg without issue. Unfortunately this is also probably the least secure solution as one jail could access the key strokes ofanother jail through the Xorg on the host.I researched other solutions to this issue and listed them out below with the advantages and disadvantages. I would like to hear everyones comments/ideas because maybethere are betters ways.
You haven't told where the graphical output needs to happen. The X11 protocol is distinguishing between the X server (e.g. the component which does the output to a grpahics card) and the X client (the component which wants to display something e.g. a movie player or whatever program you use to produce the output for display). So the question here is if you just need to have a X client running there, or the X server. You didn't describe the problem you have (I try to find out how the problem looks like outside the box), but you describe already alternatives in a limited solution sphere (you are inside the box and try to find a solution).
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5) Using multiple X servers on different ttysUsing this solution I could group jails according to the level of security that they need. On one Xorg instance say on tty3 I could have my most secure/trusted GUI jails and on tty4 I could have less secure less trusted GUI jails. Yes the jails inside of the same Xorg instance can potentially see each others keystrokes but at least I have the lest trusted jails in another Xorginstance.+Not really that heavy of a solution dependency wise because I already have Xorg installed onthe host anyways and just running it multiple times+I'm assuming the separate Xorg instances don't see each other's keystrokes...?+/- I assume it's clipboard safe between the separate Xorg instances but not in the same Xorg instance.-Less flexible of a solution which can affect my workflow, but maybe not so bad.
You need to have a graphics card for each instance (I'm not aware that two Xorg instances can share the same hardware, but I have never looked specially for something like this, so I may have overlooked that it can, or it started to be able to do that in the last 10 years.
And yes, they will not see the keystrokes of the other instance.
6) Use Null mounts for the Xorg socket but use a script to 'KILL -17' (suspend) all jails and their processes except for the one jail that I wish to work with at a time. Then resume themafterwards. +This is a pretty lightweight solution if slightly complex-A suspended app can still receive keystrokes but will not register them until unpaused. The only assurance I have is that the suspended jailed GUI app cannot request to become the active window (I Think..?) and so as long as I type into the correctnon-suspended jail, the other suspended jails cannot see keystrokes.
I wouldn't go that way. Too complicated.I have patches for FreeBSD which allow to run Xorg in a jail. This would be another option as such, but not one which provides more security (it's even less, as it opens up the memory of the entire machine to this jail, so this jail can see all other jails if you write a clever program, I use that in the sense of containerization of Xorg and a desktop environment, not for security).
There is also the possibility to run Xvnc in each jail. Each GUI program would then connect to the local vnc server instance (or better: is started inside the local vnc server instance), and then from the system you want to see the output (which can be a local Xorg server, or a Windows laptop or an ipad or whatever is able to run a vncviewer program) you connect with a vnc viewer to the vnc instance of the jail. The applications inside each vnc instance will only see keystrokes when the vnc viewer window for this particular instance is active. So if you are in the window of vnc viewer instance A the instance B will not see keystrokes.
Bye, Alexander. -- http://www.Leidinger.net alexan...@leidinger.net: PGP 0x8F31830F9F2772BF http://www.FreeBSD.org netch...@freebsd.org : PGP 0x8F31830F9F2772BF
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