Remote VNC login to Ubuntu 11.10 | mlepicki@h...

Remote VNC login to Ubuntu 11.10

Posted on October 22, 2011

Today I’ve installed Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot on my ASrock 100HT nettop. I’ve wanted to remotely control this box via VNC protocol.
My solution was x11vnc server, so I could share one one session between remote and physical access. I’ve found useful thread about x11vnc on Ubuntu 11.10 – I’ve just added some upstart magic to start x11vnc after lightdm.

First of all, I’ve installed x11vnc:
apt-get install x11vnc

Then, I’ve created /etc/init/x11vnc.conf file:
start on login-session-start
script
x11vnc -xkb -noxrecord -noxfixes -noxdamage -display :0 -auth /var/run/lightdm/root/:0 -forever -bg -o /var/log/x11vnc.log
end script


After restart, x11vnc shoud listen on vnc startard port – 5900.

This script is of course based on upstart event mechanism. Lightdm emits login-session-start event (you can find it in lightdm.conf), and we start x11vnc when this event is emited – that’s first line of x11vnc.conf file.

This entry was posted in Today I learned by mlepicki. Bookmark the permalink.

20 thoughts on “Remote VNC login to Ubuntu 11.10”

1. 

   Ciaran on October 25, 2011 at 3:42 pm said:

   Just what I was looking for, thanks!

   Reply ↓
2. 

   Nergal on October 25, 2011 at 5:58 pm said:

   As the started of the thread referenced above I want to thank mlepicki for this startup script which brought everything together.

   Reply ↓
3. 

   emk2203 on October 26, 2011 at 7:13 pm said:

   Yours looks like a truly brilliant solution, however, it fails for me. I installed x11vnc and made the x11vnc.conf file, but I cannot get it to work. After restart, a ps aux | grep vnc shows no x11vnc running, and I cannot login to the machine.

   I looked about everywhere to see if maybe the login-session-start signal needs to be activated, but couldn’t find anything, neither in the upstart lightdm.conf nor in the /etc/lightdm/ directory. Now I am out of my wits.

   Any suggestions to get it to work?

   Reply ↓
4. 

   Anonymous on October 27, 2011 at 4:48 am said:

   Works great! THanks a lot.

   Reply ↓
5. 

   emk2203 on October 27, 2011 at 6:58 am said:

   Scrap my question, please. I solved the issue – it was just that I typed -display:0 instead of -display :0 …

   

   Reply ↓
6. 

   sam on October 27, 2011 at 7:48 pm said:

   um. it works on xubuntu for sure. But never prompts me for password. not sure whatsup.

   Reply ↓

7. Pingback: Authenticating with x11vnc: what’s the difference between -auth and -rfbauth? | MoVn - Linux Ubuntu Center

8. 

   ?zgür on October 28, 2011 at 11:12 am said:

   Thanks, I was looking for this. One more question, how can we se a password for it?

   Reply ↓
9. 

   David Johnson on October 29, 2011 at 7:55 am said:

   Hi there,

   I found your website and it really helped me to get x11vnc working before login.

   Here is what I did to get it to work for Ubuntu 11.10 (your thoughts on this would be appreciated):

   1 – Install x11vnc from Software Centre

   2 – run command

   sudo x11vnc -storepasswd yourpasswordhere /etc/x11vnc.pass

   3 – run command:

   sudo chmod 744 /etc/x11vnc.pass

   4 – run command:

   sudo gedit /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

   5 – Add following line of code to the lightdm.conf file:

   greeter-setup-script=/usr/bin/x11vnc -auth /var/run/lightdm/root/:0 -noxrecord -noxfixes -noxdamage -rfbauth /etc/x11vnc.pass -forever -bg -rfbport 5900 -o /tmp/x11vnc.log

   6 – Save file and restart computer and you should now be able to connect remotely using a VNC viewer of your choice

   Kind regards,

   David Johnson

   Reply ↓
10. 

    Ryan on October 30, 2011 at 12:38 am said:

    Exactly what I was looking for, thanks!

    Reply ↓
11. 

    mlepicki on October 31, 2011 at 7:26 pm said:

    Upss… sorry guys&girls, I’ve forgot to set up mail notification on upcoming emails! Just fixing it!
    Just one note about adding password prompt: see this post http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=11400219&postcount=23 by emk2203

    Reply ↓
12. 

    Debra on November 1, 2011 at 10:56 am said:

    Thanks so much for posting this. It’s ended a huge headache for me

    Reply ↓
13. 

    thomas on November 2, 2011 at 12:39 pm said:

    Great. Still your password flying unencrypted over net.
    Mayby try this:
    http://mycomputerconfig.blogspot.com/2011/11/upgrade-ubuntu-z-1104-natty-narwhal-do.html [PL] ( http://tiny.pl/h14wk [EN] )
    _
    regards
    tom

    Reply ↓
14. 

    mlepicki on November 2, 2011 at 12:50 pm said:

    @Tom: Thanks for your links! VNC encrypts passwords sent over the net, but the rest of the traffic is sent unencrypted. That’s ok in my home network, but for public VNC access I’d recommend your solution or other security tools, like VPN.

    Reply ↓
    • 

      thomas on November 2, 2011 at 1:16 pm said:

      Sure. But if You plan connect with vnc before You login to the desktop on your remote host? Then You must give Your second pass thru unencrypted connection

      

      
      VPN of course is a good idea

      

      
      _
      regs
      tom

      Reply ↓
      • 

        Viktor on December 16, 2011 at 9:19 am said:

        For encryption, vncviwer allows a via option to be specified, ala:

        vncviewer -via USERNAME@HOST localhost:0

        From what I understand, this should give an encrypted connection/tunnel to the HOST. From the manual pages for vncviewer, “man vncviewer”:

        -via gateway
        Automatically create encrypted TCP tunnel to the gateway machine
        before connection, connect to the host through that tunnel
        (TightVNC-specific). By default, this option invokes SSH local
        port forwarding, assuming that SSH client binary can be accessed
        as /usr/bin/ssh.

        Best regards
        Viktor S. Wold Eide

        Reply ↓
15. 

    Szymon Kosecki on November 21, 2011 at 11:26 am said:

    Best to tunnel the port (5900 for default of whatever you have chosen vnc to listen on)through ssh and you have an extra layer of security.
    Google ssh tunelling, there are plenty of how-tos out there.

    Reply ↓
16. 

    Alexander Kriegisch on December 2, 2011 at 2:54 pm said:

    Thanks for this how-to. I installed x11vnc including password authentication according to mlepicki’s updated information. Maybe it would be a good idea to update the original posting so as to rid readers from scrolling.

    

    Reply ↓
17. 

    Epidemicz on December 15, 2011 at 10:34 pm said:

    Wow, thanks very much!

    Reply ↓
18. 

    Mateusz on December 28, 2011 at 2:10 pm said:

    Very nice and neat solution, that’s what I exactly need. Thanks a lot!

    Reply ↓