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Remote access Mandriva 2006 Free using FreeNX

Saturday, 21 January 2006

NoMachine NX is a Terminal Server and remote access solution based on a comprising set of enterprise class open source technologies. NX makes it possible to run any graphical application on any operating system across any network connection at incredible speed.

FreeNX application/thin-client server is based on NoMachine’s NX technology. It can operate remote X11 sessions over 56k modem dialup links or anything better. FreeNX package contains a free (GPL) implementation of the nxserver component. The following workshop describes the FreeNX installation on a Mandriva 2006 Free server and accessing it via a Windows XP client.
The workshop setup could look like this:

Step 1: Download FreeNX and NX source

RPM packages are available here: http://rpm.pbone.net

Please search for the files and download it.

As an alternative you can download all files from here:
http://www.linux-tip.de/workshops/freenx_Mandriva2006/freeNX_Mandriva2006.html
(User: freenx Password: Mandriva2006)

nc-1.10-19mdk.i586.rpm
freenx-0.4.4.-1mdk.noarch.rpm
nx-1.5.0-2mdk.src.rpm
automake1.4-1.4.0.p6-1mdk.noarch.rpm

Step 2: Install additional software from your installation CDs using Mandriva Control Centre openssh-server

expect
X11R6-contrib
rpm-build
libpng3-devel
libjpeg62-devel
automake1.7
libopenssl
openssl

Step 3: Install the downloaded RPM packages

It’s now time to install the downloaded packages. Automake is needed by nx-1.5 and netcat is needed by freenx. Just use the following commands as user root from your Download directory:

cd /home/frank/Download
rpm -i automake1.4-1.4.0.p6-1mdk.noarch.rpm
rpm -i nc-1.10-19mdk.i586.rpm

Step 4 – Build nx-1.5 RPM from source

To prepare this workshop I downloaded the binary rpm file and installed it on my test workstation. This installation was unfortunately not working at all. For that reason I decided to use the source rpm in this tutorial. It will take a little bit more time to build the package from source. If you have a slow machine, take your time and allow you a cup of coffee or tea. With the following command you will build the packages. Please watch for error messages. You probably need additional files to get the whole thing running:

rpmbuild --rebuild nx-1.5.0-2mdk.src.rpm

The binary rpm will be stored in the following directory:

cd /usr/src/RPM/RPMS/i586/

Install all rpm packages in this order:

rpm -i libxcomp1-1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm
rpm -i libxcompext1-1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm
rpm -i libnxX11_0-1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm
rpm -i nxproxy-1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm
rpm -i nxagent-1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm
rpm -i nxviewer1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm
rpm -i nxdesktop-1.5.0-2mdk.i586.rpm

Change to your Download directory and finally install freenx:

cd /home/frank/Download
rpm -i freenx-0.4.4.-1mdk.noarch.rpm

Step 5 – Prepare first run and install keys

First of all we need to check permissions on /var/lib/nxserver/home/.ssh/authorized_keys2

Permissions need to be 640 or 644, otherwise you won't be able to connect and you'll receive error messages in /var/log/messages.

chmod 644 /var/lib/nxserver/nxhome/.ssh/authorized_keys2

Now we'll need to copy the secure key that was generated onto the client machines so that your NX client can use it. The key on the server is located in:

/var/lib/nxserver/home/.ssh/client.id_dsa.key

If you are using Windows 2000 or XP on your client machines you will need to copy it to a temp directory. For example "C:\temp\" on your client machine. I’m using WinSCP to get this done. Just conncet to the server as root or other user and drag and drop the file client.id_dsa.key from right to left.

http://winscp.net/eng/index.php

Download the NoMachine NX client for Windows here and install it on your Windows box:

http://www.nomachine.com/download.php

Finally we have to install the key you just copied from your server using SCP. Please start you NX client and hit the “Configure” button:

Under Server click “Key” and “Import” the key you have stored in you temp directory.

Step 6 – Run freenx and use your Windows clients to connect to your Linux server

Please make sure that sshd is running:

/etc/init.d/sshd status
/etc/init.d/sshd start
/etc/init.d/sshd stop
/etc/init.d/sshd restart

FreeNx should automatically start after the installation, but you can start, stop and restart the service as root using the following commands:

nxserver --start: Starts the nx server
nxserver --stop: Stops the nx server
nxserver --status: Shows status of nx server
nxserver --restart: Restarts the nx server and terminate all running sessions
nxserver --help: Shows all options

At this point we should have everything on our FreeNX server setup and ready to test. It is now time to try connecting to your new FreeNX server. Please keep in mind that the username you are using to login to your Freenx server, is an accessible user created on the server. Good luck!

Disclaimer:

The author and the above mentioned website are not responsible for any damage or loss of data and warranty that the information in this article may cause to your computer equipment or anything else you may happen to open up!

Download article in pdf format here.

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