I wonder if you could help/point me in the right direction on this?
I have a simple little Ubuntu box (12.04 currently) with the standard GUI desktop and what I wanted to be able to do was have it available on my network but allow different users to access it using something like VNC, but each time being presented with a GUI log in and their own desktop space so they can work on their own projects etc.
I remember back in the day doing something similar on SCO OpenServer (yeah, waaaay back in the day!) but it’s only now that this has come up. I usually use the box for simple php programming and the like but am just intrigued if my Desktop can run it or if I need a Server install with some extra bits and, what those extra bits might be?
I am not sure how to phrase what I am looking for succinctly so I’m sorry if this sounds a long winded question…
They are all Windows 7. Maybe I dreamt it but I thought there was a web desktop vnc type thing available? Problem is I don’t know the name of the “scenario” I am looking at or if it is even possible. I don’t want the whole login to a shell the start x window service because we are talking 11-12 year old kids and I wanted to introduce them straight to a GUI so they felt more at “home” and they might want Linux at home
They are a mix of wifi and cable-connected pc’s.
Sorry I forgot that client OS detail in my initial question.
Multiseat X refers to a single machine that supports multiple concurrent users each with their own set of keyboards, mice, and monitors providing a traditional desktop experience to each user.
The goal of this project is to provide a fully functional Linux terminal server, capable of accepting connections from rdesktop, freerdp, and Microsoft's own terminal server / remote desktop clients.
You have a few options, the first, if you only need either one or two users is; http://nomachine.com
I’m not sure how licensing works on V4, but they still have a free version (albeit for a limited number of users) and if the license works re; your requirements then it’s hands-down the best solution.
Next to that you have either raw X or VNC. The latter is the most efficient, but if you have a local network connection, you will find that raw X is a much better / smoother solution, albeit it’ll make more use of your network … (!)
You’ll find lots of documentation on the web for raw X, the only ‘real’ issues you’ll have getting it going are security. Typically you’ll want something like this;
a. Make sure you uncomment “ForwardX11 yes” and “ForwardX11Trusted yes” in /etc/ssh/ssh_config
b. type “xhost +”
c. type "ssh @
d. type (this will be on ) “gnome-terminal” (or a.n.other gui application)
You can have the server present a network login, but that gets a little more complex, you have to deal with something called XDMCP which is a little different for every window manager - documentation for this can be found on the LTSP site.
