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Akisame
Asked: 2019-02-16 05:02:36 +0800 CST

Get remote desktop on remote headless server

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I bought a virtual server from hetzner.com and I am trying to get a desktop working. I already installed xrdp and gnome-desktop and I installed xserver-xorg-video-dummy and configured etc/X11/xorg.conf to create a virtual display but I just can't seem to get a desktop to run.

Startx outputs:

enter image description here

my /etc/X11/xorg.conf file:

    Section "Device"
    Identifier "Configured Video Device"
    Driver "dummy"
    #VideoRam 4096000
    #VideoRam 256000
    VideoRam 16384
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier "Configured Monitor"
    HorizSync 5.0 - 1000.0
    VertRefresh 5.0 - 200.0
    Modeline "1600x900" 33.92 1600 1632 1760 1792 900 921 924 946
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier "Default Screen"
    Monitor "Configured Monitor"
    Device "Configured Video Device"
    DefaultDepth 24
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport 0 0
        Depth 24
        Virtual 1600 900
    EndSubSection
EndSection

The error log

server xorg ssh remote-desktop

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    You will need an external rdp client, else there IS no display that can be recognize

    Also, you must tell xrdp to use GNOME and allow non root login (if desired). No matter the desktop, the first command is needed for non root user login

    sudo sed -i 's/allowed_users=console/allowed_users=anybody/' /etc/X11/Xwrapper.config

    echo "gnome-session" > ~/.xsession

    The last command will be done with every user that needs to login via RDP

    My advice, though, is use cinnamon, XFCE, or MATE. GNOME has issue with xrdp.

    For cinnamon 

    sudo apt install cinnamon xrdp

    echo "cinnamon-session" > ~/.xsession

    For mate: 

    sudo apt install ubuntu-mate-desktop xrdp

    echo "mate-session" > ~/.xsession

    For XFCE:

    sudo apt install xfce4 lightdm xrdp

    echo "startxfce4" > ~/.xsession

    Please also note you need a display manager (DM), which the server doesn't come with. Some desktops come with one, else I recommend lightdm

    I also do not recommend VNC; it has performance and security issue. I usually tunnel rdp over ssh for security

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