Hello all,
I have a question regarding the remote connection from MAC OS X to a openSUSE 10.3.
It is possible to connect to the linux box from mac like in windows using Xming. How can I connect using the XDMCP protocol? Is it an application that can make this possible?
Thanks,
Ionut
I don’t how to do an X -query from Mac OS X (that’s what you would need to login to your Linux Box over XDMCP).
However
[ul]
[li]you can ssh to your Linux Box and run X apps on your Mac display.[/li]
[LIST]
[li]on your Linux Box, make sure that the option X11Forwarding is set to “yes” in /etc/ssh/sshd_config[/li][li]In your Mac OS X terminal, type xhost +[/li][li]ssh YourLinuxBox[/li][li]start any Xorg app[/li][/ul]
[li]or you can start an Xorg app on Linux and make it appear on your Mac DISPLAY [/li]
[ul]
[li]In your Mac OS X terminal, type xhost +[/li][li]In a terminal on your Linux Box, type export DISPLAY=YourMacIp:0.0[/li][li]start any Xorg app on Linux (it will appear on your Mac display)[/li][/ul]
[/LIST]
If you run an nx server (nomachine) on your Linux box, then you can access it from your MacIntosh with the nx client. There is a legally free download here: NoMachine NX - Download the NX Terminal Server and Remote Access Software
This is incredibly easy to setup for Linux PC accessing a Linux box, and also easy to setup for an MS-Windows PC accessing a Linux box, so I assume it should be equally easy for a Mac OS X PC accessing a Linux box.
Don’t forgot to open your firewall(s) for the specific ports. There is a good installation manual on the nomachine site.
I do not know anything about the XDMCP protocol.
In case XDMCP is needed, you should of course enable it in kdm, gdm or xdm, whichever login manager you are using, on your Linux box. It is not enabled by default.
I tried with nx server and it works fine!
Thanks a lot to all for the replies!
@ oldcpu
Thanks for the tip. I just installed a free implementation on a Mandriva box (because it was the one in front of me and there was a package available in Mandriva’s repos) and the Mac OSX client… out of curiosity. It works great .
I’m glad to read nx worked.
I like that software. It works reasonably well with older PCs and slow bandwidth connections as well.
My mother (now 84) who lives in a different continent has an old PC (Intel CPU 900MHz and 512MB of RAM) with a relatively slow internet connection, and I will on occasion access her PC via nx to do maintenance on it (although I also use ssh and vnc (vnc mainly for training her)). The compression ( ? ) nx uses means when accessing remotely, its desktop display updates on the client at a faster rate than what I observe when using “vnc” .
Also, by my having ssh, vnc and nx available, means I typically have a backup when I make a mistake on her PC and inadvertently break one of those 3. Its easier to have a backup, than have to fly to a different continent to fix things. 
I have successfully connected from MAC to an kde based linux but I also have a gnome one and I can connect to it but the Computer icon from bottom-left is missing and I could not open the programs from there.
I notice the same problem using Xming from Windows OS.
Do you have any idea what could be the problem?
Thanks,
Ionut
I’m a KDE user, and unfortunately I replaced my only Gnome desktop (on my sandbox PC) last week with an LXDE desktop, so I can not try to replicate this.
A silly question (please excuse me for this) - Is there any chance your PC’s gnome display has a different resolution, and hence you just need to move a scroll bar down to see the bottom start menu ? I don’t have access to “nx” right now, but I also vaguely recall it has options to allow one to customize how the server X window is displayed on one’s client workstation (in terms of resolution).
No. The resolution is not the problem. The icon is not present there. The place where the icon should be is empty.
Reads like a gnome specific hiccup then , and you will need a gnome user to help you … (or switch to KDE 
).
FreeNX is available for openSUSE too and can be installed from repos : FreeNX Server HOWTO - openSUSE
I’ve been playing a little bit with FreeNX on Mandriva and NoMachine NX on openSUSE and noticed a couple differences.
if -z "${NXDIR:+x}" ] ; then
test -e $sysmodmap && xmodmap $sysmodmap
test -e $wmmodmap && xmodmap $wmmodmap
test -e $usermodmap && xmodmap $usermodmap
fi
XDMCP is not needed while connecting directly to KDE or Gnome.
ionpetrache, now to your question:
The NX server doesn’t necessarely start KDE or Gnome the same way as Xorg does locally. it might not source the same scripts, so the variable XDG_DATA_DIRS and XDG_CONFIG_DIRS may differ. That would explain a missing button (and much more, like different menus, missing applets, etc). The commands to start KDE and Gnome can be specified in /usr/NX/etc/node.cfg, as well as several scripts to be executed before and after connecting.
However, if you want Gnome or Kde (or any other wm) to be the same as in your local session, you should set EnableDirectXdmQuery in /usr/NX/etc/server.cfg an issue an XDM query from your Mac client :
Configure > Desktop : Unix XDM …
Settings …
(.) Query an X desktop manager
Host : your linux box
Then you will see the xdm/gdm/kdm login script (with NoMachine NX) and you can login into the window manager you want. Basically, it’s the same as running “X -query <remotehost>” from another Linux machine. TCPIP should be enable in your xdm/gdm/kdm config to honor XDMCP requests.
Yuuuhuu:) with EnableDirectXdmQuery it works fine:)
Thank you very much!