24.04 Remote Desktop

[psion13]

I used to use a toggle "Enable Remote Access" or I thought I did, I've been using VNC forever and never had to learn how to configure it.

I've spent the last week trying to setup TightVNC and a ./xstartup file, NoMachine, and xrdp to no avail.

Black screens, connection refused, no connection...

I also used to be able to allow things through ufw but it doesn't seem to be enabled, is there another firewall? I can SSH just fine.

I guess I should have read all the release note, the kids are changing things on me again. I go through this every decade or so since 1993, when I had to compile X11 and write my own NIC driver lol. I am in decline I think...

Any pointer would be greatly appreciated.

[Bombilla]

Welcome @psion13 to the community!

[ricmarques]

Hi, @psion13 (Aaron Flora)

To try to help you, I've just done the following and I'm happy to say that it worked:

1. - In the, let's call it, "Server" machine running Ubuntu MATE 24.04 LTS ("Noble Numbat"):

1.1. - Install the "xrdp" package:

sudo apt install xrdp

1.2. - Create an .xsession file directly in the "home directory" of your user with the following lines:

unset DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS
unset SESSION_MANAGER
mate-session

By the way, about this idea of creating an .xsession file with the above lines, all credit goes to @OldStrummer (Fred) for his following reply in another older topic:

XRDP MATE desktop server macOS remote desktop client

As I recall, a year ago when I installed MATE and added XRDP, I had to make the following changes to my .xsession file: unset DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS unset SESSION_MANAGER mate-session Logout and login again, and everything runs smoothly.

2. - In the, let's call it, "Client" machine running Ubuntu MATE 24.04 LTS ("Noble Numbat") or an earlier version:

2.1. - Install the "Remmina" RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol) client:

sudo apt install remmina

2.2. - Use "Remmina" to access the IP address of the Server machine using RDP

I hope this helps Please tell us if this solution also works for you or not.

[psion13]

Thank you for your response, I still can't connect to my Ubuntu MATE 24.04 with anything other than SSH. I have tried Remmina from other Linux machines and mstsc from Windows but it does not connect.

I also have NoMachine installed on all my Linux machines and it works flawlessly, but not on this one. Same symptom, just doesn't connect, not refused, but failed.

Thanks,
Aaron

[ricmarques]

Hi again, @psion13

@psion13

Thank you for your response, I still can't connect to my Ubuntu MATE 24.04 with anything other than SSH. I have tried Remmina from other Linux machines and mstsc from Windows but it does not connect.
I also have NoMachine installed on all my Linux machines and it works flawlessly, but not on this one. Same symptom, just doesn't connect, not refused, but failed.

Hmmm... Given that both "xrdp" and "NoMachine" are not working on that particular "server" but they are working in your other servers, my first recommendation is that you check the network configuration of the "server" machine, namely check that the IP address, network mask and default gateway are all set up correctly.

If the network configuration checks out, then my next suggestion is for you to run the following commands in the server machine and please include the corresponding outputs in another reply in this same discussion topic:

systemctl status xrdp

systemctl is-active xrdp

systemctl is-enabled xrdp

systemctl status xrdp-sesman

systemctl is-active xrdp-sesman

systemctl is-enabled xrdp-sesman

sudo ufw status

[psion13]

Hi ricmarques,

OK, my sincerest apologies, this might be pertinent and I didn't include it at the top because everything else is working great.

I built a network bridge to accommodate a VM running under KVM, I did it with the Network Manager GUI by creating br0 with br0 port 1.

My VM works and I can access the internet and the hosted service is available on the web via an nginx reverse proxy hosted on another machine that manages all my microservices. Just to be clear I am not trying to connect from outside my network and as stated ssh connection TO the host work just fine.

1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group defaul             t qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host noprefixroute
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: enp0s25: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP              group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 18:66:da:00:42:a5 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 10.10.10.111/24 brd 10.10.10.255 scope global noprefixroute enp0s25
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::a218:f90d:a609:25d9/64 scope link noprefixroute
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
3: br0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc noqueue state UP group              default qlen 1000
    link/ether 96:0e:49:24:41:ae brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 10.10.10.111/24 brd 10.10.10.255 scope global noprefixroute br0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::920c:d419:ce05:ef8e/64 scope link noprefixroute
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
5: vnet0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc noqueue master br0 st             ate UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/ether fe:54:00:40:70:4d brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet6 fe80::fc54:ff:fe40:704d/64 scope link
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

Another odd behavior I just noticed is that I tried to login to this site from the machine in question, just to make it easier to post information and the login dialogue of this site returns:

"You can't log in as psion13 from that IP address."

So now I am suspecting that even though I have the bridge working and the VM is accessible and I can access the web from the host, that some route or setting is not done appropriately.

xrdp.service - xrdp daemon
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/xrdp.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Fri 2024-06-07 23:12:20 CDT; 6 days ago
       Docs: man:xrdp(8)
             man:xrdp.ini(5)
   Main PID: 1720 (xrdp)
      Tasks: 1 (limit: 38333)
     Memory: 1.2M (peak: 1.7M)
        CPU: 14ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/xrdp.service
             └─1720 /usr/sbin/xrdp

 xrdp-sesman.service - xrdp session manager
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/xrdp-sesman.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Fri 2024-06-07 23:12:19 CDT; 6 days ago
       Docs: man:xrdp-sesman(8)
             man:sesman.ini(5)
   Main PID: 1643 (xrdp-sesman)
      Tasks: 1 (limit: 38333)
     Memory: 1.3M (peak: 1.8M)
        CPU: 6ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/xrdp-sesman.service
             └─1643 /usr/sbin/xrdp-sesman

xrdp - active
xrdp - enabled
ufw: command not found

Thank you so much for all your help!

Aaron

[ricmarques]

Hi again, @psion13

I'm afraid that I can't help much regarding KVM configurations Maybe someone else here in the Ubuntu MATE Community can help you.

I have a couple of questions though and I believe the answers to those questions will be helpful for other people to try to help you:

1 - You wrote: "ssh connection TO the host work just fine.". Did you mean an SSH connection from another physical machine in the same 10.10.10.0/24 network to the IP address of the KVM Virtualization Host? Or do you mean an SSH connection from another physical machine in the same 10.10.10.0/24 network to the IP address of the VM? Or do you only mean an SSH connection from the KVM Host to the VM?

2 - The ("ip address show") output that you showed was it ran in the Virtualization Host or was it ran inside the VM? What is the output for both cases? Is the idea to have the KVM Virtualization Host and the VMs all having IP addresses in the 10.10.10.0/24 network / subnet? If that's the case are you defining static IP addresses for the/each VM or are you using some kind of DHCP Server?

3 - Are you running Ubuntu MATE 24.04 LTS ("Noble Numbat") both in the KVM Virtualization Host and in the VM? If not, what is the Linux distribution and version for the KVM Host and the Linux distribution and version of the VM?

Although they are somewhat old, the following two topics here in the "Ubuntu MATE Community" may be useful to you:

KVM QEMU ethernet bridge using network manager, and guest display resolution

I'm completely new to KVM/QEMU, and been trying to shift to KVM / QEMU from VirtualBox. After going through over 10+ guides and forum threads, I was able to create Ethernet bridge using Network Manager GUI, and create a virtual machine (If I create the bridge using /etc/network/interfaces, I cannot use network manager anymore). Both host and guest machines are Ubuntu MATE 20.10 The issues I'm running into are: (1) Host machine Ethernet connectivity: after every reboot, host machine gets auto…

Create Network Bridge For Libvirt

This was a huge challenge that I spent 16+ hours on. I want to help the next person not jump down the rabbit hole. This might be a known problem, but I found postings in most forums to be incomplete, out dated, or miss leading. Summary: Creating a network bridge for Libvirt in Ubuntu Mate 19.10. Purpose: Default virtual network for Libvirt is NAT network. The MACvTap bridge does not allow host to guest communication, but will allow other local network devices to communicate to the VM. A bridge…

[psion13]

I hate people like me.

I also use Webmin on all my machines, and on this one I wanted to try Cloudmin to make managing the VM easier, but couldn't figure it out, the script is broken and outdated.

So I had installed Virtualmin while trying all of that and...

It replaces UFW with FirewallD!

ricmarques, if you're ever in the Great Lakes Region I will buy you a beer!

Thanks! Now to try to upgrade Proxmox and setup RustDesk on a vultr VPS.

[junwen_min]

Your response really helped me. I love you for that!

[Bombilla]

Welcome,@junwen_min to the community!