XRDP Login with Black Screen issue

After trying a couple of things on the Linux server and found nothing wrong with the configuration of XRDP server, I was wondering what exactly caused this whereas I got used to login properly without any issue with RDP client on Mac OS X.

Is it something wrong with an update on Microsoft RDP client, or something deep inside my connection profile?

Just found this a reply on the forum which points me to the right direction.

According to the replies in the forum
http://sourceforge.net/projects/xrdp/forums/forum/389417/topic/4880098,
it looks like a problem in the domain settings in my connection profile which has been remembered since I connected to some other servers whereas a domain needs to be specified. In Preference, I simply cleared the field Domain and now my XRDP session can be connected again with no further issue.

Apart from the black screen, here's our login session window again!

The same thing may happen on Windows RDP client as well. So, please beware of the Domain when logging in XRDP next time.

XRDP via SSH session

To make use of Windows Remote Desktop Client to connect to Graphical X session on Ubuntu Linux server, there are three basic components that would help make a secured connection:

XRDP server

SSH server

VNC server

XRDP protocol would be used to forward VNC session to Windows RDC. For security reason, it will be done through the data encapsulation by using SSH tunnel.

The benefit is that it doesn't require the client to install VNC viewer and use standard Remote Desktop Client on Windows computer.

For better security, Putty will be used to create SSH connection first and do the port forwarding as follows:

For example:

Port 5555 (client port, any other port than 3389 or 3390) => localhost:3389 (remote server port)

On the server, Firewall rules restrict that only SSH port is open to the users for connection. Through SSH session, we can connect it with Windows RDC by using URI like:

localhost:5555

Before all these happen, we need to make sure that SSH server, VNC server and XRDP server are installed  and configured properly on Linux server.

Use the following commands to install all required servers:

$ sudo apt-get install openssh
$ sudo apt-get install vnc4server
$ sudo apt-get install xrdp

Just skipped SSH and VNC setup whereas you could find lots of references on the other forums.

For XRDP, we need to make a little adjustment on the file "/etc/xrdp/xrdp.ini" .

Depending on the setup of vnc4server, you need to define the VNC port to be forward by XRDP protocol. Under the section "xrdp1" in the file "xrdp.ini", please comment out the line of "port=-1" and add a working VNC port for use, i.e., port=5901.

[globals]
bitmap_cache=yes
bitmap_compression=yes
port=3389
crypt_level=low
channel_code=1

[xrdp1]
name=sesman-Xvnc
lib=libvnc.so
username=ask
password=ask
ip=127.0.0.1
#port=-1
port=5901

Then restart XRDP service:

$ sudo service xrdp restart

Now, it's time to test from the client side by initiating SSH connection using Putty client.

Then open Remote Desktop Client on Windows comptuer with the URI:

localhost: 5555

You should a GUI login screen for xrdp session. Using linux username and password, you can login to VNC session like what a VNC viewer normally does.

Enjoy your RDC!

Xubuntu 12.04 + XAMPP PPA + XRDP + VMware Tools

Xubuntu 12.04 is out for a while and it includes a faster way to install XAMPP package for web developers as well.

Just sum up the steps and procedures to bring up new Xubuntu server VM as follows:


After basic installation of Ubuntu 12.04 LTS Server Edition, try installing a package as follows:

$ sudo apt-get install python-software-properties

to get add-apt-repository command working. This is particularly used for PPA repository.

Perform the followings to get XAMPP package from repository:

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:upubuntu-com/web

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install xampp

XAMPP directory should be under opt directory. To start XAMPP, type the command:

$ sudo /opt/lampp/lampp start


To install basic GNOME desktop 

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get upgrade

$ sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends ubuntu-desktop


To install light weight desktop install xfce, using the following command:

$ sudo apt-get install xubuntu-desktop


To install VMware tools:

$ sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-$(uname -r)

Go to vmware "VM" tab to install vmware tools

Proceed with instructions provided.

Keep it in mind whenever you update Ubuntu (kernel version changed ) you need to run the following script again:

$ vmware-config-tools.pl

I like SSH as it's straight forward and simple to use. What about using graphical application like SVN client running on a remote desktop? Apart from VNC server, XRDP is an alternative for remote GUI control.

Installation of xrdp with command:


Before anything, it's recommended to have upgrade and reboot first:

$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get upgrade
$ sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-$(uname -r)
$ sudo reboot

Now it's ready to install xrdp package:

$ sudo apt-get install xrdp

Edit File "/etc/xrdp/startvm.sh" for xrdp session manager settings:

Replace the last line from ". /etc/X11/Xsession" to "/usr/bin/xfce4-session"

Try the command to restart session manager:

$ sudo /etc/init.d/xrdp restart

After a reboot, a xfce xrdp session should be ready for connection. With Windows Remote Connection Client, it's easy to conenct to the remote desktop on Xubuntu server.