Slashdot Mirror

NoMachine NX can do that. There's even a free NX server out there (I'm using it now - it's in the Gentoo portage tree even).

NX compresses the X protocol and works some magic so it's usable over even slow links (9600bps even, apparantly). NoMachine has a free client available for download.

It can save your desktop too.

I honestly haven't gotten around to trying to compile and install the mess of little packages that make up the free sources for the FreeNX server and client, but combined with X's "built in" network transparency it may do what you need. (NoMachine sells licenses for a pre-built commercial version of the server and appears to have some binary downloads for clients as well.)

X11 itself already has mechanisms built in (for quite a long time now) to handle remote "terminal server" type connections, but by themselves they're really only suited to being used over a LAN. For "remoter" access (e.g. over the internet) FreeNX supposedly adds the functionality that you need to do this.

(Anybody want to comment on their experiences getting FreeNX installed and configured?)

As other posters have suggested, X-over-SSH is also an option, and is more likely to be more or less built-in for whatever distribution of Linux you're using. Linux systems should have the necessary capability to do this built in, and you can get the same functionality for Microsoft's Windows via installation of CygWin X11 and OpenSSH packages.

VNC is a third option, though I gather it doesn't work quite as well for this sort of thing as FreeNX or X11-over-SSH does.

I honestly haven't gotten around to trying to compile and install the mess of little packages that make up the free sources for the FreeNX server and client, but combined with X's "built in" network transparency it may do what you need. (NoMachine sells licenses for a pre-built commercial version of the server and appears to have some binary downloads for clients as well.)

X11 itself already has mechanisms built in (for quite a long time now) to handle remote "terminal server" type connections, but by themselves they're really only suited to being used over a LAN. For "remoter" access (e.g. over the internet) FreeNX supposedly adds the functionality that you need to do this.

(Anybody want to comment on their experiences getting FreeNX installed and configured?)

As other posters have suggested, X-over-SSH is also an option, and is more likely to be more or less built-in for whatever distribution of Linux you're using. Linux systems should have the necessary capability to do this built in, and you can get the same functionality for Microsoft's Windows via installation of CygWin X11 and OpenSSH packages.

VNC is a third option, though I gather it doesn't work quite as well for this sort of thing as FreeNX or X11-over-SSH does.

If you do IT and have Linux machines, then you will need programs to access the machines remotely. As mentioned by many comments previously, you will need an ssh client. I would like to also suggest you install an NX client from NoMachine.com. You can remotely access the GUI desktop on your Linux desktop (you'll need to install Free NX in your Linux box). Or you can install a VNC client and just about control any OS remotely.

No image here on my end. Perhaps /. needs to get into the business of setting up NX servers in subnets all over the world so they could verify the story before posting it -- and have a select few be able to do the same. This setup would be useful for QA of any type of digital content that is restricted to certain regions.

Cool stuff....

I used klik to install FreeNX and kNX http://www.nomachine.com/ onto a customized SuSE (with lots of self-compiled software that dis-allows now to use SUSE updates) -- and it works like a charm.

Really, really cool. Good job, probono!

Points of failure for PCs in dusty environments are the hard drives and fans. I'm looking to build a similar unit like you're describing that is completely void of moving parts (aside from the fan in the power supply, but power supplies are cheap to replace). What parts am I looking for? Mini-itx, VIA EPIA motherboard with a built-in VIA C3 processor that runs without the need of a processor fan (heat-sink still needed, obviously). CompactFlash to IDE adapter that allows me to install a compactflash card as the media storage device. Due to budget issues, I'm restricted to maybe 1GB or 2GB of disk space, but that's plenty for me to install linux with X and fluxbox or enlightenment. I'll also be running VNC or NX client in order to remotely control a desktop on a server safely sitting on my desk in the home office---essentially making the computer a thin client. Since I'm reusing my monitor (if it goes bad, I won't care), keyboard, and mouse, the total cost could feasibly fall under $600.

X can do sound too ?

seems that way.

http://www.nomachine.com/howto/html/sound-conf.htm l

These also support RDP and VNC protocols by converting to the compressed X protocol, which also gives bandwidth gains over the raw RDP/VNC. Check out this description of the technology.

Recent versions of Knoppix live-CD include the NoMachine client and FreeNX server, making it easy to test it out.

These also support RDP and VNC protocols by converting to the compressed X protocol, which also gives bandwidth gains over the raw RDP/VNC. Check out this description of the technology.

Recent versions of Knoppix live-CD include the NoMachine client and FreeNX server, making it easy to test it out.

These also support RDP and VNC protocols by converting to the compressed X protocol, which also gives bandwidth gains over the raw RDP/VNC. Check out this description of the technology.

Recent versions of Knoppix live-CD include the NoMachine client and FreeNX server, making it easy to test it out.

You might find some use in this. Alas it's proprietary licensed but that's all I could find from a brief search. Can't vouch for it as I don't have Linux here.

And before you ask, no, I did *not* need to install any non-free software on this box to get a NX server going. Gentoo's Portage has currently FreeNX 0.2.4, and 0.2.7 is available from bugs.gentoo.org. The rest of what you need for NXx serving was opensource from the start.

Oh, and by the way, I love the way NX causes further confusion regarding the question of what's a client and what's a server. In the case of FreeNX: You use nxclient to connect to an ssh server, where nxserver is the login shell of the user "nx" (as which you authenticate yourself first). nxserver starts the servers it needs, and the client applications connect to the X server on the client through the servers started by nxserver, which are clients to the nxproxy on the client :).

I wouldn't mind banner ads if they weren't annoying and targeted at broadband users.

At home I have a dialup (there is nothing but satellite available and its not worth it). At work, we are monitored, so I normally NX to my home machine to surf the web. Considering that I am now both surfing the web, and then transferring the images to work over the same 24K connection, I don't like annoying flashing ads. They waste my bandwidth, and more importantly my time. Google ads, other text ads, and non-flashy things are fine, everything else gets the right-click / Adblock treatment.

How often do you need to run an X app across the wire?

Every day. X needs better network transparancy, not less. Keep in mind that for local delivery, X uses unix domain sockets which impose no observable overhead.

Try NoMachine's NX. Better than X and GPL client and server are available.

Not necessarily, if you're using NX compression. NX performs smart caching and could easily choose to ignore a few frames of that gif. Furthermore it is much more efficient when drawing text and mouse pointer movement, and many other optimizations are made possible by its integration lower in the window system than VNC. Try it.

FreeNX is for when it absolutely, positively, has to be double the speed. (-:

The NX protocol is essentially compressed and cached X; it talks to VNC, RDP and whetever else through its own proxy.

Mandrake 10.0 RPMs are here and here. The SRPMs will probably rebuild fine on 10.1 or 9.2 and are here and here.

I second that. I have FreeNX running on my desktop and use it as a home base for my laptop, and its amazing in terms of how responsive it is. I've connected from Starbucks to my desktop before and felt like I was sitting at the machine.

The only drawback of NX is the complete lack of docs available. Still if anyone is interested, there's a debian-centered site about NX at Kalyxo and there's always NoMachine's site at nomachine.com.

NoMachine NX wins hands down.

You can test drive the free implementation, FreeNX, in Knoppix 3.6.

This is the best in every category listed in the origional post. I test drove it off a cable modem in the states to a dsl in Sweden and it was faster than *VNC on a 10mbit network. It is also more secure in that it runs over ssh by default. I think it may even do audio.

The basic stuff is opensource. And the numbers I heard about this are pretty nice:

• 9600 Baud GSM modem link over vanilla X: Mozilla-1.6 needs 4000 roundtrips and takes 5 minutes.
• 9600 Baud GSM modem link over NX: Mozilla-1.6 needs a dozen roundtrips and takes 20 seconds.
• KDE-3.2 desktop startup over vanilla X: transfers 4.8 MByte of data.
• KDE-3.2 desktop startup over NX: transfers 35 kByte of data.

This was cut and pasted from an email I sent to workmates a while back when I heard about NX initially. These days I prefer to use RealVNC (until I get around to buying a copy of NX) to connect to my XFCE session at home from the office.

Even on what you consider a fast connection (local ethernet) I prefer VNC over X11.

In a *nix-only environment, I prefer ssh with X forwarding.
I've heard there are products that serve X over low bandwidth.

Slashdoters, please convince whoever funds those schools to continue doing so because if things do not change, no one will be willing to donate these computers for use in the 3rd world. I also realize that no body owes the third world a living.

On the other hand, if there was a way to boot these machines the NoMachine way, http://www.nomachine.com/, that would be great.

Cb..

On the bandwidth requirement fromt? Frankly, I don't u'stand why we don't have a good windowing environment atleast half as good as Citrix so far. The X-Damage stuff could be the ticket though.

Just compress the X connection with NoMachine's NX. I've been using the GPLed NX components to access my home desktop from work (over a dialup connection) for the past 6 months, and it works great. I recommend that you give it a shot if you require a low-bandwidth X connection.

You can do this in X today with the help of NX (1.4 version required, which is in beta.)

The NX Client is avaiable for free (as in free beer) for Windows, Linux, Mac, Solaris, PS2, iPAQ and Zaurus, and it's very easy to setup specific connections as desktop icons or for starting automatically.

What you seem to ask for is a thin client which serves as NX client not using software but only hardware, but I don't really see that done with any thin client solution available today.

They use X at the base and add further compression and network optimization. In fact they make it work on top of VNC and RDP

Not too shabby

Introduction to NX technology
A brief introduction to NX motivation and technology
This document outlines the background and the design decisions that guided NX development. It explains why NX is different from similar technologies and states the goals the NX project is set to pursue.

Warning : Acronym Collision

The correct moderation to apply to the parent post is either "Offtopic" or "Funny", the latter being more my choice

Quick karma whoring :
- AMD NX : No Execute, prevention of buffer overflow (stupid webpage here, search google for AMD NX)
- nomachine NX technology (website), which is, functionnality-wise, the sucessor of VNC

A good solution would be IGEL Linux based thin clients with NoMachine's NX software to deliver a full Linux desktop. I've deployed this solution for quite a few companies, and the savings over Citrix & Windows is just amazing checkout these links: http://www.igeltechnology.com/ and http://www.nomachine.com/ You can visit our website, and purchase NX from us, we're the only reseller in the N. America, and the only N. American reseller in IGEL's black tie program. http://www.cpc-i.com/

Some of these boxes also have pcmcia support, if you want to go wireless (some also have this integrated). As a backend solution, you have several options like Windows Terminal Server, Citrix, Linux and Sun.

• a brand-new KDE-3.3 code-named "aKademy" together with
• a first-time ever release of FreeNX Server and FreeNX Client (using NX/NoMachine technology)
• as well as a Scribus-1.2 "aKademy Release"

• a brand-new KDE-3.3 code-named "aKademy" together with
• a first-time ever release of FreeNX Server and FreeNX Client (using NX/NoMachine technology)
• as well as a Scribus-1.2 "aKademy Release"

This question might seem stupid for the seasoned geek but how exactly is the setup? OK, can some slashdotter inform us whether this computer setup is running some form of ltsp? Or is it running a NoMachine found here NoMahine.com ? But I do not think so again ,because I see these 3 NVIDIA TNT2 32MB PCI VGA Cards probably hooked onto the System Unit. As slashdotters, I think we should be interested in knowing how the display gets its stuff and how exactly the OS gets shared. What about these cables to the monitors and keyboards or other peripherals? The standard ones seem to be short, i.e, users would have to be cramped very close together. I just do not get it!

Mandrake Linux? OK, can some slashdotter inform us whether this computer setup is running some form of LTSP? Or is it running a NoMachine found here ? But I do not think so again ,because I see these 3 NVIDIA TNT2 32MB PCI VGA Cards probably hooked onto the System Unit

Even if I ban the use of IE, how do I get firefox to render html email in Outlook?

Sites wanting to deliver a richer interface could just use remote X applications.

we could soon have X servers everywhere, so that we could run applications from POSIX servers whenever HTTP didn't suffice.

Uhm, X protocol is quite "chatty". NoMachine MX literally does miracles to circumvent network latency problems, still I think this makes X protocol merely usable on WANs and MANs (i.e. the Internet), not "a good choice".

OTOH, X protocol is just fine on LANs.

Gian Filippo Pinzari - NoMachine

What is a "shill"? (my dictionary doesn't tell me...)

I'm not sure if you are just impressed by the product
------
In that case I am pretty sure that you can't have seen and experienced the product's technology (which, BTW, was released under the GPL). Otherwise you *would* be sure....

I think the company has a pretty poor marketing. For example, their website doesn't state clearly enough the fact that they release the source of their core libraries under the GPL. That one is pretty much hidden. (The source files themselves do state it very clearly)

"The remotability of X11 on a window by window basis (as opposed to the whole desktop, which is how it's done in Windows) is central to this."
-------
I'm sorry, I have bad news to you (and I hate to say it): Citrix/ICA can do "window by window" remoting already a long time. and Microsoft's RDP (Remote Desktop Protokol) in their latest versions can do it too. Plus, both take less bandwidth than X. And both are snappier than X, with less latency for the user. And both can near-seamlessly print from the application server to the locally atttached printer of the (maybe Thin) Client. And both can detach from a running session and re-attach to it again (even from another client, effectively providing "session migration").. Can X11 do this too? It is a set of features that is absolutely essential in an enterprise environment of fat servers/thin clients. (Yes, I know Citrix and Windows Terminal Servers cost more money than X11 which ships for free on Linux)

But stay comfortable, I have also some good news for ya (and I luv it):

• The current version of NX/NoMachine, a highly efficient, GPL'd X11 compressor, supports this:
• run with the same speed (or faster) and consume the same low bandwidht (or lower) as Citrix/ICA and Microsoft/RDP. Ths will proof to be a pretty big asset for X11 in the future battle for the enterprise desktops.
• tunnel Citrix/ICA and Microsoft/RDP through its own connection. This will enable all NX clients to seemlessly access and bring to their desktops remote Windows sreens at a better speed than vanilla ICA/RDP.
• support access to X11 applicationss from Windows, Mac OS X, Zaurus, iPAQ and mobil phones. This is the start of ubiquitous desktop computing where my own desktop follows me to wherever I roam. I can even access it from booting the latest Knoppix (V3.4)

• And one of the next releases of NX/NoMachine will provide this:
• support the display of single application windows from remote Windows Terminal Servers. This will make Windows --> Linux desktop migration scenarios much smoother -- you can offer a better way of keeping a lifeline back to the MS world for the transitional period where your users still need it for lack of a Linux implementation of a particular software.
• support the de-taching and re-attaching from an X11 application without loosing the session.. This will enable "session migration": stop working in office, go home, kiss baby, have dinner, say goodnight to kids, finish that damn important document for next morning by dialing into your still running desktop session from home.
• support seamless printing from X11 applicaton server to locally attached printer. The benefit is pretty obvious.

Those who don't know about NX by now are missing something really cool and useful.

Hey, and it case you haven't noticed: I said it is GPL! Yes, GPL licensed!! (OK -- NoMachine as the NX inventors have dual-licensed:it to themselves, and they are also building and selling a commercial product on top of the exact same GPL libraries.... So what? Trolltech do this with Qt, Codeweavers do this with WINE, MySQL do this with MySQL and Redhat do this with the Linux kernel. Let NoMachine also pay their own developers.)

Oh, and in case I forgot to mention it: NX is really cool. See also this paper from Linux-Kongress 2003

"The remotability of X11 on a window by window basis (as opposed to the whole desktop, which is how it's done in Windows) is central to this."
-------
I'm sorry, I have bad news to you (and I hate to say it): Citrix/ICA can do "window by window" remoting already a long time. and Microsoft's RDP (Remote Desktop Protokol) in their latest versions can do it too. Plus, both take less bandwidth than X. And both are snappier than X, with less latency for the user. And both can near-seamlessly print from the application server to the locally atttached printer of the (maybe Thin) Client. And both can detach from a running session and re-attach to it again (even from another client, effectively providing "session migration").. Can X11 do this too? It is a set of features that is absolutely essential in an enterprise environment of fat servers/thin clients. (Yes, I know Citrix and Windows Terminal Servers cost more money than X11 which ships for free on Linux)

But stay comfortable, I have also some good news for ya (and I luv it):

• The current version of NX/NoMachine, a highly efficient, GPL'd X11 compressor, supports this:
• run with the same speed (or faster) and consume the same low bandwidht (or lower) as Citrix/ICA and Microsoft/RDP. Ths will proof to be a pretty big asset for X11 in the future battle for the enterprise desktops.
• tunnel Citrix/ICA and Microsoft/RDP through its own connection. This will enable all NX clients to seemlessly access and bring to their desktops remote Windows sreens at a better speed than vanilla ICA/RDP.
• support access to X11 applicationss from Windows, Mac OS X, Zaurus, iPAQ and mobil phones. This is the start of ubiquitous desktop computing where my own desktop follows me to wherever I roam. I can even access it from booting the latest Knoppix (V3.4)

• And one of the next releases of NX/NoMachine will provide this:
• support the display of single application windows from remote Windows Terminal Servers. This will make Windows --> Linux desktop migration scenarios much smoother -- you can offer a better way of keeping a lifeline back to the MS world for the transitional period where your users still need it for lack of a Linux implementation of a particular software.
• support the de-taching and re-attaching from an X11 application without loosing the session.. This will enable "session migration": stop working in office, go home, kiss baby, have dinner, say goodnight to kids, finish that damn important document for next morning by dialing into your still running desktop session from home.
• support seamless printing from X11 applicaton server to locally attached printer. The benefit is pretty obvious.

Those who don't know about NX by now are missing something really cool and useful.

Hey, and it case you haven't noticed: I said it is GPL! Yes, GPL licensed!! (OK -- NoMachine as the NX inventors have dual-licensed:it to themselves, and they are also building and selling a commercial product on top of the exact same GPL libraries.... So what? Trolltech do this with Qt, Codeweavers do this with WINE, MySQL do this with MySQL and Redhat do this with the Linux kernel. Let NoMachine also pay their own developers.)

Oh, and in case I forgot to mention it: NX is really cool. See also this paper from Linux-Kongress 2003

On top of the thin client/fat server advantages, have you ever tried to do X forwarding over crappy, slow lines? If you combine it with NX you will see the difference.

And tell me what exactly are the bandwidth requirements of X?

Actually, the remote X problems aren't so much the bandwidth (which *is* important) but much more the "roundtrips". Depending on link latency each X protocol "request" by the X application client, that solicits a "reply" from the X server, introduces additional wait cycles. There comes a point where increasinb bandwidth doesn increase speed: you sit there with an empty pipe and waith for roundtrips to finish....

I hate to say it, but Citrix with their ICA, Microsoft with their RDP and Tarantelly with their IAP are all doing a much better job here and use far less bandwidth, making their stuff even work over modem links..

Overall, roundtrips make X feel very sluggish across WAN or low bandwidth links.

This paper gives a few good examples and figurs about plain vanilla X and NX-enabled X:

• a Mozilla start-up alone produces nearly 6.000 round-trips and needs more than 7 minutes to complete over a 9.600 baud modem connection. With the help of NX, the round-trips are boiled down to a few dozen, and a startup may only take 20 seconds over the same modem link!
• a full-screen KDE session transfers 4.1 MByte of data over the wire, if it is run over a vanilla remote X connection. Run it over NX, and the second startup data transfer volume is down to 35 kByte only! You can run KDE sessions over a 9.600 baud modem link and have a responsiveness which is better than TightVNC over a crosslink cable hooking together two boxes only 1 yard apart.
• overall compression/speed gain is 70:1 (on average, across various applications), but can easily achieve 200:1 and more for some applications, like Web browsing.

To me, the GPL'd NX from NoMachine are the saviours for X and remote X connections. Finally someone has created a plugin addon to existing systems, which lets the Unix world compete on par with stuff like Citrix (which, strangely, is now embraced by Redhat). NX is giving a bright future to ubiquitous desktop computing based on Unix. What's best: it can even access Windows sessions (via RDP) with a 2- to 10fold speed increase over plain rdesktop sessions.

I am looking forward to see their session "de-tach and re-attach" feature, as well as their "session migration" (leave office, go home, tease the baby, have dinner, and finish your work via a remote session from home by dialing into the very same destkop that you left back at work). ;-)

NX is really cool. I even use it over a GSM modem (which gives me only 9600 baud link speed). With GSM it is still faster than VNC-connecting two neighbouring boxen underneath my table.....

"After all, they could see during last LinuxTag"
-----------
Yeah, I saw it and it did pretty much impress me then. Since that date I use it. But the Novell management drones could als take Klaus Knopper's recent 3.4 Knoppix release and start the NX Client from there for evaluation purposes. However, I don't think they are smart enough to get themselves an account on one of the publicly available TestDrive servers of NoMachine.

To me it seems pretty stupid that Novell/SUSE/LTSP arent using NoMachine's brilliant and highly efficient and GPL'd NX technology.

After all, they could see during last LinuxTag and last Linux-Kongress how well this works even over a modem or ISDN connection with as little as 20-40 kBit/sec.!!

Not only does NX speed up Unix-type X connections with a turbo charger, but also Windows RDP and general VNC sessions.

In the case of X, the avarage gain is a ratio of 70:1 for an office productivity sesson (KDE/destkop, KMail/mailer, Konqueror/filemanager, OpenOffice/wordprocessor and Mozilla/webbrowser all open and in use), when you combine the highest level of compression, with the intelligent cache and roundtrip-elimination NX provides so reliably.

Pretty stupid by their technicians as well as their marketeers, if you ask me.

i have just downloaded the packages and discovered a wonderful thing called NX which gives me remote access. Has anyone checked it out ?

Boy, you are scaring me!

Me too!
NX renders all my Citrix licenses invalid. I hope my boss doesn't read about their dirt-cheap pricing, otherwise he'll kick my butt and sack me right away.

Stupid /me last week signed an expensive Microsoft/Citrix Thin Client 200 seats contract, and this money hasn't been financed yet, let alone written off!

Absolutely fantastic!

Klaus Knopper has included the NX Client from NoMachine!

NX is an extremley fast, highly compressing, low latency remote X (plus remote RDP and remote VNC) connector.

My home machine runs an NX server build only from the Open Source/GLP components of NX. (I bought a license of their commercial product, which works great, just to show them my appreciation of their work -- but I am the type of person who wants to tweak and study and modify software.)

Anyway, this Knoppix edition now enables me to access my home desktop servers (including my wife's WinXP box) from anywhere in the world, -- anytime by just booting a Knoppix on an internet-connected PC. (NX access to my desktop from my Zaurus already works flawlessly.)

NX doesn't require much bandwidth. A modem or ISDN connection is enough.

Really ubiquitous desktop computing is now present for me.

It's great to see that NX
from NoMachine
is finally coming out on Linux distros. Will it be coming out with any others?