Can't get remote desktop to open in x11 window through ssh

Question

I am having trouble getting an x11 window of the desktop of a remote machine.

I am VPN'ed into a local network and I can get into the computer I want through the command line using:

ssh -X computer_name -l login_name

I thought that the -X would cause the remote machine's desktop to pop up in x11, and although x11 launched on my mac, I did not get an x11 window of the machines desktop.

I can get things like emacs to run and pop up in new x11 windows, but I want to get the whole desktop going.

I am running Mac OS 10.7, and the remote machine is running linux.

Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

Figured it out.

after the command

ssh -X computer_name -l login_name

I had to start a gnome-session

gnome-session >&/dev/null &

this gave me the linux desktop in an x11 window.

Answer 2

If you want your remote Linux desktop to be displayed on a window on your Mac you should use on your Mac (providing that the VPN is already setup and running, you have access to your Linux server, and XDMCP is configured on it):

$ Xephyr -query <linux-ip-or-name> :1

Answer 3

ssh -X (or -Y) only tunnels the connection to your local X server for the applications started on the remote machine from your SSH session. It cannot do anything about the desktop environment that is running on the remote machine's own X server.

You're probably looking for something like VNC, not X11 forwarding.

Answer 4

X-Window allows you to run programs remotely, and have their windows appear locally on your machine. As you stated, you were able to get this working properly. If you want to see the entire linux desktop on your mac, you will want to use a program like VNC.

You will need to run vncserver on your linux machine, then you can use any of a number of VNC clients on your mac to see the entire linux desktop. For example, Chicken of the VNC.