How to setup FreeNX??

[alpha645]

Did anyone got any succes succesfully setting up FreeNX? I'm using Propriëtary drivers from nVidia now and that didn't make the X VNC module happy . My box goes into some sort of deadlock when I try to login, I thought that FreeNX was a good alternative. But I have to use a setup program that is located here :

/usr/share/doc/freenx-0.7.0/nxsetup

It always gives errors and I don't see anything changing whatsoever.... Could someone please shed some light on this?

TIA, Alpha

[EdmunTimberlane]

I did today. On the server you need to install the required packages

yum install freenx

Now your done with the server. On the client machine you will need to install freenx client and then import the servers ssh key

This page helped me http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_FreeNX_Server

[EdmunTimberlane]

Also watch out for this error:

/usr/bin/xauth:  creating new authority file /var/lib/nxserver/home/.Xauthority
/usr/libexec/nx/nxloadconfig: line 285: kde-config: command not found

http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=167289

[alpha645]

Thanks, I'll give it a try when I have time again

[alpha645]

Thanks again, I got a little further . The executables I was looking for are stored in /usr/libexec/nx , but the nxsetup keeps giving errors .

./nxsetup --install --setup-nomachine-key --clean --purge
which: no nxloadconfig in (/usr/share/doc/freenx-0.7.0:/usr/kerberos/sbin:/usr/kerberos/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/root/bin)
./nxsetup: line 130: .: filename argument required
.: usage: . filename [arguments]
Removing special user "nx" ...done
Setting up ...mkdir: unknown operand
Try 'mkdir --help' for more info

Any ideas?

Thanks

[alpha645]

Ok, it figures that the error above was from nxloadconfig the following command fixes nxsetup:

ln -s /usr/libexec/nx/nxloadconfig /usr/bin/

And then:

gedit /usr/bin/nxloadconfig

Comment out line 284 till 286 .

But now, I try to start the server without SSH (which means I don't need SSH). That doesn't work either, I tried the following so far:

/usr/share/doc/freenx-0.7.0/nxsetup --install --setup-nomachine-key (In my opinion rather useless bacause I don't use SSH...)

passwd -d nx

/usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --adduser Ronald

/usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --passwd Ronald
<enterspasswordforremote>

And then (I figured this out myself):

/usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --start

This is the output:

[Ronald@Alpha Ronald]$ su -
Wachtwoord:
[root@Alpha ~]# /usr/share/doc/freenx-0.7.0/nxsetup --install --setup-nomachine-key
Starting ssh service ...Starten van sshd: [ OK ]
done
Setting up /etc/nxserver ...done
Generating public/private dsa key pair.
Your identification has been saved in /etc/nxserver/users.id_dsa.
Your public key has been saved in /etc/nxserver/users.id_dsa.pub.
The key fingerprint is:
40:08:8e:b8:19:9e:52:45:34:d8:bb:d5:77:7f:d6:ae root@Alpha
Setting up /var/lib/nxserver/db ...done
Setting up /var/log/nx/nxserver.log ...done
Setting up special user "nx" ...mailbox-bestand wordt aangemaakt: Bestand bestaat al
Unlocking password for user nx.
passwd: Warning: unlocked password would be empty.
passwd: Unsafe operation (use -f to force)
[root@Alpha ~]# passwd -d nx
Removing password for user nx.
passwd: Success
[root@Alpha ~]# /usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --adduser Ronald
NX> 100 NXSERVER - Version 1.5.0-70 OS (GPL)
NX> 1000 NXNODE - Version 1.5.0-70 OS (GPL)
NX> 716 Public key added to: /home/Ronald//.ssh/authorized_keys2
NX> 1001 Bye.
NX> 999 Bye
[root@Alpha ~]# /usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --passwd Ronald
NX> 100 NXSERVER - Version 1.5.0-70 OS (GPL)
New password:
Password changed.
NX> 999 Bye
[root@Alpha ~]# /usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --start
NX> 100 NXSERVER - Version 1.5.0-70 OS (GPL)
mv: kan stat niet toepassen op `/var/lib/nxserver/home/.ssh/authorized_keys2.disabled': File or directory does not exist
NX> 122 Service started
NX> 999 Bye


And then? How to connect? The nxclient or nxdesktop did not work ...

[casket88]

Sorry to semi-hijack this thread but I too have setup freenx simply by issuing the command 'yum install freenx'. All I have done from there on in is export the key and I have been able to connect no worries.

Have I missed some important steps?

[alpha645]

Sorry to semi-hijack this thread but I too have setup freenx simply by issuing the command 'yum install freenx'. All I have done from there on in is export the key and I have been able to connect no worries.

Have I missed some important steps?

Seems easy, but then I have the following questions:

- Where did you get the key?
- How do you 'export' the key? (move it to the ~/.ssh dir)
- How do you start the server?
- Which port to connect to?
- Which login/password? (the one from local?)

[alpha645]

Ok, I think I got further by doing the following:

/usr/share/doc/free*/nxsetup --uninstall --purge
rm -rf /home/Ronald/.ssh /root/.ssh /home/Ronald/.nx /root/.nx
service sshd stop
/usr/share/doc/free*/nxsetup --install # Create my own keys
service sshd stop
cd /etc/ssh/
rm -rf ssh_host_dsa_key.pub ssh_host_dsa_key
cp /etc/nxserver/users.id_dsa.pub ssh_host_dsa_key.pub
cp /etc/nxserver/users.id_dsa ssh_host_dsa_key
service sshd restart
/usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --adduser Ronald
/usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --passwd Ronald
/usr/libexec/nx/nxserver --start

Well, so far so good the server SHOULD work. But it does not. In the client I enter:

Host: 127.0.0.1
Port: 22
And the correct dsa_key (ssh_host_dsa_key)

The output is:

"Server not installed or NX access disabled"

The log says:
NX> 203 NXSSH running with pid: 15977
NX> 285 Enabling check on switch command
NX> 285 Enabling skip of SSH config files
NX> 285 Setting the preferred NX options
NX> 200 Connected to address: 127.0.0.1 on port: 22
NX> 202 Authenticating user: nx
NX> 208 Using auth method: publickey
NX> 204 Authentication failed.

Could someone PLEASE help me?

[casket88]

Seems easy, but then I have the following questions:

- Where did you get the key?
- How do you 'export' the key? (move it to the ~/.ssh dir)
- How do you start the server?
- Which port to connect to?
- Which login/password? (the one from local?)

- The key was found at /etc/nxserver/client.id_dsa.key
- By exporting I simply mean renaming the key to <username>.id_dsa.key and using smbclient to quickly place it on a remote share.
- The server started itself as part of the install through yum
- 22
- Local login.

[alpha645]

Thanks, I'm going to try a clean reinstallation now (The guys from the mailing list recommended this in some way lol). I messed around so much that it's probably not reliable to use anymore. Thanks for you reply .

[ayaboh]

Follow this howto for Centos http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/FreeNX