Linux – How to start remote Xorg/gnome via ssh & Xforwarding, then close ssh but without shutting down Xorg/gnome

linuxsshwinex11forwarding

Question:

I have a Linux server where I connect to via ssh.
It works fine, and also, X-forwarding works fine (in the local network).

Now I wanted to run a server program under wine. because it's a Windows application, it doesn't run on the command line, so I have to start it via x-forwarding. So far not a problem, works wonderfully.

My problem is I connect to the target computer with X-forwarding, like this:
ssh ip.of.target.computer -X

then I start

gnome-session

from the ssh terminal. Gnome loads and i can start the graphical server application via wine. But when I want to logout from the X-forwarding, that closes the gnome-session (and the server X-window-application)…

How can I login, start a X-window application, and then logout ssh without closing the X-application ?

Best Answer

You might find the -N option useful:

 -N      Do not execute a remote command.  This is useful for just for‐
         warding ports (protocol version 2 only).

and/or the -T option:

 -T      Disable pseudo-tty allocation.

That way you won't get a shell prompt.

Try combining it with disown.

ssh <host> -X -N -T &
disown %<number>

where <number> is whatever number is printed in bracket after running the ssh command.

For example:

$ ssh -X -N -T myserver&
[1] 10317
$ disown %1

That will detach ssh from the shell and window, so you can close the window and ssh will keep running.

Related Solutions

SSH – How to Recover from ‘Too Many Authentication Failures for User Root’

Are you sure that root login to ssh is allowed?

Check sshd_config and verify that root login is permitted. sshd will need to be restarted if the setting changes.

Ssh – How to run GUI application via ssh as another user via sudo

The easiest way is to use ssh -X to run commands as the other user. But this makes the applications run markedly slower, even locally.

The -i option tells sudo to reinitialize the environment. X applications require $DISPLAY and (on some setups) $XAUTHORITY, and may use other environment variable such as locale settings. Try without -i, or if you must use -i, run

sudo -i -u other_user \
  env DISPLAY="$DISPLAY" XAUTHORITY="${XAUTHORITY-$HOME/.Xauthority}" \
  xapplication

Even if you get rid of -i, you might have to supply XAUTHORITY explicitly: by default (if the variable is not set) it's .Xauthority in the home directory.

So far I've been assuming the other user could read your $XAUTHORITY. But that won't be the case unless you make it so (e.g. with setfacl -m user:other_user:r $XAUTHORITY).

Alternatively, rather than let the other user read your $XAUTHORITY, you could copy the right cookie to another file that the user can read.

xauth extract -f - "$DISPLAY" |
sudo -u other_user xauth -f ~other_user/.Xauthority merge -

Note that allowing another user access to your display allows him to do almost anything with it, including sending fake keypresses to applications. So if you were changing users for isolation, you won't get much.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

SSH – How to Recover from ‘Too Many Authentication Failures for User Root’

Ssh – How to run GUI application via ssh as another user via sudo

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