FreeNX

FreeNX allows you to set up a terminal server.

How NX works

• You call nxclient with your user
• nxclient uses the nx user to connect to the NX server. This authentication works passwordless with a private key (the nomachine-key) in your nxclient and an authorized public key on the nx server. Private and public key must fit to each other.
• nx's shell on the NX server is called nxserver which allows communication over the nx protocol
• now your user name and password is transmitted and checked
• then nxserver establishes the display connection

SUSE 13.1

To install FreeNX on SUSE Linux 13.1 first open a console and find out if your computer is 64bit:

# uname -i
x86_64

in this case it is 64bit.

64bit

This is how I installed a FreeNX server on SUSE 13.1x32 on 2014-08-10:

• open a console and enter

# yast -i expect rdesktop
# wget http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/beyerle:/NX/openSUSE_13.1/x86_64/NX-3.5.0-123.1.x86_64.rpm
# wget http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/beyerle:/NX/openSUSE_13.1/x86_64/FreeNX-0.7.3-7.1.x86_64.rpm
# rpm -ivh NX-3.5.0-123.1.x86_64.rpm FreeNX-0.7.3-7.1.x86_64.rpm

• read how to set it up

# cat /usr/share/doc/packages/FreeNX/README.SuSE

• set it up

# nxsetup --setup-nomachine-key

32bit

This is how I installed a FreeNX server on SUSE 13.1x32 on 2014-07-19:

• open a console and enter

# yast -i expect rdesktop
# wget http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/beyerle:/NX/openSUSE_13.1/i586/NX-3.5.0-123.1.i586.rpm
# wget http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/beyerle:/NX/openSUSE_13.1/i586/FreeNX-0.7.3-7.1.i586.rpm
# rpm -ivh NX-3.5.0-123.1.i586.rpm FreeNX-0.7.3-7.1.i586.rpm

• read how to set it up

# cat /usr/share/doc/packages/FreeNX/README.SuSE

• set it up

# nxsetup --setup-nomachine-key

• Now connect with any NX client to the NX server. The connection does not work for me, I get an error message

The NX service is not available or the NX access
was
disabled on host ...

• To solve this problem, you need a private/public key pair. Generate one with the command

ssh-keygen -t dsa

The command will ask where to put the key pair. The private key will be named id_dsa and the public key will be named id_dsa.pub. Add the public key to /var/lib/nxserver/home/.ssh/authorized_keys and import the private key into your NX client. The re-login using your NX client.

TroubleShooting

• starting the nxagent, you get

/usr/NX/bin/nxagent: error while loading shared libraries: libXcomp.so.3: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Download nxcomp from http://software.opensuse.org/package/libXcomp3 and install it. Copy libXcomp.* to /usr/lib.

• during nxsetup, you get

strings: '/usr/bin/nxagent': No such file
Error: Could not find 1.5.0 or 2.[01].0 version string in nxagent. NX 1.5.0 or 2.[01].0 backend is needed for this version of FreeNX.

copy /usr/NX/bin/nxagent to /usr/bin

• The connection fails during the "Negotiating link parameters" step.

Stop the fireWall on the target computer.

• The connection fails after the "Authentication completed" step.

you get an error message like that:

NX> 1004 Error: NX Agent exited with exit status 1.
Can't open /var/lib/nxserver/db/running/sessionId{CBE6C1DE8281C9A77A5F72F05947EE1F}: No such file or directory.
mv: cannot stat `/var/lib/nxserver/db/running/sessionId{CBE6C1DE8281C9A77A5F72F05947EE1F}': No such file or directory

Possible workaround: re-install the NX server using the command

nxsetup

• You get an error when logging in

Test the connection using ssh, there may be no lines of text sent when logging in. So, e.g. not

hello world
$