Bug#385664: freenx: NXClient doesn't start properly
Nadim Shaikli
Version: 0.4.4+0.4.5-3
Severity: normal
Tags: patch
My NXClient starts, authenticates, talks to the remote freenx and seems
to have gone through all the necessary steps yet I didn't get connected
and got timed-out or "lost connection" errors [1] (the NXClient doesn't
start a new window or a virtual desktop, etc) after much looking I finally
guessed that it might have been a fonts problem on the nxserver side and
I was right. Many have complained about this (such as in this post/thread
[2]) yet there hasn't been much of a discussion regarding how to address
this problem. A solution is presented below.
FONT Solution
-------------
In your /etc/nxserver/node.conf add the following lines (or replace
the relevant empty comments sections with),
XSERVER_CONF="/etc/X11/xorg.conf"
AGENT_EXTRA_OPTIONS_X="-fp $(echo $(grep -v '^ *#' $XSERVER_CONF | grep FontPath | awk '{print $2}' | sed -r "s/^[\"']|[\"']$//g") | sed 's/ /,/g')"
Note the XSERVER_CONF could be what is noted above or "/etc/X11/XF86Config-4"
NO COLOR Solution
-----------------
If your NXClient finally does start yet you can't seem to see the proper
colors (or you end-up with a black-on-black screen) do the following,
sudo ln -s /etc/X11/rgb.txt /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb.txt
The nxagent (part of freenx) has /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb.txt hard-coded
instead of providing an option to point to where it needs to be (possibly
via the node.conf file).
I've spent close to 4-days (on-n-off) on this and I'm sure there are
others that might appreciate these pointers/solutions.
NOTE: the meta key within the NXClient doesn't seem to work
(but that is minor related to what is noted above).
[1] "Error: Lost connection to peer proxy on FD#10"
[2] http://mail.kde.org/pipermail/freenx-knx/2006-July/003676.html
Regards,
- Nadim
-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
APT prefers testing
APT policy: (500, 'testing')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.16-2-686
Locale: LANG=en_US, LC_CTYPE=en_US (charmap=ISO-8859-1)
Versions of packages freenx depends on:
ii adduser 3.97 Add and remove users and groups
ii bash 3.1-5 The GNU Bourne Again SHell
ii debconf [debconf-2.0] 1.5.3 Debian configuration management sy
ii expect 5.43.0-7 A program that can automate intera
ii netcat 1.10-32 TCP/IP swiss army knife
ii nxagent 1.4.92+1.5.0-4 NoMachine NX - nesting X server wi
ii ssh 1:4.3p2-3 Secure shell client and server (tr
ii xbase-clients 1:7.1.ds-3 miscellaneous X clients
ii xfonts-base 1:1.0.0-3 standard fonts for X
freenx recommends no packages.
-- debconf information:
freenx/configured: true
freenx/no_shadow:
* freenx/key_type: NoMachine Keys
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Martin Michlmayr
> Package: freenx
This package doesn't appear to be in Debian. Do you know where you
obtained it from? What does
dpkg -p freenx | grep Maintainer
say?
--
Martin Michlmayr
http://www.cyrius.com/
Nadim Shaikli
> * Nadim Shaikli [2006-09-01 17:05]:
> > Package: freenx
>
> This package doesn't appear to be in Debian. Do you know where you
> obtained it from? What does
> dpkg -p freenx | grep Maintainer
> say?
It notes the following info - Stefan Lippers-Hollmann <s....@gmx.de>.
The package is available on a number of non-official repositories/sites;
I got mine with,
deb http://packages.debianbase.de/testing/i386/nx/ ./
yet there are other locations such as the one listed on the
debian wiki page [1].
Note the changes listed on that wiki page are also required for
freenx to work properly. I mailed a couple of people about
updating the wiki page with the info noted in this bug report
(you might want to follow-up with the wiki page's maintainer
as well).
[1] http://wiki.debian.org/freenx
Regards,
- Nadim
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Stefan Lippers-Hollmann
On Saturday 02 September 2006 18:32, you wrote:
> --- Martin Michlmayr <t...@cyrius.com> wrote:
> > * Nadim Shaikli [2006-09-01 17:05]:
> > > Package: freenx
> >
> > This package doesn't appear to be in Debian. Do you know where you
> > obtained it from? What does
> > dpkg -p freenx | grep Maintainer
> > say?
>
> It notes the following info - Stefan Lippers-Hollmann <s....@gmx.de>.
Since these packages aren't in debian and won't become ready for debian in
the etch timeframe (if it will be possible to get them into a releasable
state for etch+1 remains to be seen [1]), the debian BTS is probably not
the best place for discussing unofficial packages. A more appropriate list
would probably be [2], [3] or the listed package maintainer directly (wich
would be me).
> The package is available on a number of non-official repositories/sites;
> I got mine with,
>
> deb http://packages.debianbase.de/testing/i386/nx/ ./
I'm in no way affiliated with that repository, but a short look at the
*.changes files suggest that those may be a very outdated rebuild of my
source packages, definately in no way X.org 7 compatible and
lacking quite a lot of changes done over the last year.
> yet there are other locations such as the one listed on the
> debian wiki page [1].
I'm not tracking testing, but sid packages should be installable on testing
right now.
http://debian.tu-bs.de/project/kanotix/unstable.README or [4], [5]
http://debian.tu-bs.de/project/kanotix/stable.README
> Note the changes listed on that wiki page are also required for
> freenx to work properly. I mailed a couple of people about
> updating the wiki page with the info noted in this bug report
> (you might want to follow-up with the wiki page's maintainer
> as well).
The proposed changes are not sufficient for proper NX 2.0 compatibility and
will result in an installation that's neither stable for NX 1.5, nor NX 2.0
connections; a NX 1.5 client is the better option for now.
Probably more important might be the question why I haven't updated to NX
2.0 yet...
There are actually quite some reasons why this hasn't happened besides the
ubiquitous time related issues:
- the changes to the core components of NX 2.0 are rather small in
comparison to NX 1.5, but contain some compatibility traps which affect
other dependent packages. It doesn't "fix" the most important issues like
64 bit safety or "proper" X.org 7/ FHS compatibility either.
- recently qtnx as the first FOSS (GPL) client for NX (based on qt4) has
seen its initial release [6], which isn't yet compatible to NX 2.0 [7].
- This week 2X Software Ltd. <http://2x.com> has released a complete NX 1.5
based client (qt3 based) and server suite (perl based) licensed under the
GPL [8], [9] (sources), initial contacts seem to be very promising.
Although I do have private NX 2.0 packages for testing, I currently prefer
concentrating on fixing the remaining X.org 7/ FHS related issues (proper
xkb/ rgb.txt/ font handling, which basically means getting XFree86 4.3 FHS
compliant...) and preparing qtnx packages (NX ==1.5 dependency for the time
being) while evaluating 2X Software's codebase (switching is technically
possible at any time), instead of being forced to add an epoche later.
Other important aspects are reworking the build system from scratch,
splitting the sources into proper/ self sustaining packages/ tarballs [1]
and trying to reduce the amount of forked code by integrating NX related
patches to the original upstream authors, where the upstream license allows
the inclusion of GPLed code, unfortuneately this isn't the case for X.org
itself.
Patches, packaging help and comments very appreciated [2], there's a long
way ahead until #255850 [10] can be closed.
> [1] http://wiki.debian.org/freenx
>
> Regards,
>
> - Nadim
>
[1] still current, although it seems to be easier to integrate patches into
2X Software's code base [8], [9]:
http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-nx-group/2005-October/000016.html
[2] http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/pkg-nx-group (packaging
efforts to get nx packages ready for debian, largely stalled due to
upstream build related issues)
[3] https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/freenx-knx (general NX related
questions)
[4] http://kanotix.com/debian/pool/main/n/nx/
[5] http://kanotix.com/debian/pool/main/f/freenx/
[6]
http://blog.gwright.org.uk/articles/2006/08/23/qtnx-ready-for-public-consumption
[7] http://blog.gwright.org.uk/articles/2006/08/27/qtnx-and-nxproxy
[8] http://2x.com/news/linuxterminalserver.htm
[9] http://code.2x.com/linuxterminalserver
[10] http://bugs.debian.org/255850
Regards
Stefan Lippers-Hollmann
Nadim Shaikli
> Since these packages aren't in debian and won't become ready for debian in
> the etch timeframe (if it will be possible to get them into a releasable
> state for etch+1 remains to be seen [1]), the debian BTS is probably not
> the best place for discussing unofficial packages. A more appropriate list
> would probably be [2], [3] or the listed package maintainer directly (wich
> would be me).
Noted though this info should really be listed on the debian wiki freenx
page (http://wiki.debian.org/freenx), no ? The debian freenx wiki seems
to be lacking a great deal of info especially which you had just noted
with your recent reply. If someone were to start on what I embarked upon
a week or so ago I'm not sure he/she would come to realize all this info
as it isn't pointed to from anywhere...
> > The package is available on a number of non-official repositories/sites;
> > I got mine with,
> >
> > deb http://packages.debianbase.de/testing/i386/nx/ ./
>
> I'm in no way affiliated with that repository, but a short look at the
> *.changes files suggest that those may be a very outdated rebuild of my
> source packages, definately in no way X.org 7 compatible and
> lacking quite a lot of changes done over the last year.
That and others are listed on the "official" freenx homepage,
http://freenx.berlios.de/download.php
maybe that page should be updated as well (and a link added to point to
the debian freenx wiki page).
> > Note the changes listed on that wiki page are also required for
> > freenx to work properly. I mailed a couple of people about
> > updating the wiki page with the info noted in this bug report
> > (you might want to follow-up with the wiki page's maintainer
> > as well).
>
> The proposed changes are not sufficient for proper NX 2.0 compatibility and
> will result in an installation that's neither stable for NX 1.5, nor NX 2.0
> connections; a NX 1.5 client is the better option for now.
Well it works fine for me (with all the changes noted) using a 2.0 NXClient.
Keep in mind that whomever is interested in NX is most likely to download
the 2.0 client as that is the one listed and propagated by the nomachine.com
homepage (1.5 NX clients are very hard to find though that is not a central
issue).
> Probably more important might be the question why I haven't updated to NX
> 2.0 yet...
As noted, do please share this info somewhere hopefully on the debian
freenx wiki page (note that a google search for 'freenx' doesn't even
list the debian NX list). Do keep in mind also that most of those asking
questions on the web and requesting assistance are using Windows Clients
to connect to linux servers - as such they have very differing needs and
are forced to use newer 2.0 clients (more likely than not). You are
addressing this from a linux to linux point-of-view which is perfectly
fine, it would be wise though to potentially address the other users'
needs as there are many (like me) who continue to look for a proper NX
server to be used with a 2.0 windows client.
Should I continue to use my hacks or revert to using what you have in
the repository as a starting point ?
Thanks for your complete email and prompt reply.