VGL on WSL2 Ubuntu

[southern.cross]

Has anyone had success in getting VGL to work on any version of WSL2 Ubuntu? 

The VGL installation is not making /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key

The following told me to use lightdm: https://github.com/VirtualGL/virtualgl/issues/65

I successfully completed:

sudo systemctl disable gdm3

sudo apt install lightdm

But  not,

sudo systemctl enable lightdm

I get:

root@SEDACS29L:~# systemctl enable lightdm

Synchronizing state of lightdm.service with SysV service script with /lib/systemd/systemd-sysv-install.

Executing: /lib/systemd/systemd-sysv-install enable lightdm

The unit files have no installation config (WantedBy=, RequiredBy=, Also=,

Alias= settings in the [Install] section, and DefaultInstance= for template

units). This means they are not meant to be enabled using systemctl.

Possible reasons for having this kind of units are:

• A unit may be statically enabled by being symlinked from another unit's

  .wants/ or .requires/ directory.

• A unit's purpose may be to act as a helper for some other unit which has

  a requirement dependency on it.

• A unit may be started when needed via activation (socket, path, timer,

  D-Bus, udev, scripted systemctl call, ...).

• In case of template units, the unit is meant to be enabled with some

  instance name specified.

If I proceed and try to run,

/opt/VirtualGL/bin/vglserver_config -config -s

even after a wsl --shutdown and relaunch I cannot get /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key to be created.

Google searches have not shown any results of VGL being used with WLS2 Ubuntu... Is this not a supported use case?

Thanks in advance.

[DRC]

Using WSL as a VirtualGL server platform isn't officially supported, because it doesn't make sense in production VirtualGL environments to use a Windows workstation as a virtual Linux server.  However, there is no technical reason why it shouldn't work.

Issue #65 (the necessity to use LightDM on Ubuntu 16.04 and later) was worked around in VirtualGL 2.6.2, so that issue is no longer relevant in the latest releases of VirtualGL.

I need to reproduce the issue before we can proceed, so please specify the version of Ubuntu you are using.  Also, please make sure you are using the latest release of VirtualGL.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VirtualGL User Discussion/Support" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to virtualgl-use...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/virtualgl-users/34f961d5-dcad-4a07-9624-1c36512faf88n%40googlegroups.com.

[southern.cross]

Thanks for the response.

I've tried on two different machines:

(1)  Windows 10 Pro 20H2 Build 19042.928, with WSL2 Ubuntu 20.04. 

(2) Windows 10 Home insider program Build 21370.co_release.210424-1611, insider Developer program Nvidia Driver 470.25  (the combination of these two give GPU pass through abilities), with WSL2 Ubuntu 20.04.

They both have the same behavior where /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key is never generated.

I'm hoping to get this to work as our team is looking to standardize on VGL for our development process. Each team member has a different computer setup (some linux, some Mac, some Windows/WSL2, some local, some remote). Hopefully we can get it working on WSL2...

Thanks again.

[southern.cross]

Sorry. Forgot to mention. I'm using VGL 2.6.5 and hoping to use TurboVNC 2.2.6

[DRC]

It definitely should work with Ubuntu 20.04. I assume that you're using
our official DEB packages for VirtualGL 2.6.5 and not packages from any
other provider. I would suggest the following diagnostic procedure:

1. Re-enable GDM but don't start it yet.

2. Re-run vglserver_config.

3. Verify that /usr/share/gdm/greeter/autostart/virtualgl.desktop exists
with the following contents:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Exec=/opt/VirtualGL/bin/vglgenkey

4. Edit /opt/VirtualGL/bin/vglgenkey and change the $XAUTH command lines
as follows:

$XAUTH -f /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key generate $DISPLAY . trusted
timeout 0 >/tmp/out 2>&1 ||
$XAUTH -f /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key add $DISPLAY . `$XAUTH
list | awk '{print $3}' | uniq` >/tmp/out2 2>&1
echo Success >/tmp/out3

5. Start GDM and check the contents of /tmp/out*. /tmp/out should say

xauth: file /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key does not exist

and /tmp/out3 should say

Success

If /tmp/out2 exists, then post its contents.

>> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/virtualgl-users/34f961d5-dcad-4a07-9624-1c36512faf88n%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "VirtualGL User Discussion/Support" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
> an email to virtualgl-use...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:virtualgl-use...@googlegroups.com>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/virtualgl-users/437080c3-c011-492b-ba07-90ceb62f2ccdn%40googlegroups.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/virtualgl-users/437080c3-c011-492b-ba07-90ceb62f2ccdn%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

[southern.cross]

(1) systemd does not exist so I can't use systemctl to enable but not start. So, I've been using 'service gdm3 start/stop'. So, I stopped gdm3 and proceeded to (2)

(2) ran as expected

(3)  /usr/share/gdm/greeter/autostart/virtualgl.desktop gets generated with correct contents

(4) made the changes. To verify, here is the output of "cat  /opt/VirtualGL/bin/vglgenkey"

<snip>

root@SEDACS29L:/tmp# cat  /opt/VirtualGL/bin/vglgenkey

#!/bin/sh

XAUTH=xauth

if [ -x /usr/X11R6/bin/xauth ]; then

        XAUTH=/usr/X11R6/bin/xauth

         2>&1 echo "X11R6" > /tmp/out4

fi

if [ -x /usr/openwin/bin/xauth ]; then

        XAUTH=/usr/openwin/bin/xauth

         2>&1 echo "openwin" /tmp/out5

fi

if [ ! -d /etc/opt/VirtualGL ]; then

        mkdir -p /etc/opt/VirtualGL

         2>&1 echo "mkdir" > /tmp/out6

fi

if [ -f /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key ]; then

        rm /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key

         2>&1 echo "rm" > /tmp/out7

fi

$XAUTH -f /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key generate $DISPLAY . trusted timeout 0 >/tmp/out 2>&1 ||

        $XAUTH -f /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key add $DISPLAY . `$XAUTH list | awk '{print $3}' | uniq` >/tmp/out2 2>&1 echo Success >/tmp/out3

chmod 644 /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key

</snip>

(5) I used "service gdm3 start"

No "out*" files were created in /tmp

So, my understanding of how to enable, start and stop services in WSL2 seems to be lacking.

If I run gdm directly by running "/usr/sbin/gdm3" I still get no /tmp/out* files

Running:  echo "$(cat  /opt/VirtualGL/bin/vglgenkey)"

produced two /tmp/out* files:

/tmp/out  ==> "xauth:  file /etc/opt/VirtualGL/vgl_xauth_key does not exist"

/tmp/out7  ==> ""

# echo $DISPLAY

<my IP>:0.0

thoughts?

[DRC]

If systemctl doesn't exist, then that's not exactly a standard Ubuntu configuration, and it doesn't surprise me that multiple things are broken from VirtualGL's point of view.  I'm also suspicious of your DISPLAY environment variable.  It's uncommon in this day and age for X servers to allow TCP communications, so your DISPLAY should be something like :0.0 rather than <IP_address>:0.0.  I'm happy to investigate this further on a paid support basis, but since I don't personally use WSL, there unfortunately isn't anything else I can do within the context of community support unless I can reproduce the issue using a standard Ubuntu 20.04 installation (which I can't.)

DRC

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/virtualgl-users/acd857f4-1af3-4ed2-9b71-41aa4ac57d60n%40googlegroups.com.

[southern.cross]

Understood.

No systemctl support was a Microsoft decision. Google it... you'll see a decent amount of chatter on it.

The non-standard DISPLAY is also related to Microsoft decisions. That's the display that I have to use when doing X11forwarding. I can switch it back to :1 for the sake of trying VGL but it won't display anything. Again, a Microsoft decision.

[southern.cross]

What's your preferred method to reach you to discuss paid support options?

[DRC]

You can e-mail me directly from here:

https://virtualgl.org/About/Contact

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/virtualgl-users/c7fd341e-f0b6-46db-88f7-466196c60ab1n%40googlegroups.com.

[Mutatedtheory]

I'm not sure if the problem is not simply that the gpu hardware is just not available within WSL.

In WSL2, there seems to be some progress done originally by Nvidia (on selected drivers), followed by Intel and AMD to give acces to the graphics hardware within WSL. So maybe with a compatible graphics card and a proper configuration, VirtualGL server on windows via WSL2 can be made possible...