Installing and Using X2Go for UM T3 Users

This page describes how to get the X2Go client software, install it on Windows (explicitly, it will likely also go on a Mac) and use it to connect to umt3int05, the new SL7 interactive service machine. A nice feature of X2Go is that you can "pause" a session, pack up and go home, then reconnect to that session later on, with all of its shells, etc, still running as you left them. A second nice feature is that it does not use the X11 protocol to reach your laptop, so you do not need to be running an X-Server.

All future SL7 interactive machines that we build will also act as X2Go servers.

Getting the Client

Browse to here and download the X2go client for Windows. Then, just run the installer.

NOTE: As of 10/30/2018, version 4.1.1.1 found here works better than version 4.1.1.2, where "better" is defined as not having problems running root from within the virtual desktop.

You can either set up an ssh key to use with this client, or login via username/password each time. Note that if you use a key, then you must remember to get your initial afs tokens via kinit/aklog before you attempt to connect, and then further remember to renew them at lease once every 30 days. After you have installed the client, browse to this URL to learn how to set up a key, or use another key already on your laptop. Be sure to put any newly generated public key into your Linux .ssh/authorized_keys file.

Configuring the Client

You will need to configure a session to connect to umt3int05.physics.lsa.umich.edu. The following setups are suggested for each of the Tabs in the configuration process.

• Session Tab
  • Session name: choose a name
  • Path: /
  • Host: umt3int05.physics.lsa.umich.edu
  • Login: Your username here
  • SSH port: 22
  • RSA/DSA key location from above
  • Check "Try auto login"
  • Session type is KDE
• Connection Tab
  • Connection speed: as appropriate for your locale, in Physics use LAN
  • Compression Method: 16m-jpeg
  • Image quality: 9
• Input/Output Tab
  • 1600x1000 at 96 DPI (this nicely filled my laptop screen, but was not full screen)
  • "Bidirection copy and paste" checked
  • "Autodetect keyboard settings" checked.
• Media Tab
  • These do not need to be checked, but this also works
  • "Enable sound support" of type "PulseAudio" checked
  • "Client side printing support" checked
• Shared Folders Tab
  • "Use SSH port forwarding to tunnel file system conections through firewalls" checked

Usage Hints

Right click on the "desktop" to open a Konsole shell. Konsole supports multiple tabs, or you can have multiple Konsole windows. This is a full KDE desktop environment, unique to your login.

The Firefox browser can be run from a Konsole shell. I believe the Konquerer also exists, but I have no experience with it.

The X2go client assumes you have write permissions to your home directory. It may be necessary to first ssh to bridge-um using your usual Linux key, and do a kinit/aklog command pair to get your afs tokens. These tokens will be good for 30 days before they expire.

Note on the server install

The server rpms on umt3int05 were downloaded from http://packages.x2go.org/epel/7Server, the main branch. The Heuler branch is the bug fix branch, although not yet production.

The repo looks like this

[root@umt3int05 yum.repos.d]# cat x2go.repo
[x2go-release-epel]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Release Builds)
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/main/$basearch
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=1
protect=0

[x2go-release-epel-source]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Release Builds) - Sources
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/main/SRPM
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=0
protect=0
skip_if_unavailable=1

[x2go-saimaa-epel]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Saimaa ESR Release Builds)
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/saimaa/$basearch
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=0
protect=0

[x2go-saimaa-epel-source]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Saimaa ESR Release Builds) - Sources
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/saimaa/SRPM
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=0
protect=0
skip_if_unavailable=1

[x2go-nightly-epel]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Nightly Builds)
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/heuler/$basearch
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=0
protect=0

[x2go-nightly-epel-source]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Nightly Builds) - Sources
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/heuler/SRPM
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=0
protect=0
skip_if_unavailable=1

[x2go-extras-epel]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Extra Packages)
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/extras/$basearch
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=1
protect=0

[x2go-extras-epel-source]
name=Upstream X2Go EPEL Packages (Extra Packages) - Sources
baseurl=http://packages.x2go.org/epel/$releasever/extras/SRPM
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=http://packages.x2go.org/pub.key
enabled=0
protect=0
skip_if_unavailable=1

-- BobBall - 07 Mar 2018