Remote login over XDMCP

There are two possible ways. With VNC or without VNC. That’s the question.

I decided for second option as I don’t like VNC so much. Any way using VNC has many advantages. You can use it over SSH, it’s cross-platform, de facto standard today so there is no problem with client application.

On other side, XDMCP protocol is here for tens of years even if it has a label of security dangerous service. If you would like to setup it via SSH, continue reading, for example by this one.

How to set remote login

Quite simple. Navigate to /etc/X11/gdm/ and edit custom.conf

[xdmcp]
Enable=true
Port=177

Then only restart GDM service

wendy@honey:~$ pfexec svcadm refresh gdm && pfexec svcadm restart gdm

and log in from another box. You can use the X nested server or Terminal Server Client GTK application.

wendy@bee:~$ pkg info -r SUNWtsclient
Name: SUNWtsclient
Summary: tsclient - A frontend for rdesktop and other remote desktop tools
Description: tsclient - A frontend for rdesktop and other remote desktop tools
Category: Applications/Internet
State: Not installed
Publisher: opensolaris.org
Version: 0.5.11
Build Release: 5.11
Branch: 0.126
Packaging Date: October 22, 2009 9:34:25 PM
Size: 424.92 kB
FMRI: pkg://opensolaris.org/SUNWtsclient@0.5.11,5.11-0.126:20091022T213425Z

I don’t know why but I still prefer the command line way.

wendy@bee:~$ Xephyr -query honey :1

Screen shots

Everybody love screen shots, so here are some.

  

Disabling use ‘exit’ to leave the shell

I don’t know why there always is somebody who thinks he knows things better than you. It has come with build snv_126. There is no reason why CTRL+D should be disabled by default.

The reason of disable CTRL+D is to avoid user from closing terminal by accident. That’s great.

How to fix it

wendy@honey:~$ pfexec sed -i 's/set -o ignoreeof/\#set -o ignoreeof/' /etc/bash/bashrc

Multiple Boot Environments

One of features I really like on OpenSolaris is cloning your system. Especially when doing a system upgrade. There is nothing better than feeling you can safely upgrade your up-and-running fully configured system to newer version and when something went wrong then simply reboot to previous one. Wicked!

This feature is called Boot Environment (BE). You can have as many BE as you wish. To display all your environments, type beadm list:

wendy@honey:~$ beadm list
BE Active Mountpoint Space Policy Created
-- ------ ---------- ----- ------ -------
opensolaris - - 4.10G static 2009-02-18 08:35
devel - - 5.45G static 2009-04-24 15:01
opensolaris-2 - - 6.84G static 2009-09-01 23:16
opensolaris-3 NR / 9.02G static 2009-11-02 19:01

For my destructive tasks I use separated BE so it is almost sate to do anything… Almost…

Any way. If you want play with your system and don’t be afraid of changes you will be doing, create new BE, activate it and reboot.

pfexec beadm create testing
pfexec beadm activate testing
pfexec init 6

If something bad happens, boot some old BE, activate other BE and reboot. Simply shit happens.

For more information see man pages or on-line manual at http://dlc.sun.com/osol/docs/content/IPS/ggfxy.html

PS: Do you have same story how BE saved your ass? Please, share it in comments.

G’Day

Hello,
as on another sites it is usual to say hello world so….. Hello world!

Who I am

It doesn’t matter. Just call me Wendy.

How do I look

Two eyes, two arms…. blond? brunet? It doesn’t matter.

Where I am from

It doesn’t matter. Only what I need is some Internet connection. I am at home everywhere.

What I do

I’m a switcher from Linux, namely from Debian and Ubuntu to OpenSolaris which became my love at first sight. I really really love its technologies, advanced options, capability, the ZFS, zones… simply everything. So what this blog for? Well, I’d like to post somewhere notes which I found during my sorrow and pleasure with OpenSolaris. Feel free to use them on your own risk.

My desktop

My current desktop where I play with OpenSolaris is Dell OptiPlex 755, Intel Core2 Quad Q6700 4@2.66GHz, 8GB RAMM and 4TB storage. Pretty good for play playing, huh?

Favorite commands

ssh, screen, irssi, mutt

Favorite food

Pizza

Favorite drink

Pepsi

Favorite movie

Forrest Gump

Favorite TV show

House M.D.