Enabling VNC

[Kevin J. Cummings]

Jeremy Conlin wrote:
> On 2004-10-20 15:27:23 -0400, "Kevin J. Cummings" 
> <cummings at kjchome.homeip.net> said:
> 
>>
>> You need to put a password in your password file.  Look at the 
>> vncpasswd command in order to do this.  Make sure you do this as 
>> "root" so that it writes it to the correct file.
>>
>> After that, you should only need to restart the X server.  You need to 
>> make sure that it shuts down entirely, then restart it.  "telinit 3" 
>> should be useful if you're running at init level 5.  Then make sure 
>> with "killall X" as root after you login to one of your consoles.  
>> Then "telinit 5" should restart X for you....
> 
> 
> Well, I ended up rebooting the machine and didn't need to restart the X 
> server.  I can log into the machine via ssh with X11 forwarding and then 
> issue
> 
> vncviewer localhost:1

No, if the machine you logged into is running at initlevel 5, and you 
are trying to connect to the console X server, you should use:

vncviewer localhost:0

I'm very copnfused by your insistance of connecting to DISPLAY :1.
I thought you were trying to control your console X11 session?

> and it asks for the password and starts to export the desktop, but it 
> fails.  I see the Fedora splash screen and then there is a window 
> displaying an error message about some Gnome manager that isn't 
> working.  The screen turns black and I can't do anything.  If I log out 
> of ssh and then back in and do vncviewer...  then I just get a black 
> screen after entering my password.  Is there something else I need to do?

If you were running a virtual X11 desktop via the vncserver service, 
then the :1 would be approprite, but then you have already configured 
that vncserver as a particular user, requiring a password file in 
~/.vnc/passwd.  If you are seeing a "splash screen", I don't think 
you're seeing a virtual X11 desktop, since it'd already be "logged in" 
(mine does when I enable it).  You might be connecting to a screensaver 
though.  I don't think 3D screensavers work to well over VNC.  And 
depending on your network connection, it can take a *long* time to 
transfer 24bit graphics over dialup lines.  Your screen will look black 
until enough data has been transfered to be displayed by your vncviewer.

I don't have any problem running vncviewer to my system either through 
localhost, or from my wife's Win98 machine.

Though, when I run it through "localhost", I get the cascading window 
effect of the entire screen looking like the vncviewer titlebar 
repeating towards the SE corner of my screen, each with its own "mouse 
pointer".  Luckily, I can close the bottommost window in the NE corner.  B^)

> Thanks again,
> Jeremy

-- 
Kevin J. Cummings
kjchome at rcn.com
cummings at kjchome.homeip.net
cummings at kjc386.framingham.ma.us