Posted by Vince Wadhwani on Jun 21, 2006

I use FreeNX a lot. It's faster than VNC and works through the same port as ssh which means that it's very convenient for me. Also, unlike VNC on linux, it will automatically log you in to a desktop session. It's ideal for people who remotely manage linux boxes and need a GUI. Unfortunately, I seem to have run into a lot of problems getting it running lately. I can't get it working on AMD64 at all, but finally found a repository that made install on x86 a snap. Here's how:

1. First, add this repository to your /etc/apt/sources.list

deb http://free.linux.hp.com/~brett/seveas/freenx breezy-seveas freenx

2. Next, run apt-get update followed by apt-get dist-upgrade

3. You might get a warning about the secure key missing for the above repo but don't worry about it for now. Instead just run one huge command to get things properly downloaded and installed:

sudo apt-get install freenx nxclient libxcomp1 libxcompext1 nxagent nxdesktop nxlibs nxproxy nxviewer

4. Debconf will start up and query you as to which type of key you want to use.. personally I just use the nomachine key, but your mileage may vary.

Here's a great thread on the Ubuntu Forum where I gleaned the above information from. If you need extra help, it's a good thread (and forum) to visit.