[SOLVED] Remmina Remote Desktop Client

[JerryF]

Hello all,

To preface, I set up my partner's desktop with Mint 19 Xfce. He had (and still does have on a separate disk) 18.3 Cinnamon.

I installed Remmina a few weeks ago and was able to connect easily to the desktop (18.3 Cinnamon) from my laptop (19 Xfce). I used the VNC option by typing in the desktop's IP address.

Now that the desktop is running 19 Xfce, I can no longer connect to it. From the laptop's Remmina, when I click on "Browse the network to find a VNC server", the desktop does not show, only the laptop. From the desktop's Remmina, it is the same result---the desktop does not show, only the laptop.

Even if I type in the desktop's IP address (which was what I had been using when it worked), Remmina won't connect.

The desktop can connect to the laptop using Remmina.

I can ping both computers each way. Turning off the firewall doesn't help either.

Can anyone help?

Thanks.

[Neil Edmond]

Not sure about this, but I seem to recall reading that Mint 19 no longer includes a VNC server by default. If that is true, the simple fix would be to install one.

[JerryF]

Not sure about this, but I seem to recall reading that Mint 19 no longer includes a VNC server by default. If that is true, the simple fix would be to install one.

Thanks for the reply. Forgot to mention that the desktop can connect to the laptop. So, this begs the question: why can the desktop connect to the laptop but not the other way around?

[Neil Edmond]

Oh...well...dunno. I guess that blows my theory. I don't really know much about the subject, though I have used VNC for remote desktop and it's performance was/is stellar, I just don't like the way it handles multiple monitors. So I have switched, almost exclusively, to AnyDesk... much more flexible.

[smurphos]

Oh...well...dunno. I guess that blows my theory.

No Neil you are absolutely right. The host machine needs a VNC server and the client needs a VNC client. Remmina is the client. On Mint 18.3 Vino is pre-installed as the server (Desktop Sharing in the menu).

On Mint 19 there is no pre-installed VNC server so that machine will need one set up and installed.

viewtopic.php?f=157&t=272337

Why no VNC server in 19? - Gnome made Vino much harder to use outside of the Gnome3 desktop.

[JerryF]

Hi smurphos,

Thanks for the link. There were a couple of solutions so I'm not sure which.

Should I set up vino or x11vnc?

[JerryF]

I was making some headway. I installed x11vnc using this guide:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/VNC/Servers

I followed this section and performed these commands to see if I could connect:

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x11vnc -storepasswd

It will respond with:

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Enter VNC password:
Verify password:
Write password to /home/USERNAME/.vnc/passwd?  [y]/n y
Password written to: /home/USERNAME/.vnc/passwd

I then ran:

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x11vnc

When I did this, the laptop was able to connect to the desktop. So I continued setting up the service to run automatically when booting:

Have x11vnc start automatically via systemd in any environment (Vivid+)

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sudo nano /lib/systemd/system/x11vnc.service

Entered this into nano and wrote out, then exited nano
[Unit]
Description=Start x11vnc at startup.
After=multi-user.target

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/bin/x11vnc -auth guess -forever -loop -noxdamage -repeat -rfbauth /home/USERNAME/.vnc/passwd -rfbport 5900 -shared

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Then ran:

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sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable x11vnc.service

The service runs on both computers. Then when I try to connect to either the desktop or laptop, Remmina prompts me with a password.

I enter the password I set up with

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x11vnc -storepasswd

but it gets rejected "Authentication failed. Trying to reconnect..."

Argggh!

[JerryF]

I found my mistake!

For the service to start, I forgot to change /home/USERNAME/.vnc/passwd to the actual user's name.

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ExecStart=/usr/bin/x11vnc -auth guess -forever -loop -noxdamage -repeat -rfbauth /home/USERNAME/.vnc/passwd -rfbport 5900 -shared

Now Remmina works!

[smurphos]

Sorry for the delayed reply - glad you got it up and running..

[JerryF]

Thanks to your advice about x11vnc I got it going.

It's unfortunate that something like this has to be difficult.