Changes

In the previous chapter ([[Displaying Remote Access to the Ubuntu Linux Applications Remotely (X11 Forwarding)Desktop]]) we looked at how to display the entire Ubuntu Linux desktop on a remote computer. Whilst this works well if you actually need to remotely display the entire desktop, it could be considered overkill if all you want to do is display a single application. In this chapter we will look at displaying individual applications on a remote system.

In order to run an application on one Linux system, and have it display on another system there are a couple of pre-requisites. Firstly, the system on which the application is to be displayed must be running an X server. If the system is a UNIX or Linux based system with a desktop running then this is no problem. If the system is running windowsWindows, however, then you must install an X server on it before you can display applications from a remote system. A number of commercial and free Windows based X servers are available for this purpose and a web search should provide you with a list of options.

Secondly , the system on which the application is being run (as opposed to the system which the application is to be displayed) must be configured to allow SSH access. Details on configuring SSH on an Ubuntu Linux system can be found in the chapter entitled [[Configuring Ubuntu Linux Remote Access using SSH]]. Finally, SSH must be configured to allow X11 Forwarding. TO To verify this load the /etc/ssh/ssh_config file into an editor and make sure that the following directive is set:

The first step is in remotely displaying an application is to move to the system where the application is to be displayed. At this system, ssh into into the remote system so that you have a command prompt. This can be achieved using the ssh command. When using the ssh command we need to use the -X flag to tell ssh that we plan to tunnel X traffic through the tunnel:

When run, the above command should run the ''xclock '' utility on the remote system, but display the output on the local system.: <pre>xclock&</pre>