Sample pen to run applications through X-forwarding on a server on the Internet

Hi, Habr!

Today we would like to share our groundwork and hypotheses regarding the application of good old ideas to modern trends of the Web, in particular, Cloud Computing. You probably already noticed a lack of some power or other parameters of your personal computer, and even more so, each user is faced with the question of using the Internet safely for your computer and your own data. For Windows users, there is also a problem with viruses that constantly try to leak onto a computer when visiting websites and reading mail. We offer to plunge a little into the future and provide some outside view on remote launch of applications on a web server via X-forwarding.

Why we decided to offer you this

You are given the opportunity to run some applications from a remote server. The goal is simple - we give you a "play" with applications that are running somewhere not on your computer to analyze the health and suitability of use on an ongoing basis.

Necessary software

In order to log into our server and you have Windows, you will need Xming ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/xming ) and OpenSSH for Windows ( http://sshwindows.sourceforge.net/ ). In another case (Linux, MacOSX), nothing is required to be installed. You can also use PuTTY to connect to the server via SSH. To speed up the process, you can download the installers for these programs in the archive from our server: http://datapoliten.ru/files/f7/ab/f7aba2ac04b64ba3b40679175e367054/xming-sshwindows.zip . The installation order is not important, no special settings are required.

Login Procedure

As a precaution (we do not want to let anyone get on our server), we do not give anonymous access to run applications. To get a login with a password to enter the server, please leave a comment on this topic, or write a personal message, we will try to send you a password within a few minutes. If you are not a Habr user, but you have friends on Habr who can confirm this, we will also issue you a login with a password.

Linux or MacOS

If you have Linux or MacOS X, then to enter our server, just enter the following command in the console (for MacOS X users, the X11 server will start automatically): or to start remote firefox and OpenOffice.org, respectively. If you need input in Russian in a running remote application (or some other), it may be quite simple to switch the system layout on your computer. If this does not help, MacOS X users can be advised: 1) go to the X11.app settings and put a checkmark “follow the system keyboard layout” in the “input” tab 2) if paragraph 1) does not help, install a newer version of X11 from the XQuartz website : http://xquartz.macosforge.org/trac/wiki

ssh -YC ваш_логин@212.158.161.59 firefox



ssh -YC ваш_логин@212.158.161.59 openoffice.org-3.0.0







(unfortunately, the installation requires downloading about 80 MB and logging out of the account)

If you are a Linux user, I, unfortunately, cannot help you. You may find the answer in the comments of respected Habrausers.

Windows

If you have Windows, then you can use a pre-prepared template in the archive called remote-login.xlaunch, which you need to edit (click "change" in the context menu) and change the desired login in it, as well as, possibly, the path to ssh .exe, if your Windows is not on the C: drive or the path to Program Files is different from “C: \ Program Files (x86) \” (the source file was created in the 64-bit edition of Windows), you need to point to ssh.exe, which is located in the folder путь_до_program_files\OpenSSH\. In addition to the login, you can change the command to run on the server: to launch OpenOffice.org, enter openoffice.org-3.0.0 in the corresponding input field (instead of firefox by default).



If you downloaded everything separately, then the template for XMing can also be downloaded from our server:http://datapoliten.ru/files/f7/ab/f7aba2ac04b64ba3b40679175e367054/remote-login.xlaunch .

After the file has been edited (and you just clicked “next-> next-> next ...”), the SSH client should start up with a request to enter a password. The first time you log in, you will be traditionally asked whether the RSA (DSA) fingerprint matches the one on our server (8a: 0a: be: 7c: 14: 9b: 67: 3e: 7c: cf: 5d: 18: 42: 92: 20: 3d), enter yes. If you see words about .Xauthority, X11 identification, you can safely skip them - this does not play a special role. Also, the X-server will most likely ask your firewall about further actions - allow XMing to create a listening socket (any X-client on the remote server connects to it via SSH).

To switch the layout, the Caps Lock key is configured, the default layout is English.

Installed Applications

Currently, firefox and openoffice.org-3.0.0 are available, although you can run GNOME (gnome-session), view downloaded PDFs and more, but it’s interesting to get comments from you about the operation of these applications using X- forwarding over the internet.