Faster SSH/x11 forwarding w/o installing software on the server

sshx11-forwardingxorg

Does anybody know any way to accelerate X11 forwarding on SSH, except for using a faster cypher and compression, without installing any software on the server?
In my case I do not have any permission to install software on the server. It belongs to my university. However, I would like GUI programs that run on the server and displayed on my home computer to be actually usable.

Best Answer

Tunneling X11 through ssh is quite bandwidth expensive and the X protocol is not ideal for high RTT links. You may simply not have enough bandwidth, or too much latency, for it to be usable.

You seem to have already narrowed down the options you have:

  • options needing you to install software on both ends (either an X protocol optimizer such as x2go, FreeNX or others, or using another protocol than X over SSH such as VNC or Remote Desktop)

  • using compression (or not, it should be better with but try both): option -C

  • using a less expensive cipher protocol such as BlowFish-CBC or arcfour (the second is less secure): add option -c blowfish-cbc

The only one you seem to have missed is if your X program is Firefox, in which case it seems that setting network.http.pipelining and using ssh multiplexing could make a difference.

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