Ubuntu – How to use Ubuntu 18.04 on VNC without display attached

18.04remote desktopvnc

I know that there are previous topics on this issue, but most of them focuses on other versions, which have different configuration options or try to solve it by installing Xfce or other custom display manager.

I want to use my computer as a home server, but I like to connect to it and access the default graphical interface on VNC. I use vino for the VNC.

When a display is attached, I can access the computer fine. When it is missing I can also connect, but only get an empty X (?) screen with a cursor and Gnome isn’t running.

xrandr says Can’t open display. How can I add a virtual display to be used and shared among multiple remote sessions?

Best Answer

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/bionic/+source/xserver-xorg-video-dummy

sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-video-dummy

How to use: Add Fake Display when No Monitor is Plugged In

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – ubuntu 18.04 connect to login screen over VNC

Ubuntu 18.04 switched from LightDM to GDM3. Connecting to the login screen with VNC while using GDM3 is currently not possible. The easiest way to get this VNC functionality back is to simply switch back from GDM3 to LightDM.

LightDM is still being actively developed and used by many Linux distributions including some other flavors of Ubuntu. So no worries there.

Install LightDM

apt install lightdm

Should you for some reason come to regret switching to LightDM:

dpkg-reconfigure gdm3

Once you have LightDM installed and configured as your default greeter..

Install x11vnc from packages

apt install x11vnc

Create the file /etc/systemd/system/x11vnc.service

# Description: Custom Service Unit file
# File: /etc/systemd/system/x11vnc.service
[Unit]
Description="x11vnc"
Requires=display-manager.service
After=display-manager.service

[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/x11vnc -loop -nopw -xkb -repeat -noxrecord -noxfixes -noxdamage -forever -rfbport 5900 -display :0 -auth guess
ExecStop=/usr/bin/killall x11vnc
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=2

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable the x11vnc service

 systemctl enable x11vnc.service

This assumes screen :0 represents your monitor and binds x11vnc to that monitor instead of a session. If you do not have a monitor (headless) you can install the xserver-xorg-video-dummy package and use the dummy driver to configure a virtual :0 screen for you.

Side notes

Incase you are using virt-manager (which also enables VNC on 127.0.0.1:5900) you may want to bind x11vnc to your LAN IP (-listen 10.0.0.1)
The parameters used to start x11vnc tell it not to ask for an additional password (-nopw)

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – ubuntu 18.04 connect to login screen over VNC

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