Anyone got VNC with Ubuntu gnome?

[lattice0]

I followed several tutorials about VNC servers with gnome. I was trying to have a simple Ubuntu desktop experience inside a lima ubuntu VM. For some reason, I tried everything and I only get a gray screen when connecting through VNC. Installing XFCE stuff instead of gnome works. Here's a complete script that will create the VM and install the VNC stuff on it (password setting does not work for some reason so you set when the script runs)

#!/usr/bin/env bash

set -x
set -e

MACHINE_NAME="${MACHINE_NAME:=ubuntu_test_1}"
CPU_COUNT="${CPU_COUNT:=8}"
MEMORY="${MEMORY:=10}"
VNC_PORT="${VNC_PORT:=5901}" 

limactl start \
  --name=$MACHINE_NAME \
  --cpus=$CPU_COUNT \
  --memory=$MEMORY \
  --tty=false \
  --set ".portForwards += [{'guestPort': $VNC_PORT, 'hostPort': 5901}]" \
  --set '.mounts=[]' \
  template://ubuntu
  
limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME sudo apt update

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME sudo sed -i "/#\$nrconf{restart} = 'i';/s/.*/\$nrconf{restart} = 'a';/" /etc/needrestart/needrestart.conf

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME sudo apt install -y gnome-session gnome-terminal

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME mkdir -p /home/${USER}.linux/.vnc/

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME /bin/bash -c "echo \#\!/bin/sh\n/usr/bin/gnome-session > /home/${USER}.linux/.vnc/xstartup"

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME /bin/bash -c "chmod +x /home/${USER}.linux/.vnc/xstartup"

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME sudo apt install -y ubuntu-desktop

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME sudo apt install -y tigervnc-standalone-server

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME vncserver -kill :1 || true

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME /bin/bash -c "echo '123456' | vncpasswd -f > /home/${USER}.linux/.vnc/passwd"

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME /bin/bash -c "echo '#!/bin/sh
# Start Gnome 3 Desktop 
[ -x /etc/vnc/xstartup ] && exec /etc/vnc/xstartup
[ -r \$HOME/.Xresources ] && xrdb \$HOME/.Xresources
vncconfig -iconic &
dbus-launch --exit-with-session gnome-session & '> /home/${USER}.linux/.vnc/xstartup"

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME sudo apt-get install -y gnome-panel gnome-settings-daemon metacity nautilus gnome-terminal dbus-x11

limactl shell $MACHINE_NAME vncserver -localhost -geometry 1440x900

[balajiv113]

Hi,
There is already a display type vnc supported for QEMU driver.
Is your use case is to have a separate one ???

[afbjorklund]

it uses the VNC syntax, so that would be localhost:1 (for TCP port 5901)

the default is to try the first 10 ports, to find a free one:

  vnc:
    # VNC display, e.g.,"to=L", "host:d", "unix:path", "none"
    # By convention the TCP port is 5900+d, connections from any host.
    # 🟢 Builtin default: "127.0.0.1:0,to=9"
    display: null

[lattice0]

limactl start \
  --name=$MACHINE_NAME \
  --cpus=$CPU_COUNT \
  --memory=$MEMORY \
  --tty=false \
  --set '.mounts=[]' \
  --set '.video.display="vnc"' \
  --set ".video.vnc.display=\"localhost:${VNC_PORT}\""
  template://ubuntu

simply won't start VNC (does not print VNC info on startup). If I take out the line set .video.vnc.display then it starts at 5900

[lattice0]

“What’s my login password?”
Password is disabled and locked by default. You have to use limactl shell bash (or lima bash) to open a shell.

Alternatively, you may also directly ssh into the guest: ssh -p 60022 -i ~/.lima/_config/user -o NoHostAuthenticationForLocalhost=yes 127.0.0.1.

“Does Lima work on ARM Mac?”

how can I log in VNC then?

[afbjorklund]

Currently you have to set the user password using the shell, it only has authorized ssh keys by default

[lattice0]

[:~/lima/bin$ ./limactl start   --name=$MACHINE_NAME   --cpus=$CPU_COUNT   --memory=$MEMORY   --tty=false   --set '.vid
eo.display.vnc="127.0.0.1:3"'   template://ubuntu
WARN[0000] `--set` is experimental
INFO[0000] Terminal is not available, proceeding without opening an editor
FATA[0000] failed to unmarshal YAML (main file "/home/lz/.lima/dev1/lima.yaml"): [24:8] cannot unmarshal map[string]interfac
e {} into Go struct field LimaYAML.Video of type string
      21 | memory: 10GiB
      22 | video:
      23 |   display:
    > 24 |     vnc: 127.0.0.1:3
                  

[afbjorklund]

You might want to use provisioning already in the yaml template

[afbjorklund]

Perhaps also use Ubuntu MATE, since GNOME3 doesn't work so well over remote connections?