vncserver on Amazon Linux on Amazon's AWS

NOTE: this first step may be outdated in new versions of Amazon Linux, which provides libjpeg-turbo.

First, get a good version of libjpeg-turbo:

1. yum clean all
2. yum --enablerepo=amzn-preview install libjpeg-turbo
3. see: https://forums.aws.amazon.com/thread.jspa?threadID=121128

Necessary packages:

1. gnutls-2.8.5-10.el6.x86_64.rpm
2. libfontenc-1.0.5-2.el6.x86_64.rpm
3. libtasn1-2.3-3.el6.x86_64.rpm
4. libxdmcp-1.1.1-7.ram1.x86_64.rpm
5. libXfont-1.4.5-2.el6.x86_64.rpm
6. libxkbfile-1.0.6-1.1.el6.x86_64.rpm
7. libXmu-1.1.1-2.el6.x86_64.rpm
8. mesa-dri-drivers-9.0-0.7.el6.x86_64.rpm
9. pixman-0.26.2-5.el6_4.x86_64.rpm
10. tigervnc-license-1.3.0-16.el6.noarch.rpm
11. tigervnc-server-1.3.0-16.el6.x86_64.rpm
12. tigervnc-server-minimal-1.3.0-16.el6.x86_64.rpm
13. xkeyboard-config-2.6-6.el6.noarch.rpm
14. xorg-x11-proto-devel-7.6-25.el6.noarch.rpm
15. xorg-x11-xauth-1.0.2-7.1.el6.x86_64.rpm
16. xorg-x11-xkb-utils-7.7-4.el6.x86_64.rpm

Necessary packages for fluxbox:

1. pyxdg-0.18-1.el6.noarch.rpm

Here's a link to all the packages needed: rpms

Start by trying to install tigervnc-server. That will fail. Follow the dependencies down, installing packages one by one as they come up. If they fail, install their dependencies first.

These packages were special cases

1. mesa-dri-drivers-9.0-0.7.el6.x86_64.rpm
1. just "--nodeps" install this one
2. the libraries of the dependencies are never called from my experience
2. libXtst-1.2.1-2.el6.x86_64.rpm
1. there is a more recent version of this already in Amazon Linux, so just skip this one and "--nodeps" the parent package, which is libXmu-1.1.1-2.el6.x86_64.rpm

If not found, add location of libXdmcp.so.6 to /etc/ld.so.conf and run "ldconfig", e.g. locations is /usr/lib/libXdmcp.so.6 so add the line "/usr/lib".

Once I got the vncserver up with

  vncserver :66 -localhost

bizarrely, it was listening on port 5966 and some 6066 port. The 5966 port is the one you want.

See previous post on Redhat VNC for details, click here.

Redhat: vnc to remote server

NOTE: if the vncserver insists on starting on a port other than 5966, like 6099, wipe the ~/.vnc directory and start over again. If that doesn't help, change the second instance of 5966 below to 6066 in the port forwarding ssh command, e.g. '-L 5966:localhost:6066'.

1.  as remote root on myhost
1. yum install tigervnc
2. yum install tigervnc-server
3. yum install libXfont pixman
4. yum install fluxbox
5. yum install firefox
2. as a remote user, myuser, on myhost
1. vncserver :66 -localhost
1. set a password, call it mypassword
3. as local user
1. ssh -L 5966:localhost:5966 myuser@myhost
1. leave running and do next step in another local term
2. vncviewer -encodings 'copyrect tight zrle hextile' localhost:5966
1. authenticate with mypassword
4. as a remote user, myuser, on myhost
1. export DISPLAY=:66
2. xterm &
3. fluxbox &
4. firefox &