8.8. Configuring a Custom Desktop

Problem

The Connection Wizard only gives you four choices for your remote desktop: KDE, Gnome, CDE, and Custom. You don't want KDE, Gnome, or CDE, you want something else like IceWM or Xfce, so Custom is the obvious choice. How do you configure a custom desktop?

Solution

First, make sure the desktop you want to use is installed on your FreeNX server. Then, fire up the Connection Wizard on the client.

On the Desktop tab of the Connection Wizard, click Custom, then Settings.

On the Settings window, click "Run the following command," and type in the command to start up your chosen desktop.

Check "New virtual desktop."

Finish the rest of the setup, and you're done. See Figure 8-5 for an example.

Discussion

You may or may not be able to get a custom desktop to work; currently, there are some problems with these.

Configuring a custom desktop

Figure 8-5. Configuring a custom desktop

Make sure your server and client versions match, or your remote desktops might get garbled, or even be unusable. They must have the same major and minor version numbers, so the server version 1.5.0-50 must be paired with a client version starting with 1.5.

Gnome and KDE run well even over slow links. To get even better performance, try lightweight window managers like IceWM or Xfce. These are fully featured, but a lot less resource-hungry. However, FreeNX is so efficient, you probably won't notice a lot of difference.

Be sure to check the documentation for your window manager or desktop to find the correct start command. Some need only to execute the binary, some have a startup script. Table 8-1 lists some examples.

Table 8-1. Startup commands for popular window managers

Window manager

Startup command

Afterstep

afterstep

Enlightenment

enlightenment

FVWM

fvwm2

Gnome

gnome-session

IceWM

icewm

KDE

startkde

TWM

twm

Xfce

startxfce4

You won't need the full path as long as these commands are in your $PATH on your FreeNX server.

See Also