[winswitch] single, homogeneous and flexible operating (OS) context

Antoine Martin antoine at nagafix.co.uk
Sun Mar 12 14:03:55 GMT 2023


On 11/03/2023 23:11, Mario Marietto wrote:
> ----> I don't think that the host OS matters much.
> 
> I think it's because of the package management. Ubuntu uses as default 
> one (old) version,debian another one even older and so on. And this 
> explains why I'm using an old version full of bugs.
> 
> -----> 3.1 is not a supported version, it is well out of date.
> 
> this is the version used by ubuntu 22.04 that I've used. I'm very sad 
> that it uses such an old version. And I upgrade the packages often. So 
> what should I do to use the newest version ? recompile it from source on 
> the host and guest os ?
https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/wiki/Download#-for-debian-based-distributions

> ------> A common workaround for this is to pre-start xpra or even just 
> the virtual framebuffer.
> 
> Can you point me to the webpage where it is explained how to do that ? 
> thanks.
The simplest form:
`Xvfb :100`
Will start a vfb on display :100
Then you can start xpra using this display later:
xpra start :100

> ------> If it is the application(s), I would first try with something 
> very fast
> and reliable like an `xterm`.
> 
> Can you point me to the webpage where it is explained how to do that,too 
> ? thanks.
`xpra start --start=xterm`

Cheers
Antoine

> 
> 
> On Fri, Mar 10, 2023 at 11:25 AM Antoine Martin via shifter-users 
> <shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk 
> <mailto:shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk>> wrote:
> 
>     Posts unrelated to the release announcements should be using a separate
>     thread.
> 
>     On 08/03/2023 00:48, Mario Marietto via shifter-users wrote:
>      > Hello.
>      >
>      > I would like to integrate Ubuntu,Fedora,Arch or maybe some other
>     distro
>      > into one single,homogeneous and flexible operating (OS) context.
> 
>     Go with Fedora.
>     Ubuntu and Debian have too many unfixable problems and Arch is not an
>     officially supported distro.
> 
>      > I would
>      > like to use Ubuntu (22.04) as the host OS
> 
>     I don't think that the host OS matters much.
> 
>      > and the rest of the OSes
>      > (Fedora,Arch) will be virtualized within different virtual
>     machines (I
>      > don't want to use containers,I know that they are a better
>     choice,but I
>      > want to understand if a virtual machine is good anyway when it is
>     very well
>      > configured). The idea is also to use qemu + kvm with the
>     nographic and no
>      > vga options enabled,without virt-manager or boxes. I don't want
>     to open and
>      > close the virtual machine graphical interface every time I want
>     to run an
>      > application.
> 
>     That makes sense.
> 
>      > I find it much more comfortable if I can run every application
>      > and command within one only terminal by premising,for example,a
>     letter
>      > indicating to which distribution the command or application
>     belongs to. Or
>      > I could tell xpra to open the fedora or the arch linux terminal.
>     For sure
>      > it will be much faster to configure,but it has less scenic effect.
>      >
>      > So. I've installed Fedora 37 on a qemu-kvm VM and I've installed
>     xpra on
>      > Ubuntu and on Fedora. As you can see below,when I invoke firefox
>     from the
>      > Fedora VM (that has IP = 192.168.122.156),it starts correctly :
>      >
>      >
>      > ziomario at Z390-AORUS-PRO-DEST:~$ xpra start
>     ssh://marietto@192.168.122.156 <mailto:marietto at 192.168.122.156>
>      > --start=firefox
>      >
>      > Warning: vendor 'Intel' is greylisted,
>      > you may want to turn off OpenGL if you encounter bugs
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,384 Xpra GTK3 X11 client version 3.1 64-bit
> 
>     3.1 is not a supported version, it is well out of date.
> 
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,454  running on Linux Ubuntu 22.04 jammy
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,454  window manager is 'Xfwm4'
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,465 opencv not found:
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,465  No module named 'cv2'
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,465  webcam forwarding is disabled
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,677 GStreamer version 1.20.3 for Python
>     3.10.6 64-bit
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,733 No OpenGL_accelerate module loaded: No
>     module named
>      > 'OpenGL_accele
>      > rate'
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,881 Warning: vendor 'Intel' is greylisted,
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,881  you may want to turn off OpenGL if you
>     encounter
>      > bugs
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,979 OpenGL enabled with Mesa Intel(R) UHD
>     Graphics 630
>      > (CFL GT2)
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:52,989 Connected (version 2.0, client OpenSSH_8.8)
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,129 loaded RSA private key from
>      > '/home/ziomario/.ssh/id_rsa'
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,141 Authentication (publickey) successful!
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,407  keyboard settings: rules=evdev, model=pc105,
>      > layout=it
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,585  desktop size is 3840x1080 with 1 screen:
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,585   :0.0 (1016x286 mm - DPI: 96x95) workarea:
>      > 3840x1044
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,585     AOC HDMI-1 1920x1080 (598x336 mm -
>     DPI: 81x81)
>      > 2023-03-07 18:26:53,585     PHL HDMI-2-0 1920x1080 at 1920x0
>     (598x336 mm -
>      > DPI: 81x81)
>      > 2023-03-07 18:27:03,895 unknown packet type: setting-change
>      > 2023-03-07 18:27:08,033 enabled remote logging
>      > 2023-03-07 18:27:08,033 Xpra X11 seamless server version 4.4 32-bit
> 
>     4.4 is also well out of date.
> 
>      > 2023-03-07 18:27:08,034  running on unknown
>      > 2023-03-07 18:27:08,220 server does not support xi input devices
>      > 2023-03-07 18:27:08,220  server uses: xtest
>      >
>      >
>      > The problem is that firefox takes 6 or more seconds to appear.
>     And it's not
>      > the only one that's so slow. Every application that I try to run
>     is very
>      > slow.
> 
>     It's not clear to me if it is Firefox that is too slow to start or the
>     xpra session.
> 
>     You can see what the xpra server does on startup in the server log file.
>     A lot of work as gone into making the server faster to start:
>     https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/issues/2341
>     <https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/issues/2341>
>     But the time it takes to start the virtual framebuffer is beyond our
>     control and this can take many seconds, especially with older versions.
>     A common workaround for this is to pre-start xpra or even just the
>     virtual framebuffer.
> 
>     If it is the application(s), I would first try with something very fast
>     and reliable like an `xterm`.
>     Slow application startup is usually caused by dbus timeouts or missing
>     daemons.
>     ie: not having `gnome-keyring-daemon` slows down `gnome-terminal`:
>     https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/issues/3109
>     <https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/issues/3109>
> 
>      > You can imagine that is not good if I want to  integrate
>      > Ubuntu,Fedora,Arch or maybe some other distro into one
>     single,homogeneous
>      > and flexible operating (OS) context. When I want to run an
>     application, I
>      > expect it to start as fast as it would if it were installed
>     locally. Is
>      > that goal achievable ?
> 
>     Yes.
> 
>     Just be aware that it is preferable to use a single xpra session per
>     application, which makes it harder to pre-launch xpra sessions in
>     advance. Advanced setups use pre-launched session pools for that.
> 
>     Cheers,
>     Antoine
> 
> 
>      > Il giorno mar 7 mar 2023 alle ore 10:55 Antoine Martin via
>     shifter-users <
>      > shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk
>     <mailto:shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk>> ha scritto:
>      >
>      >> Hi,
>      >>
>      >> Hopefully, this will be the final release from the 3.1.x LTS+1
>     branch
>      >> which will be replaced by a new v5 LTS branch before too long.
>      >> This release includes all the fixes that had accumulated over
>     the past 9
>      >> months.
>      >>
>      >> Unlike previous releases from this branch, support for all platforms
>      >> should be in good shape and there are packages for almost every
>      >> supported distribution - even those that only support Python 3,
>     which is
>      >> quickly becoming the norm.
>      >> There are also builds for many of the RHEL 8.x and 9.x clones,
>     and some
>      >> arm64 builds too - though those may take a few more days to build.
>      >>
>      >> The most serious fixes affected focus issues and a clipboard
>     regression
>      >> on MS Windows which was introduced in 3.1.3.
>      >> There are also many new workarounds for new, broken or misconfigured
>      >> system libraries and environments.
>      >>
>      >> As always, the MS Windows and MacOS binary bundles have the most
>     library
>      >> updates, with new OpenSSL 3, GStreamer, ffmpeg, etc.
>      >> Anyone still stuck on this LTS branch should upgrade.
>      >>
>      >> The more detailed release notes can be found here:
>      >> https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/releases/tag/v3.1.4
>     <https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/releases/tag/v3.1.4>
>      >>
>      >> Downloads:
>      >> https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/wiki/Download
>     <https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/wiki/Download>
>      >>
>      >> Cheers,
>      >> Antoine
>      >> _______________________________________________
>      >> shifter-users mailing list
>      >> shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk
>     <mailto:shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk>
>      >> https://lists.devloop.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/shifter-users
>     <https://lists.devloop.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/shifter-users>
>      >>
>      >
>      >
> 
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> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Mario.



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