Which web browser can be X11 forwarded over SSH?

Xeratul · 11-19-2023, 10:24 AM

Hello,

There is falkon, but chromium and firefox in ubuntu cannot be forwarded.

What else more?

Kind regards

pan64 · 11-20-2023, 12:14 AM

I don't understand. All of them are simple X apps, works the same way (from this point of view). If ssh x11 forwarding configured properly every and each app can be used that way. But probably nee more details what are you trying.

allend · 11-20-2023, 12:23 AM

In my experience, Firefox can be sluggish when using X11 forwarded over SSH. I recommend trying VNC tunneled through a SSH connection.

Turbocapitalist · 11-20-2023, 12:24 AM

Any graphical package can use X11 forwarding, if it is using X. However, some more recent distros have been chasing down the Wayland dead end. If the remote system has Wayland, then you will not be able to forward the graphical output as-is.

There are some fatal shortcomings in X11 which have not and probably cannot (given the lack of people with the skill) be fixed. Wayland was supposed to replace it but has been "under development" for over 15 years yet without becoming a viable alternative.

The situation is dire, as there are fewer skilled IT people every year. The tiny group that are able to evade being rounded up and broken by the frauds, poseurs, and charlatans now leading most education programmmes are very few each year, and certainly not enough to replace those that age out of the field. Those that are subject to such programmes spend their time contributing to the global mess created by javascript (today's BASIC) rather than studying advanced maths and C.

Whoa. I digress.

If the remote system is running Wayland then there might be some kind of bridge like XWayland which is rumored to provide some kind of X11 compatibility.

Xeratul · 11-20-2023, 07:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by allend

In my experience, Firefox can be sluggish when using X11 forwarded over SSH. I recommend trying VNC tunneled through a SSH connection.

You mean ?

Code:

ssh -C -X  myusername@distant 

export DISPLAY=:0 ; screen -d -m     x11vnc 

export DISPLAY=:0 ; screen -d -m     firefox freemails.org

Code:

xtightvncviewer distant:0

or maybe:

Code:

  ssh -C -X  myusername@distant   xtightvncviewer localhost:0

Right?

Turbocapitalist · 11-20-2023, 07:55 AM

Try without screen and without overriding the $DISPLAY defaults. The latter will definitely prevent X forwarding from working.

Code:

$ ssh -X  myusername@distant 
$ firefox freemails.org &
$ echo $DISPLAY

That'll test your basic forwarding capabilities using Firefox.

allend · 11-21-2023, 05:49 PM

This is what I do for VNC through SSH tunnel .

lvm_ · 11-22-2023, 12:38 AM

Any browser will work provided it is set up not to use hardware video acceleration which bypasses X11 and outputs straight to the hardware (not entirely true, actually, but mostly true)

Xeratul · 11-23-2023, 03:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Turbocapitalist

Try without screen and without overriding the $DISPLAY defaults. The latter will definitely prevent X forwarding from working.

Code:

$ ssh -X  myusername@distant 
$ firefox freemails.org &
$ echo $DISPLAY

That'll test your basic forwarding capabilities using Firefox.

isn't it slow? VNC needed?

But, firefox (modern one on ubuntu or manjaro) does not allow X11 forward any longer.

Turbocapitalist · 11-23-2023, 04:04 AM

Forwarding seems to work as recently as Mozilla Firefox 119.0.1 on Linux Mint 21.2. Which one do you have and does in not work in practice?