The examples below should work for the current versions.
The online manual is for the current development version, use man xpra
to get the version corresponding to the version you have installed.
This is how xpra is most often used.
This command will start an xterm
(or any graphical application of your choice) on HOST
and display it to your local desktop through an SSH transport:
xpra start ssh://USERNAME@HOST/ --start-child=xterm
Instead of starting and attaching to the session using a single command:
on the server which will export the application (xterm
in the example), start an xpra server instance on a free display of your choice (:100 in this example
):
xpra start :100 --start=xterm
then from the client, just connect to this xpra instance:
xpra attach ssh://USERNAME@HOST/100
(replace HOST
with the hostname or IP of the server)
If you are attaching from the same machine and using the same user account, this is sufficient:
xpra attach :100
And if there is only a single xpra session running, you can omit the display and simply run:
xpra attach
SSH is great, it provides secure authentication and encryption, it is available on all platforms and is well tested.
However, in some cases, you may not want to give remote users shell access, or you may want to share sessions between multiple remote users.
In this case, use TCP sockets:
xpra start --start=xterm --bind-tcp=0.0.0.0:10000
Then, assuming that the port you have chosen (10000
in the example above) is allowed through the firewall, you can connect from the client using:
xpra attach tcp://SERVERHOST:10000/
Beware: this TCP socket is insecure, see authentication.
Xpra can also forward a full desktop environment using the start-desktop mode:
xpra start-desktop --start-child=fluxbox
Just like above, you can connect via SSH, TCP or any other supported transport.
This mode allows you to access an existing display remotely.
Simply run:
xpra shadow ssh://SERVERHOST/
Xpra synchronizes the clipboard state between the client and server, so it can be used as a clipboard sharing tool:
xpra shadow --clipboard=yes --printing=no --windows=no --speaker=no ssh://SERVERHOST/
(other features are disabled to keep just the clipboard)
xpra shadow --printing=yes --windows=no --speaker=no ssh://SERVERHOST/
The local printers should be virtualized on the server.