Documentation for how to enable gnome-remote-desktop on a completly headless system
Raising bug from downstream ubuntu: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-remote-desktop/+bug/2064647
I am on a completely headless system starting from a minimal ubuntu-server 24.04 installation. I have installed the desktop using apt install ubuntu-desktop
I want to use the new gnome-remote-desktop so that I can create a developer machine in a VM environment that can be accessed through a thin client as an example using Microsoft RDP
I suspect there is some missing documentation.
Starting the service using: systemctl start gnome-remote-desktop.service
results in:
journalctl -xeu gnome-remote-desktop.service
Apr 30 10:16:39 localhost systemd[1]: Starting gnome-remote-desktop.service - GNOME Remote Desktop...
░░ Subject: A start job for unit gnome-remote-desktop.service has begun execution
░░ Defined-By: systemd
░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support
░░
░░ A start job for unit gnome-remote-desktop.service has begun execution.
░░
░░ The job identifier is 2929.
Apr 30 10:16:39 localhost (p-daemon)[1613]: gnome-remote-desktop.service: Failed to determine user credentials: No such process
Apr 30 10:16:39 localhost systemd[1]: gnome-remote-desktop.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=217/USER
░░ Subject: Unit process exited
░░ Defined-By: systemd
░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support
░░
░░ An ExecStart= process belonging to unit gnome-remote-desktop.service has exited.
░░
░░ The process' exit code is 'exited' and its exit status is 217.
Running sudo systemd-sysusers
does create some new users, restarting the remote desktop now gives:
May 02 14:27:47 localhost gnome-remote-de[36906]: Init TPM credentials failed because No TPM device found, using GKeyFile as fallback
May 02 14:27:47 localhost gnome-remote-de[36906]: Init file credentials failed: Error creating directory /var/lib/gnome-remote-desktop: Permission denied
May 02 14:27:47 localhost gnome-remote-desktop-daemon[36906]: **
May 02 14:27:47 localhost gnome-remote-desktop-daemon[36906]: ERROR:../src/grd-settings.c:345:grd_settings_constructed: assertion failed: (priv->credentials)
May 02 14:27:47 localhost gnome-remote-desktop-daemon[36906]: Bail out! ERROR:../src/grd-settings.c:345:grd_settings_constructed: assertion failed: (priv->credentials)
May 02 14:27:47 localhost systemd[1]: gnome-remote-desktop.service: Main process exited, code=dumped, status=6/ABRT
As a headless system I can not use any UI controls so I suspect there is some command / config that needs to to be set before launching rdp