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I'm currently running Ubuntu 15.10 on my home-theater and I'm frequently using Remmina Remote Desktop Client to manage the box. Since the home-theater is frequently in use playing it's video duties, it would be immensely helpful to remote desktop into a separate session than the current - since it's playing full screen video for the family and VNCing in and tinkering with stuff would be incredibly distracting for those watching videos.

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  • The command to start a second Xserver as root startx -- :1, I'm looking for way to find it on a LAN.
    – Nodak
    Jan 3, 2016 at 4:46
  • Have you thought about using a dlna server to stream video rather than doing so over vnc? You'd be able to support multiple concurrent streams and still be able to log in to the desktop normally. Jan 3, 2016 at 5:08
  • @GrandmasterB I'm not streaming video over the home-theater, it's playing the video to a television.
    – kneeki
    Jan 3, 2016 at 5:52
  • @Nodak I saw that command as well. I'm also unsure how I would VNC into a specific instance of Xserver.
    – kneeki
    Jan 3, 2016 at 5:53
  • What exactly do you need to "manage" or "tinker" on that HTPC what could not better be done through an SSH session? What application is used for streaming video to the TV?
    – Takkat
    Jan 3, 2016 at 8:04

1 Answer 1

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I think we were working too hard.

When I ssh into a machine I enable X forwarding with the -X flag.

ssh -X [email protected]

Then from the terminal I call the application, thunar (or nautilus), sudo thunar, sudo gdebi-gtk, etc.

This only renders the application interface on your machine, and you will not see a full 'desktop' of another instance, but the host computer will continue to function without interrupting the video to your TV.

See if that will be suitable for you.

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  • This is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, thanks!
    – kneeki
    Jan 3, 2016 at 11:39

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