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Kevin StaleyFlag for United States of America

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RHEL 6.7 Gnome Desktop on VMware 6 VM

So, I’ve spent several hours getting an X Windows client set up on my W7 PC in order to connect via SSH to a Linux 6.7 VM and launch a
gnome-session that appears in a window on my desktop. It works, but some errors are generated and it seems a few features (printer
management, performance monitoring to name two) are missing from what the physical console on our older RHEL 5 server shows when using Gnome.

What I am wondering is; is it possible, and if so, advisable, to run the GUI (Gnome or KDE) within the vSphere Client at the console tab? At present the Linux VM does not have the VM Tools installed – perhaps a prerequisite for GUI console ability within vSphere? Would you recommend using a PC based client instead (I’m in a trial of OpenText’s Extend suite – failed to get Cygwin/X working)?
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Avatar of Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)
Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)
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Thanks Andrew! Yes, Exceed is the client I found to be the easiest to configure (have two week left in a trial). I receive several errors launching a gnome-session with it, but their tech support points to possible missing environment variables and perhaps some security settings. I may post some of them later to get your input.

I will certainly look into getting the VMware tools installed as well.

I'll post an update tomorrow once I have had a chance to try a few more things.
Xming, Xming Fonts and putty are easy enough to set up, and they're free.
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@gheist.  Nothing.  Andrew answered his main question already, so I didn't need to add to that.  I'm answering his comment about the trial expiring.  
(have two week left in a trial)
@serialband  - thanks for the suggestions. I have seen a lot of favorable posts about Xming and putty, but have not tried them yet. I might do so before purchasing Extend.

@gheist - thanks for your comments about Xming and the recommendation of the other two options. I can tell I have a bit more to try before making a firm decision. As to the comment about how my question relates to VMware... I use a vSphere client to manage all the VMs, and this client has a console tab for each VM. For Windows VMs in this console you have much the same ability as an RDP session to the same VM. So, I was wondering if there might be GUI capability (Gnome or KDE are two I am aware of) within the vSphere client when going to the console of this RHEL 6 VM, and so avoiding the use of a remote client.

@Andrew - I successfully installed the VMTools. Thanks again for encouraging me to do so. I've relied a lot on the consultants we hired to deploy the entire cluster to also configure things as they saw fit. They possibly assumed I was going to install the tools on this VM. As for the Extend software and my gnome-session, I have attached a text file containing the output displayed in an Xterm window (I opened it using xterm -ls &  - per Extend tech support's recommendation) after entering "gnome-session &". The xterm session was opened using the SSH method. If you are able and willing to offer any suggestions based on your review of this text file, I would welcome them. If not, no worries, I have an open incident with Red Hat support as well. Thanks!
Forgot to upload the file... attaching it here.
gnome-session.txt
It is as much relates to vmware as to power connector of your computer.
The stuff withing vsphere is called HorizonView, and it supports RDP and PCoIP to CentOS/RedHat7
Thanks to all for your helpful comments and suggestions!

I heard back from Red Hat support and it seems I was missing two packages that now provide access in Gnome to printer management (yum install system-config-printer) and the system monitor (yum install gnome-system-monitor).

@gheist - A few minutes ago I downloaded the home version of MobaXterm...wow! Easy to install, configure, and use for precisely what I wanted such a tool to do for me. Extend does have a LOT of extras I do not foresee ever using, so with MobaXterm (Professional) at $69 vs. Extend at $545 (and $109/yr for maintenance) the choice seems fairly straightforward to me. Thanks for the recommendation!