Setting Up for Linux Desktops
Table Of Contents
- Setting Up Horizon 7 for Linux Desktops
- Contents
- Setting Up Horizon 7 for Linux Desktops
- Features and System Requirements
- Preparing a Linux Virtual Machine for Desktop Deployment
- Setting Up Active Directory Integration for Linux Desktops
- Configuration Options for Linux Desktops
- Setting Up Graphics for Linux Desktops
- Installing Horizon Agent and Managing Linux Desktops
- Install Horizon Agent on a Linux Virtual Machine
- Enable Reversible Password Encryption
- Configure the Certificate for Linux Agent
- Create a Desktop Pool That Contains Linux Virtual Machines
- Upgrade Horizon Agent on a Linux Virtual Machine
- Uninstalling and Reinstalling Horizon 7 for Linux Machines
- How to Perform Power Operations on Linux Desktops from vSphere
- Gather Information About Horizon 7 for Linux Software
- Bulk Deployment of Horizon 7 for Linux Desktops
- Overview of Bulk Deployment of Linux Desktops
- Create a Virtual Machine Template for Cloning Linux Desktop Machines
- Input File for the Sample PowerCLI Scripts to Deploy Linux Desktops
- Sample Script to Clone Linux Virtual Machines
- Sample Script to Join Cloned Virtual Machines to AD Domain
- Sample Script to Join Cloned Virtual Machines to AD Domain Using SSH
- Sample Script to Install Horizon Agent on Linux Virtual Machines
- Sample Script to Install Horizon Agent on Linux Virtual Machines Using SSH
- Sample Script to Upload Configuration Files to Linux Virtual Machines
- Sample Script to Upload Configuration Files to Linux Virtual Machines Using SSH
- Sample Script to Upgrade Horizon Agent on Linux Desktop Machines
- Sample Script to Upgrade Horizon Agent on Linux Virtual Machines Using SSH
- Sample Script to Perform Operations on Linux Virtual Machines
- Sample Script to Delete Machines from the Connection Server LDAP Database
- Troubleshooting Linux Desktops
- Collect Diagnostic Information for Horizon 7 for Linux Machine
- Troubleshooting Horizon Agent Registration Failure for a Linux Machine
- Troubleshooting an Unreachable Horizon Agent on a Linux Machine
- Troubleshooting Horizon Agent on a Linux Machine That Is Not Responding
- Troubleshooting Copy and Paste between Remote Desktop and Client Host
- Configuring the Linux Firewall to Allow Incoming TCP Connections
- Index
2 Configure custom configuration options.
a Right-click the virtual machine and click Edit Settings.
b Specify the number of vCPUs and the vMemory size.
For recommended values, follow the guidelines in the installation guide for your Linux
distribution.
For example, Ubuntu 12.04 recommends configuring 2048 MB for vMemory and 2 vCPUs.
c Select Video card and specify the number of displays and the total video memory (vRAM).
Set the vRAM size in vSphere Web Client for virtual machines that use 2D or vSGA, which use the
VMware driver. The vRAM size has no affect on vDGA or NVIDIA GRID vGPU machines, which
use NVIDIA drivers.
For recommended values, follow the guidelines in System Requirements for Horizon 7 for Linux. Do
not use the Video Memory Calculator.
3 Power on the virtual machine and install the Linux distribution.
4 Configure the virtual machine as a gnome desktop environment.
KDE has not been certified to support Horizon Agent, although basic connections and the use of audio
and video work well on some distributions such as Kubuntu.
5 Ensure that the system hostname is resolvable to 127.0.0.1.
Prepare a Linux Machine for Remote Desktop Deployment
You must perform certain tasks to prepare a Linux machine for use as a desktop in a Horizon 7 deployment.
Before a Linux machine can be managed by Horizon 7, the machine must be able to communicate with
Connection Server. You must configure networking on the Linux machine so that the Linux machine can
ping the Connection Server instance using its FQDN (fully qualified domain name).
Open VMware Tools (OVT) are pre-installed on RHEL 7, CentOS 7, and SLED 12 machines. If you are
preparing either of these machines for use as a remote desktop, you can skip steps 1 through 5 in the
following procedure, which describe how to install VMware Tools by manually running the installer.
Prerequisites
n
Verify that a new virtual machine (VM) was created in vCenter Server and your Linux distribution was
installed on the machine
n
Familiarize yourself with the steps for mounting and installing VMware Tools on a Linux VM. See
"Manually Install or Upgrade VMware Tools in a Linux Virtual Machine" in the vSphere Virtual Machine
Administration document.
n
Familiarize yourself with the steps for configuring your Linux machine to be resolvable through DNS.
These steps vary for the different Linux distributions and releases. For instructions, consult the
documentation for your Linux distribution and release.
Procedure
1 In vSphere Web Client or vSphere Client, mount the VMware Tools virtual disk on the VM.
2 Right-click the VMware Tools installer file, VMwareTools.x.x.x-xxxx.tar.gz, click Extract to, and select
the desktop for your Linux distribution.
The vmware-tools-distrib folder is extracted to the desktop.
3 On the VM, log in as root and open a terminal window.
Setting Up Horizon 7 for Linux Desktops
14 VMware, Inc.