If you only use SSH key authentication and do not have a local account password set, specify a password before you use xrdp to log in to your VM. If you created a password for your user account when you created your VM, skip this step. Restart the xrdp service for the changes to take effect as follows: sudo service xrdp restart Configure xrdp to use xfce as your desktop environment as follows: echo xfce4-session >~/.xsession Tell xrdp what desktop environment to use when you start your session. Install xrdp on your Ubuntu VM as follows: sudo apt-get -y install xrdp xrdp is an open source Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) server that is available on most Linux distributions, and works well with xfce. Now that you have a desktop environment installed, configure a remote desktop service to listen for incoming connections. Install and configure a remote desktop server Sudo DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive apt-get -y install xfce4 Next, install xfce using apt as follows: sudo apt-get update Use your own values: ssh you are using Windows and need more information on using SSH, see How to use SSH keys with Windows. The following example connects to the VM named .com with the username of azureuser. Commands for other distributions vary slightly (use yum to install on Red Hat Enterprise Linux and configure appropriate selinux rules, or use zypper to install on SUSE, for example).įirst, SSH to your VM. The following example installs the lightweight xfce4 desktop environment on an Ubuntu 18.04 LTS VM. Depending on your choice of desktop environment, it may consume one to 2 GB of disk space, and take 5 to 10 minutes to install and configure all the required packages. There are various desktop environments in Linux that you can choose. Linux VMs are commonly managed using SSH connections rather than a desktop environment. Most Linux VMs in Azure do not have a desktop environment installed by default. Install a desktop environment on your Linux VM If you need to create a VM, use one of the following methods:

This article requires an existing Ubuntu 18.04 LTS VM in Azure. The article was writen and tested using an Ubuntu 18.04 VM.

This article details how to install and configure a desktop environment ( xfce) and remote desktop ( xrdp) for your Linux VM running Ubuntu. When new to Linux, or for quick troubleshooting scenarios, the use of remote desktop may be easier. Linux virtual machines (VMs) in Azure are usually managed from the command line using a secure shell (SSH) connection. Applies to: ✔️ Linux VMs ✔️ Flexible scale sets

Install rdp on ubuntu 16.04