Ubuntu install desktop and xfce

1. Use tasksel install desktop environment and xfce, if the server don’t have tasksel, you should install it.

   apt install tasksel

   tasksel and reboot

   If tasksel not include xfce, please use below command install xfce which contains a few enhancements for the desktop environment:

   sudo apt install xfce4 xfce4-goodies

2. Add user to connect to server with VNC

   adduser www

3. Add user to the sudo group

   usermod -aG sudo www

4. change to the new user www, install VNC server

   sudo apt install tightvncserver

5. run the vncserver command to set a VNC access password, create the initial configuration files, and start a VNC server instance:

   vncserver

6. You can use vncpasswd to change password

   vncpasswd

7. Configuring the VNC Server

   vncserver -kill :1

8. Before you modify the xstartup file, back up the original

   mv ~/.vnc/xstartup ~/.vnc/xstartup.bak

9. Then

   sudo vim ~/.vnc/xstartup

   #!/bin/bash
   xrdb $HOME/.Xresources
   startxfce4 &
   

   chmod +x ~/.vnc/xstartup

10. I have been stuck for this step for a long time, If you use root installation, starting the vncserver service requires using a user, such as ‘www’.

    sudo -u www vncserver -localhost

    -localhost means VNC to only allow connections localhost.

11. start a ssh tunnel in you local,

    ssh -L 59000:localhost:5901 -C -N -l www your_server_ip

    then use VNC client connect to the server.