Installing Guacamole Browser VNC on Rackspace Cloud Server

Installing Guacamole Browser VNC on Rackspace Cloud Server is actually not very difficult. You can install easily to enable a VNC Server as remote desktop. It is obvious that, Installing Guacamole Browser VNC is not only the way to get a VNC, you can for example install TightVNC for only VNC setup. However, Installing Guacamole Browser VNC on Rackspace Cloud Server has the advantages to create own applications or login to Remote Server from any device’s browser.

Installing Guacamole Browser VNC on Rackspace Cloud Server : Prerequisite

We are taking that, you are using a Linux based or OS X based computer or PuTTY as SSH/Telnet Client. Guacamole has got own website now :

At the time of writing Guacamole supports following Operating Systems (both x86/x64) :

1. Debian 6.0 (Squeeze)
2. Debian Testing (Wheezy)
3. Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot)
4. Ubuntu 12.04 (Precise Pangolin)
5. Ubuntu 12.10 (Quantal Quetzal)
6. Fedora 15 (Lovelock)
7. Fedora 16 (Verne)
8. Fedora 17 (Beefy Miracle)
9. Fedora 18 (Spherical Cow)

We will describe for Debian System as the Standard. As we said before, you can use VNC without this Guacamole with TightVNC like described here. Also you can read the theoretical part on Virtual Network Computing or VNC.

Installing Guacamole Browser VNC on Rackspace Cloud Server : Steps

We are not describing the server building process in this guide on installing Guacamole Browser VNC on Rackspace Cloud Server, you can follow the initial steps described in VNC without this Guacamole with TightVNC guide for setup of that part plus installing TightVNC. We have a video Guide too for installing TightVNC for the setup of VNC for Ubuntu, also NeuroDebian specific VNC Setup Video is also available. There are not much difference in Ubuntu and Debian as Debian is the Grandfather.

We will use a Pre-built package of Guacamole for this guide. First, update :

Edit the sources of Debian :

Usually in Rackspace the sources.list is not edited unlike Ubuntu. Still its better to check.

deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian squeeze multiverse restricted universe

deb-src http://http.us.debian.org/debian squeeze multiverse restricted universe

Needs to be active to make the part of TightVNC running fine. We are not describing that part – we are skipping the part of installing TightVNC as they are linked above. But you must install TightVNC in your case.

If sudo command is creating issue, please follow official Debian’s guide :

Install Apache Tomcat package :

wget Guacamole :

wget http://sourceforge.net/projects/guacamole/files/

current/binary/debian-6.0-amd64/guacamole-0.8.0-debian-6.0-amd64.tar.gz

I have used break to two lines, the above command is of one line. You can for example download it after going to tmp folder. Untar it :

tar -xzf guacamole-0.8.0-debian6.0-amd64.tar.gz

You must check the file names in browser if any error happens :

Change Directory to that folder :

Run :

You must make two symbolic links:

By effectively copying the web application (for example in our case is located at /var/lib/guacamole/guacamole.war) into the directory where Tomcat monitors for web application deployment, copying the configuration file, guacamole.properties, into the Tomcat’s classpath, such that Guacamole can find it once it runs. This must be done as root:

ln- -s is Symlink – you already know about Symlinks, is not it ?

The last phases :

service tomcat6 restart

service guacd start

Now there are two files :

Yo must edit them if needed.

Go to the browser :

http://your-ip:port/guacamole/

Port is usually 8080, 5900, 5901.