xvncviewer support broken by new version 4.1.1

[Mads Chr. Olesen]

Binary package hint: service-discovery-applet

The current version of xvnc4viewer in Gutsy does not support the "-xrm *passwordDialog:true" option which the plugin passes to it.

Just removing the parameters works, as the new default is opening a X password dialog, see attached patch.

Possibly some version detection should be done, to assert whether to pass the parameter.

[Basilio Kublik (sourcercito)]

just install this app and quickly notice that, actually the "-xrm" argument is what make it fail, the *passwordDialog:true doesn't affect the functionality of the plugin.

[xtknight (xt-knight)]

How do you test that this patch works? I have never used service-discovery-applet and I don't know how to execute it.

[Mads Chr. Olesen (shiyee)]

service-discovery-applet is an Avahi service browser for the gnome panel. You add it to your gnome panel, click the icon choose "VNC Remote Access" (given that you have a vnc service advertised at your LAN), and click a service to connect to it.

[xtknight (xt-knight)]

Thanks. I've got a working test case.

However, the dialog of vncviewer 3 is a bit buggy. You have to click on the password textbox and have your cursor over it all the time, and no password chars appear. But, I suppose this is not much of a problem is vncviewer 4 is now default (is it?)

There are also "stdout"/"stderr"-like error messages whenever you exit the VNC (is this expected behavior)?

The above may be separate bugs/problems, so I will try and make a debdiff so this fix can be uploaded. Thank you for the patch.

[xtknight (xt-knight)]

Mads Chr. Olesen's patch in debdiff format.

[Daniel Holbach (dholbach)]

Sebastian: can you please take a look at the patch?

[Chris Jones (cmsj)]

I have just tested the patch with:

ii xvnc4viewer 4.1.1+xorg1.0.2-0ubuntu4 Virtual network computing client software fo

and it fixes the bug, but as pointed out, it will not help vnc3 users

[xtknight (xt-knight)]

Here is the patch with a fixed changelog e-mail.

[Daniel Holbach (dholbach)]

Trent: maybe you can look into this bug?

[Daniel Holbach (dholbach)]

Avahi people: can somebody please comment on the patch?

[Andrea Veri (av)]

unsubscribing u-u-s as far as nothing needs to be sponsored at the moment. Feel free to re-subscribe when a working and well-tested debdiff has been attached to the bug report. Thanks.

[Noel J. Bergman (noeljb)]

Ubuntu no longer includes xvncviewer, using vinagre by default instead. The VNC plugin at /usr/share/service-discovery-applet/plugins/xvncviewer.py should be modified to invoke vinagre. At a quick glance, changing:

 cmdline = ["/usr/share/service-discovery-applet/tools//exec_wrapper", "xvncviewer", "-xrm", "*passwordDialog:true", hostname ]

to

 cmdline = ["/usr/share/service-discovery-applet/tools//exec_wrapper", "vinagre", hostname+":"+port ]

I haven't checked it, yet, but will soon. This is similar to the posted patch, but replaces xvncviewer with vinagre, and passes the connection string as "hostname:port" as required.

[Noel J. Bergman (noeljb)]

Close ... very close. I did not bother to rename the file, which we could do, but am providing a minimal working patch over the current, existing, service-discovery-applet code.

[Noel J. Bergman (noeljb)]

I am working with upstream, and have provided a replacement for xvncviewer.py that detects which of (in order of preference) vinagre, xvnc4viewer, xvncviewer (v3) is present, and adjusts to which VNC viewer is available to use. This makes it suitable for upstream inclusion, since downstream distributions can vary on what they include, and also makes it easier for end-users to adjust for their own preferences.

[Noel J. Bergman (noeljb)]

Attached is the replacement VNC plugin. I've been using it for a month. Should work with versions of Ubuntu back for a number of revisions.

[syldeb35 (sylvain-debray)]

This bug still exist in Karmic
The file in post #16 works in Karmic

[Nigel Stewart (nigels)]

Confirming this in Karmic
The file in post #16 works nicely when copied over /usr/share/service-discovery-applet/plugins/xvncviewer.py