How To RDP into Ubuntu?

So many IT pros with a windows background cross paths with Linux and are shocked to learn that nothing in Linux has a UI and yet it’s the preferred server for open source apps. Many feel helpless without the GUI of Linux because Windows likes to make a GUI for almost every single thing you want to do and the majority is used to it. After all your first computer was a windows unless you bought a Mac to keep up with Joneses in your teens. Now comes day 1 of learning Linux or provisioning a Linux server and the first thing many want to learn is how can I RDP into the box.

The answer is that there are many GUI packages available for Linux but they don’t come pre-installed. If you look up GUI packages for Linux you’ll find many options with tutorials but we’ll talk about the easiest way we came across.

We just went to digital ocean and provisioned a Ubuntu droplet. After that, we SSHed into the droplet and there it was the awesome terminal with no GUI.

1. Nano into a sh file using

nano GUI.sh

2. Paste the following

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade -y
sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends ubuntu-mate-core ubuntu-mate-desktop -y
sudo apt-get install mate-core mate-desktop-environment mate-notification-daemon xrdp -y
adduser kiki\nusermod -aG admin kiki
usermod -aG sudo kiki
su - kiki
echo mate-session> ~/.xsession
sudo cp /home/burp/.xsession /etc/skel
sudo service xrdp restart

3. During the setup, it’ll ask you to set up a new password for your new user kiki

4. Change the username by modifying instances of Kiki in the file above

5. After everything is installed open your RDP client and use the IP of your droplet with the user as kiki and the password you chose during setup

This script was shamelessly taken from Jerry the Hacker. Thanks, Jerry for blogging about this