Purdue University

ThinLinc

For your first time accessing Anvil using ThinLinc client, your desktop might be locked after it has been idle for more than 5 minutes. It is because in the default settings, the "screensaver" and "lock screen" are turned on. To solve this issue, please refer to the FAQs Page.

Anvil provides Cendio's ThinLinc as an alternative to running an X11 server directly on your computer. It allows you to run graphical applications or graphical interactive jobs directly on Anvil through a persistent remote graphical desktop session.

ThinLinc is a service that allows you to connect to a persistent remote graphical desktop session. This service works very well over a high latency, low bandwidth, or off-campus connection compared to running an X11 server locally. It is also very helpful for Windows users who do not have an easy to use local X11 server, as little to no setup is required on your computer.

There are two ways in which to use ThinLinc: preferably through the native client or through a web browser.

Browser-based Thinlinc access is not supported on Anvil at this moment. Please use native Thinlinc client with SSH keys.

Link to section 'Installing the ThinLinc native client' of 'ThinLinc' Installing the ThinLinc native client

The native ThinLinc client will offer the best experience especially over off-campus connections and is the recommended method for using ThinLinc. It is compatible with Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.

• Download the ThinLinc client from the ThinLinc website.
• Start the ThinLinc client on your computer.
• In the client's login window, use desktop.anvil.rcac.purdue.edu as the Server and use your Anvil username x-anvilusername.
• At this moment, an SSH key is required to login to ThinLinc client. For help generating and uploading keys to the cluster, see SSH Keys section in our user guide for details.

Link to section 'Configure ThinLinc to use SSH Keys' of 'ThinLinc' Configure ThinLinc to use SSH Keys

• To set up SSH key authentication on the ThinLinc client:

  • Open the Options panel, and select Public key as your authentication method on the Security tab.

    

  • In the options dialog, switch to the "Security" tab and select the "Public key" radio button:

    

  • Click OK to return to the ThinLinc Client login window. You should now see a Key field in place of the Password field.

  • In the Key field, type the path to your locally stored private key or click the ... button to locate and select the key on your local system. Note: If PuTTY is used to generate the SSH Key pairs, please choose the private key in the openssh format.

    

• Click the Connect button.
• Continue to following section on connecting to Anvil from ThinLinc.

Link to section 'Connecting to Anvil from ThinLinc' of 'ThinLinc' Connecting to Anvil from ThinLinc

• Once logged in, you will be presented with a remote Linux desktop running directly on a cluster login node.
• Open the terminal application on the remote desktop.
• Once logged in to the Anvil login node, you may use graphical editors, debuggers, software like Matlab, or run graphical interactive jobs. For example, to test the X forwarding connection issue the following command to launch the graphical editor geany:

  $ geany

• This session will remain persistent even if you disconnect from the session. Any interactive jobs or applications you left running will continue running even if you are not connected to the session.

Link to section 'Tips for using ThinLinc native client' of 'ThinLinc' Tips for using ThinLinc native client

• To exit a full-screen ThinLinc session press the F8 key on your keyboard (fn + F8 key for Mac users) and click to disconnect or exit full screen.
• Full-screen mode can be disabled when connecting to a session by clicking the Options button and disabling full-screen mode from the Screen tab.