firefox over ssh

When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
"X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.

What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*. I'm
sure this happens by design, but I can't find out how it works, why it
might be desirable, or how to disable it.

I've looked at http://www.openssh.org/ but can't find the relevant docs.
Any pointers would be welcome.

Mark Atherton


* evidence: (1) when I ssh into a fresh linux installation and run
firefox it runs with the configuration setup as for my local system. (2)
ps -Al shows no firefox (or firefox-bin) running on the remote machine.

On Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:41:34 +0000, Mark Atherton <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.
>
> What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*.

If you have an instance of firefox on running on the local machine,
firefox will detect that and simply tell that instance to open a new
window. If you have no local copy of firefox running then it will
run on the remote machine as you expect.


--
-| Bob Hauck
-| Hooray for San Fancisco values!
-| http://www.haucks.org/

Mark Atherton wrote:
> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.

ssh -X

robert
>
> What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*. I'm
> sure this happens by design, but I can't find out how it works, why it
> might be desirable, or how to disable it.
>
> I've looked at http://www.openssh.org/ but can't find the relevant docs.
> Any pointers would be welcome.
>
> Mark Atherton
>
>
> * evidence: (1) when I ssh into a fresh linux installation and run
> firefox it runs with the configuration setup as for my local system. (2)
> ps -Al shows no firefox (or firefox-bin) running on the remote machine.

On Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:41:34 +0000, Mark Atherton wrote:

> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.
>
> What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*. I'm
> sure this happens by design, but I can't find out how it works, why it
> might be desirable, or how to disable it.
>
> I've looked at http://www.openssh.org/ but can't find the relevant docs.
> Any pointers would be welcome.
>
> Mark Atherton
>
>
> * evidence: (1) when I ssh into a fresh linux installation and run
> firefox it runs with the configuration setup as for my local system. (2)
> ps -Al shows no firefox (or firefox-bin) running on the remote machine.

Put the following in your ~/.ssh/config file

Host *
ForwardX11 yes
ForwardX11Trusted yes
StrictHostKeyChecking no
ForwardAgent yes
BatchMode yes

Robert Harris wrote:
> Mark Atherton wrote:
>> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
>> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
>> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.
>
> ssh -X

Thanks, but that just seems to enable X11 forwarding - from man ssh:

"-X Enables X11 forwarding. This can also be specified on a
per-host basis in a configuration file."

I already have that working - I can run other X apps on the remote
machine and they display locally.

Mark

General Schvantzkoph wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:41:34 +0000, Mark Atherton wrote:
>
>> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
>> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
>> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.
>>
>> What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*. I'm
>> sure this happens by design, but I can't find out how it works, why it
>> might be desirable, or how to disable it.
>>
>> I've looked at http://www.openssh.org/ but can't find the relevant docs.
>> Any pointers would be welcome.
>>
>> Mark Atherton
>>
>>
>> * evidence: (1) when I ssh into a fresh linux installation and run
>> firefox it runs with the configuration setup as for my local system. (2)
>> ps -Al shows no firefox (or firefox-bin) running on the remote machine.
>
> Put the following in your ~/.ssh/config file
>
> Host *
> ForwardX11 yes
> ForwardX11Trusted yes
> StrictHostKeyChecking no
> ForwardAgent yes
> BatchMode yes

Doesn't any difference. Thanks anyway. I've had a good look through man
ssh_config and nothing there helps either.

Mark

Bob Hauck wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:41:34 +0000, Mark Atherton <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
>> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
>> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.
>>
>> What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*.
>
> If you have an instance of firefox on running on the local machine,
> firefox will detect that and simply tell that instance to open a new
> window. If you have no local copy of firefox running then it will
> run on the remote machine as you expect.

You are right! When firefox isn't running locally a remote instance is
run. If I run firefox locally *after* starting a remote instance then a
new remote instance is run.

I'm starting to wonder whether this isn't some weirdness of the X protocol.

Any ideas how can I stop ssh or X or whatever trying to guess where I
want to run an application?

Mark

Mark Atherton wrote:

> When I ssh into a remote system and run firefox I expect that with
> "X11Forwarding yes" in my sshd_config on the remote system I should
> execute firefox on the remote system but view it locally.
>
> What seems to happen is that firefox runs on the local machine*. I'm
> sure this happens by design, but I can't find out how it works, why it
> might be desirable, or how to disable it.
>
> I've looked at http://www.openssh.org/ but can't find the relevant docs.
> Any pointers would be welcome.
>
> Mark Atherton
>
>
> * evidence: (1) when I ssh into a fresh linux installation and run
> firefox it runs with the configuration setup as for my local system. (2)
> ps -Al shows no firefox (or firefox-bin) running on the remote machine.

Um, don't jump all over me for this but are you sure you are running form
the correct system? If you ssh into the remote system then do a `hostname`.
does it show the hostname you expect? I know it sounds obvious, but
sometimes people overlook the obvious.

Mark Atherton wrote:
> You are right! When firefox isn't running locally a remote instance is
> run. If I run firefox locally *after* starting a remote instance then a
> new remote instance is run.
>
> I'm starting to wonder whether this isn't some weirdness of the X protocol.
>
> Any ideas how can I stop ssh or X or whatever trying to guess where I
> want to run an application?

It's Firefox deciding, not X or ssh.

--
Paul

On 2006-11-22, Mark Atherton <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
> You are right! When firefox isn't running locally a remote instance is
> run. If I run firefox locally *after* starting a remote instance then a
> new remote instance is run.
>
> I'm starting to wonder whether this isn't some weirdness of the X protocol.
>
> Any ideas how can I stop ssh or X or whatever trying to guess where I
> want to run an application?

As someone else noted, firefox is deciding this, not X or ssh. And this
behavior (annoying as it is) changed recently. I've found one workaround to
get firefox to actually start on a remote machine if you've already got
a local instance running. After 'ssh -X'ing into the remote host, start
firefox with the following command:

env MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1 firefox -P

The "-P" tells firefox to start with the profile selector. For some reason,
'env MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1 firefox' isn't enough -- you need the "-P".

--
Joshua Baker-LePain
Department of Biomedical Engineering
Duke University