I've been looking at various options at administering several servers remotely like:
VNC (don't like the lax security of 8 characters max for a password) and
NX (awesome piece of kit but still limited to a per desktop viewer)...
What I'm looking for is a GUI that essentially gives me access to the whole system
where I can switch from one user to another at will without having to logout of one
desktop and then into another.
Essentially, a real live environment where you can switch between users and back,
and from the login screen to any other user as if you were physically using the machine.
From your desktop you cannot use putty and the ssh protocol from your PC to get a root (or any user) screen in bash or ksh on the remote? I do it 50 times per week PC->Solaris, PC->ubuntu, etc.
Just open a terminal window, type ssh user@host and you are there. My "desktop" used to administrate ~500 servers is exactly that: lots of xterms with ssh-sessions in them (and an occasional Firefox window to read my documentation wiki or search the web).
Exactly. You don't need a GUI remotely because you have one at your desktop already. What i like to do is to have xterms with the ssh-calls for certain important server/user combinations predefined. For instance: i use a certain server and user for maintaining my self-created packages which i use for deployment. For this server i have predefined (as an entry in my window managers menu) the command:
So i just click on that and a window pops open, with a certain colour so that its pupose stands out, the respective window title and logged in already with the correct user.
Yes. I use this feature heavily because i have no intention to enter my password manually 1000 times a day. I store the (passwordless) keys on my local machine and use that as my "jump server" to the rest of the infrastructure.