Getting Started With Xming

What is Xming?
Where can I download Xming
How do I use Xming?
What is Cygwin?

What is Xming?
Xming is a free X window server for Microsoft Windows. It allows one to use Linux graphical applications remotely. A detailed description may be found at the software's home page.
Where can I download Xming?
Xming may be downloaded at the project's SourceForge download page.
The installer file is available along with a fonts installer, a portable application bundled with PuTTY, and an alternative installer for use with mesa. The default installer uses OpenGL. Extra tools and clients are also available in a zip file.
How do I use Xming?
Download the installers for Xming and Xming-fonts. Run the Xming installer and then the Xming fonts installer. (You may want to put an Xming icon on your desktop and install the 100 dpi fonts. Otherwise, you can accept the default settings.)

Note: that you must also install PuTTY. For more information on PuTTY, visit our PuTTY FAQ.

To run Xming:

  1. Launch Xming. An Xming icon will appear in the Windows system tray. Xming does not require additional configuration.
  2. Launch PuTTY.
  3. In the left menu pane, expand the "SSH" option under "Connection".
  4. Select "X11", and the options controlling SSH X11 forwarding will appear.
  5. Check the box to enable X11 forwarding, and enter ":0.0" for the X display location.

    PuTTY X11

  6. Go back to the "Session" category, enter the server information, and open the session.
  7. You should now be able to launch graphical applications such as "gedit" from the command line.
    If you wish to open multiple applications in multiple windows, append "&" to the end of the command to allow the execution of multiple programs.
    Example: 
    •    gedit &
    •    eclipse &

What is Cygwin?
On a Windows PC, one can run Cygwin, which is a Unix environment that runs inside of Windows. This can be used as an alternative to Xming. In order to run graphical applications remotely using Cygwin, one needs to install the openssh package as well as the X11-base package. You may wish to install the X11 font packages as well.
Once Cygwin and the required dependencies have been installed, use the following procedure to run a graphical
application. Eclipse is used in this example:

  1. Start a bash shell with the Cygwin icon on the Windows Desktop.
  2. Enter the following command to start the X windows server:
         startx

    this should cause an Xterm window to appear.

  3. In the xterm window, enter the following command to log into one of the HUM 301 workstations:
       ssh -Y <username>@hum301-<nn>.cs.newpaltz.edu

    where <username> is your NPCUID and <nn> is a number between 01 and 21.
    Complete the login process by entering your password.

  4. Once you are logged into the HUM 301 workstation, enter the following
    command to start Eclipse: 
       eclipse