Troubleshooting VNC Connection error

So I'm back out to work after a nice vacation, so I should have seen this coming, right?

When attempting to connect to my VNC Server from my client, a nice error message popped up.
Unable to connect to server.
I managed to ssh into the server, but the VNC Server refused to restart:

[myuser@xxxxxx tmp]# service vncserver restart
Shutting down VNC server: 3:myuser                         [FAILED]
Starting VNC server: 3:myuser
Warning: xxx.xxx.xxx:3 is taken because of /tmp/.X3-lock
Remove this file if there is no X server xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:3
A VNC server is already running as :3                         [FAILED]







Long story short, I had to delete the lockfile and socket in order to be able restart the VNC Server.

0. Login as root/sudo
1. Remove lock file and socket
rm -rf /tmp/.X3-lock
rm -rf /tmp/.X11-unix/X3

2. Restart vnc service
service vncserver restart

Installation of VNC Server on CentOS 5.x

 I honestly thought I documented this already, but I searched the blog and was unable to locate it.

This covers installation and quick configuration of VNC on a server, in the event that Desktop access is needed on a remote server. In some cases, the CLI is not enough, and I've found this very useful.

On to the entry:

1. Login as root (or su)

2. Install required packages:
yum  -y install vnc-server

3. Secure the VNC server:
vncpasswd
Set mypassword
cd ~/.vnc
ls
the passwd folder should be listed

4. Configure the server:
nano /etc/sysconfig/vncservers
add to end of file:

VNCSERVERS="3:myusername"
VNCSERVERARGS [3] = "-geometry 1024x768"

5. Start the VNC service and configure service to autostart on boot:
service vncserver start
chkconfig vncserver on

6. Further configuration:
cd ~/.vnc
nano xstartup
add under the line "# Add the foll..."

(while true ; do xterm ; done) &

remove comments(#) from

#unset SESSION_MANAGER
#exec /etc/x11/xinit/xinitrc

7. Restart the vnc service
Service vncserver restart

8. Configure firewall to allow VNC server traffic
system-config-securitylevel-tui
add 5903:tcp to exceptions list

9. Open VNC client from remote peer and connect to VNC Server:
server: 192.168.x.x:3
username myusername
password: mypassword (as set in Step 3)


finito
-noveck