-1

I have an Ubuntu 16.04 droplet on DigitalOcean and I'm trying to set up remote desktop capabilities for it. I followed these instructions through Step 2. However, when I start the VNC server using the vncserver command, it goes haywire and bogs down the server until it crashes. Here are excerpts from the log file:

19/12/17 23:47:52 Xvnc version TightVNC-1.3.10
19/12/17 23:47:52 Copyright (C) 2000-2009 TightVNC Group
19/12/17 23:47:52 Copyright (C) 1999 AT&T Laboratories Cambridge
19/12/17 23:47:52 All Rights Reserved.
19/12/17 23:47:52 See http://www.tightvnc.com/ for information on TightVNC
19/12/17 23:47:52 Desktop name 'X' (thoughtful:1)
19/12/17 23:47:52 Protocol versions supported: 3.3, 3.7, 3.8, 3.7t, 3.8t
19/12/17 23:47:52 Listening for VNC connections on TCP port 5901
Font directory '/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/' not found - ignoring
Font directory '/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/' not found - ignoring
/home/epoirier/.vnc/xstartup: 1: /home/epoirier/.vnc/xstartup: Cannot fork
xrdb: Resource temporarily unavailable
xrdb: cannot run '/usr/bin/cpp -P  -DHOST=thoughtful -DSERVERHOST=thoughtful -DSRVR_thoughtful -DDISPLAY_NUM=1 -DCLIENTHOST=thoughtful -DCLNT_thoughtful -DVERSION=11 -DREVISION=0 -DVENDOR="AT&T Laboratories Cambridge" -DVNDR_AT_T_Laboratories_Cambridge -DRELEASE=3332 -DNUM_SCREENS=1 -DEXT_XC_MISC -DEXT_SYNC -DEXT_MIT_SUNDRY_NONSTANDARD -DEXT_BIG_REQUESTS -DEXT_XTEST -DEXT_MIT_SHM -DEXT_SHAPE -DSCREEN_NUM=0 -DWIDTH=1024 -DHEIGHT=768 -DX_RESOLUTION=2951 -DY_RESOLUTION=2954 -DPLANES=24 -DBITS_PER_RGB=8 -DCLASS="TrueColor" -DCLASS_TrueColor=34 -DCOLOR -DCLASS_TrueColor_24=34 /home/epoirier/.Xresources'
/usr/bin/startxfce4: X server already running on display :1
xrdb: Resource temporarily unavailable
xrdb: cannot run '/usr/bin/cpp -P  -DHOST=thoughtful -DSERVERHOST=thoughtful -DSRVR_thoughtful -DDISPLAY_NUM=1 -DCLIENTHOST=thoughtful -DCLNT_thoughtful -DVERSION=11 -DREVISION=0 -DVENDOR="AT&T Laboratories Cambridge" -DVNDR_AT_T_Laboratories_Cambridge -DRELEASE=3332 -DNUM_SCREENS=1 -DEXT_XC_MISC -DEXT_SYNC -DEXT_MIT_SUNDRY_NONSTANDARD -DEXT_BIG_REQUESTS -DEXT_XTEST -DEXT_MIT_SHM -DEXT_SHAPE -DSCREEN_NUM=0 -DWIDTH=1024 -DHEIGHT=768 -DX_RESOLUTION=2951 -DY_RESOLUTION=2954 -DPLANES=24 -DBITS_PER_RGB=8 -DCLASS="TrueColor" -DCLASS_TrueColor=34 -DCOLOR -DCLASS_TrueColor_24=34 /home/epoirier/.Xresources'
/usr/bin/startxfce4: X server already running on display :1
/etc/xdg/xfce4/xinitrc: 8: /etc/xdg/xfce4/xinitrc: Cannot fork
/etc/xdg/xfce4/xinitrc: 8: /etc/xdg/xfce4/xinitrc: Cannot fork
cpp: error: vfork: Resource temporarily unavailable
/usr/bin/startxfce4: X server already running on display :1
sh: 1: Cannot fork

This is the beginning of the log and it descends into more chaos from here with many different "Cannot fork" warnings. Nothing from the command line indicates that something is going wrong when starting the VNC server. Anyone have any ideas on what's going wrong here?

Alex
  • 1,221
  • 2
  • 26
  • 42
Eric Poirier
  • 1
  • 1
  • Take a look at the [Archlinux Wiki - vncserver](https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/TigerVNC). – David C. Rankin Dec 20 '17 at 00:34
  • 1
    Stack Overflow is a site for programming and development questions. This question appears to be off-topic because it is not about programming or development. See [What topics can I ask about here](http://stackoverflow.com/help/on-topic) in the Help Center. Perhaps [Super User](http://superuser.com/) or [Unix & Linux Stack Exchange](http://unix.stackexchange.com/) would be a better place to ask. – jww Dec 20 '17 at 04:11

1 Answers1

0

You are probably running out of file descriptors for the user running that process.

Check what is the current limit with ulimit -n and change accordingly.

Jorge Ferreira
  • 96,051
  • 25
  • 122
  • 132