element14 Community
element14 Community
    Register Log In
  • Site
  • Search
  • Log In Register
  • Members
    Members
    • Benefits of Membership
    • Achievement Levels
    • Members Area
    • Personal Blogs
    • Feedback and Support
    • What's New on element14
  • Learn
    Learn
    • Learning Center
    • eBooks
    • STEM Academy
    • Webinars, Training and Events
    • Learning Groups
  • Technologies
    Technologies
    • 3D Printing
    • Experts & Guidance
    • FPGA
    • Industrial Automation
    • Internet of Things
    • Power & Energy
    • Sensors
    • Technology Groups
  • Challenges & Projects
    Challenges & Projects
    • Design Challenges
    • element14 presents
    • Project14
    • Arduino Projects
    • Raspberry Pi Projects
    • Project Groups
  • Products
    Products
    • Arduino
    • Dev Tools
    • Manufacturers
    • Raspberry Pi
    • RoadTests & Reviews
    • Avnet Boards Community
    • Product Groups
  • Store
    Store
    • Visit Your Store
    • 'Choose another store...'
      • Europe
      •  Austria (German)
      •  Belgium (Dutch, French)
      •  Bulgaria (Bulgarian)
      •  Czech Republic (Czech)
      •  Denmark (Danish)
      •  Estonia (Estonian)
      •  Finland (Finnish)
      •  France (French)
      •  Germany (German)
      •  Hungary (Hungarian)
      •  Ireland
      •  Israel
      •  Italy (Italian)
      •  Latvia (Latvian)
      •  
      •  Lithuania (Lithuanian)
      •  Netherlands (Dutch)
      •  Norway (Norwegian)
      •  Poland (Polish)
      •  Portugal (Portuguese)
      •  Romania (Romanian)
      •  Russia (Russian)
      •  Slovakia (Slovak)
      •  Slovenia (Slovenian)
      •  Spain (Spanish)
      •  Sweden (Swedish)
      •  Switzerland(German, French)
      •  Turkey (Turkish)
      •  United Kingdom
      • Asia Pacific
      •  Australia
      •  China
      •  Hong Kong
      •  India
      •  Korea (Korean)
      •  Malaysia
      •  New Zealand
      •  Philippines
      •  Singapore
      •  Taiwan
      •  Thailand (Thai)
      • Americas
      •  Brazil (Portuguese)
      •  Canada
      •  Mexico (Spanish)
      •  United States
      Can't find the country/region you're looking for? Visit our export site or find a local distributor.
  • Translate
  • Profile
Personal Blogs
  • Members
  • More
Personal Blogs
Legacy Personal Blogs BeagleBone - Show XWindow Graphic Apps on Windows Desktop
  • Blog
  • Documents
  • Mentions
  • Sub-Groups
  • Tags
  • More
  • Cancel
  • New
Blog Post Actions
  • Subscribe by email
  • More
  • Cancel
  • Share
  • Subscribe by email
  • More
  • Cancel
Group Actions
  • Group RSS
  • More
  • Cancel
Engagement
  • Author Author: Jan Cumps
  • Date Created: 27 Aug 2016 9:01 AM Date Created
  • Views 1528 views
  • Likes 2 likes
  • Comments 4 comments
  • xwindows
  • cygwin
  • windows
  • BeagleBone
  • feature_tutorial
Related
Recommended

BeagleBone - Show XWindow Graphic Apps on Windows Desktop

Jan Cumps
Jan Cumps
27 Aug 2016

I 'm learning embedded Linux with a BeagleBone.  This time I'm using my Windows Desktop as the screen for my board.

 

You don't have permission to edit metadata of this video.
Edit media
x
image
Upload Preview
image

 

Graphic Programs on a headless board.

 

XWindow and Preparation of the Windows PC

 

I'm going to run applications on the BB. These applications want to show a window and graphics.

My BB doesn't have a screen. It will direct the graphics to my Windows laptop.

The activity doesn't require any software installation on the BB. Everything is there.

You have to run an xwindow server on your PC though - a program that will receive the graphics from the BB and draw them on the Windows desktop.

I'm using Cygwin for that. Install the latest version.

There's one change to the default install that you have to do on the 'Select Packages' screen.

Change X11 from Default to Install.

image

 

Then let the installation rip - this is a good time to do a long household chore because the first download of Cygwin takes a long time.

I have selected to create the Start Menu icons at the end of the install, so that I get an entry in the Start menu for the xwindow server.

After installation, you can start the Cygwin service in several ways. The easiest is to select the XWin Server program from your Start menu.

 

 

 

 

image

 

You get two new icons in the Tray. The first one - the Cygwin/XServer icon - lets you set preferences on how the xwindow canvas appears on your desktop.

We will not use that in this session. We leave everything as is.

image

The green icon is a menu that allows you to run a set of linux graphic applications locally on your Windows computer.

We'll use that to start a terminal session. From there we'll contact our BB and kick off graphical apps.

 

To do that, right-click on the X applications menu icon. Then select System Tools -> XTerm.

 

image

 

The xterm window pops up on your desktop. And that's the last piece of action that's executed on your computer.

You can spot that because the prompt shows my computer's name. It's a local Cygwin linux session.

In the next section, we connect to the BB and start shooting off graphic programs.

image

 

 

Connect to BeagleBone and Run Graphic Programs

 

Everything is now ready to establish the graphic link between BB and your PC, and run a few graphic applications.

Up until now, we were working on a Cygwin linux session on the PC. After the next step, we're in a linux session on the BB Debian - almost similar as when you go via PuTTY.

In the xterm window, secure shell into your BB. Use the -XY options to allow the BB to tunnel the graphic commands back to your PC xwindow server.

 

ssh -XY debian@192.168.7.2

 

Enter the password of user debian. You see that we have landed in our bb linux session, because the prompt changes to debian@beaglebone.

image

 

You're now ready to run graphic programs. There are a number of them installed in the /usr/bin/ folder of Debian.

Let's start with the test program xlogo.

That one is typically used to see if everything is set up right.

 

Start it by running this command on the prompt (the & after the command takes care that linux kicks off the program and returns back to the prompt without waiting for the app to finish:

 

 

xlogo &

 

 

If you see a small window popping up on your Windows desktop, you've got success!

image

 

Now go on and try a few of the other pre-installed applications:

 

xcalc &
xterm &
xclock &
xmessage "Hello, world!" &
xedit &

 

 

This is different than running a Desktop Environment. We're running individual applications here. You don't have a typical KDE, GNOME, Xfce, LXDE, ... experience.

Nothing stops you to install any of these windowing flavours on your BB and run that desktop environment on your Windows screen. It works - but you'll have to do that install.

 

image

Have fun!

 

 

 

 

BeagleBone - First Little Checks
BeagleBone - Cross Compile c++ on Windows
BeagleBone - Show XWindows Graphic Apps on Windows Desktop
  • Sign in to reply

Top Comments

  • jkridner
    jkridner over 7 years ago in reply to jkridner +1
    Windows 10's Bash shell can run graphical Linux applications with this trick | PCWorld trying to Google my own answer ^^^^.
  • Jan Cumps
    Jan Cumps over 4 years ago

    I fixed the video link

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up 0 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • Jan Cumps
    Jan Cumps over 7 years ago in reply to jkridner

    According to your Google find, it requires a similar additional xwin server. They mention XMing, I use Cygwin.

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up 0 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • jkridner
    jkridner over 7 years ago in reply to jkridner

    Windows 10's Bash shell can run graphical Linux applications with this trick | PCWorld

     

    trying to Google my own answer ^^^^.

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up +1 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • jkridner
    jkridner over 7 years ago

    Does this change with the Windows 10 Ubuntu add-on? Will it make it easier?

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up 0 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
element14 Community

element14 is the first online community specifically for engineers. Connect with your peers and get expert answers to your questions.

  • Members
  • Learn
  • Technologies
  • Challenges & Projects
  • Products
  • Store
  • About Us
  • Feedback & Support
  • FAQs
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy
  • Legal and Copyright Notices
  • Sitemap
  • Cookies

An Avnet Company © 2023 Premier Farnell Limited. All Rights Reserved.

Premier Farnell Ltd, registered in England and Wales (no 00876412), registered office: Farnell House, Forge Lane, Leeds LS12 2NE.

ICP 备案号 10220084.

Follow element14

  • X
  • Facebook
  • linkedin
  • YouTube