Run Smalltalk on server without GUI?

Question

I\'ve got rather distinct question - I\'d like to run Smalltalk on a production server without using graphical interface. Is this possible with VW or Pharo (maybe even Squeak)?<

Answer 1

If I had root access on the VPS I would personally install Xvnc it doesn't add too much bloat on the server and it's much easier to manage Squeak and Pharo with a GUI.

You can launch each Squeak instance in it's own Xvnc display without relying on a Window Manager by having Squeak take up the whole screen.

You need only minimal X support files. On an headless Ubuntu apt-get install tightvncserver pulls only 19.8 Mb of packages. And unlike RFBServer it will just work with any Squeak/Pharo image.

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Here's how I do this:

For each VM launch an Xvnc session. You can have as many displays as you need. Display :0runs on the VNC port 5900, display :1on 5901 and so on.

To statrt Xvnc on display :0

Xvnc :0 -nolisten tcp -geometry 1024x726 -depth 24 &

Then launch Squeak on that display

squeak -display :0 -- ~/fullscreen.st  &

fullscreen.st is a simple Smalltalk statup script that adjusts Squeak to the size of the screen

"fullscreen.st"
ScreenController new fullScreenOn

A note on security

By default Xvnc accept connections without a password so I suggest you take at least one of the following precautions.

• Forces Xvnc to listen on loopback. I use an LD_PRELOAD trick similar to this for that purpose and connect using ssh port forwarding.
• Block the port on your firewall
• Read on the -rfbauth argument to setup Xvnc password authentication.