[SETUP ERROR] Unable to connect via freerdp

[ifalatik]

Please provide the following information:

Description of what seems to work and what not, where you think the setup has failed:

• Container runs
• Windows is installed
• Can connect via Browser
• Office didn't seem to be installed (not listed in Apps), but running the InstallOffice.ps1 script seems to have solved that (even though it says it was already installed) -> apps show up now
• I can start them as well
• setup is never able to connect to the running VM via freerdp (neither xfreerdp3 nor flatpak run)
• after the first error I accessed the VM through the website and was presented with two open Terminal windows: One was totally blank, the other one showed a Registry entry.

Confirmation whether you have tried the setup troubleshooting tips already

Yes, I have tried all of the steps. I was able to install Office manually, but none of the commands after If you still get an error, test if you can connect to the VM using RDP. work.

The windows_install.log and setup_output.log (in ~/.local/share/linoffice)

windows_install.log

setup_output.log

The setup.log, setup_office.log, and setup_rdp.log (if they exist) in C:\OEM in the Windows VM (you can access it through 127.0.0.1:8006 in the browser (password is MyWindowsPassword) or via RDP with the command xfreerdp /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388)

setup_rdp.log doesn't exist.

• Your system information (see above)
• System information:
  • The release version of LinOffice you used: v2.2.7
  • Your Linux distribution: Ubuntu 24.04
  • Your desktop environment: Gnome
  • Are you using Wayland or X11?: Wayland
  • How did you install Podman? (e.g. was it preinstalled, or did you install it from the repo, or did you do something more exotic like installing it in a Distrobox container): Apt repo
  • How did you install Podman-Compose? (e.g. did you install it from the repo, did you install it via pip, or did you install it manually): Apt repo
  • Which FreeRDP version are you using ('native' version from repo or Flatpak): Native / Flatpak

[ifalatik]

One more thing that I did find to be strange: the CD drive (D:) was never unmounted after installation

[eylenburg]

Can you connect via freerdp just using xfreerdp3 /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388 (the virtual machine needs to be running and Windows user logged out)?

[mitiemann]

I also cannot connect via FreeRDP at the moment. Office had already been installed on first Browser connect. For me, there have been no open Terminal windows.

I've tried using the xfreerdp command, but get the following output:

❯ flatpak run --command=xfreerdp com.freerdp.FreeRDP /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388
[15:44:39:489] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [warn_credential_args]: Using /p is insecure
[15:44:39:489] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [warn_credential_args]: Passing credentials or secrets via command line might expose these in the process list
[15:44:39:489] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [warn_credential_args]: Consider using one of the following (more secure) alternatives:
[15:44:39:489] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [warn_credential_args]:   - /args-from: pipe in arguments from stdin, file or file descriptor
[15:44:39:489] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [warn_credential_args]:   - /from-stdin pass the credential via stdin
[15:44:39:489] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [warn_credential_args]:   - set environment variable FREERDP_ASKPASS to have a gui tool query for credentials
[15:44:39:491] [2:00000004] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.x11] - [load_map_from_xkbfile]:     : keycode: 0x08 -> no RDP scancode found
[15:44:39:491] [2:00000004] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.x11] - [load_map_from_xkbfile]: ZEHA: keycode: 0x5d -> no RDP scancode found
[15:45:55:918] [2:00000004] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core.transport] - [transport_read_layer]: BIO_read retries exceeded
[15:45:55:918] [2:00000004] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core] - [transport_read_layer]: ERRCONNECT_CONNECT_TRANSPORT_FAILED [0x0002000D]

[15:47:12:420] [2:00000004] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core.transport] - [transport_read_layer]: BIO_read retries exceeded
[15:47:12:420] [2:00000004] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core] - [transport_read_layer]: ERRCONNECT_CONNECT_TRANSPORT_FAILED [0x0002000D]
[15:47:12:420] [2:00000004] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core] - [freerdp_connect]: freerdp_post_connect failed

I had the same issue in December already, but hadn't dug deeper back then due to time constraints. This time, I'm highly motivated to provide any help I can give.

The remaining info:

setup_output.log
windows_install.log

setup.log:

setup_office.log:

LinOffice: v2.2.7
Linux: Bluefin, it's a Fedora Silverblue variant built on bootc
Desktop: Gnome
Window compositor: Wayland
Podman: pre-installed
FreeRDP: Flatpak

Thanks a lot in advance!

[eylenburg]

Looking at the windows_install.log I think the error comes from this part in FreeRDP:

[14:07:37:076] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [freerdp_client_settings_parse_command_line_arguments_int]: Unsupported command line syntax!
[14:07:37:077] [2:00000002] [WARN][com.freerdp.client.common.cmdline] - [freerdp_client_settings_parse_command_line_arguments_int]: FreeRDP 1.0 style syntax was dropped with version 3!

I have seen this error from multiple users. Now unfortunately I have no clue what causes it. I have the Flatpak version of FreeRDP 3 as well and I don't get this error.

When I type in xfreerdp without further parameters, the suggest syntax for the /app (RemoteApp) parameter is this:

/app:program:[path|||alias],cmd:command,file:filename,guid:guid,icon:filename,name:name,workdir:directory,hidef:[on|off]

This is the syntax that is currently used by LinOffice, for example in the setup script it tests the connection with xfreerdp /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388 /app:program:"C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe",cmd:"/c tsdiscon" - so basically it runs the the app cmd.exe with the command /c tsdiscon (which just means disconnect RDP again).

However, in the FreeRDP wiki the syntax is shown differently:

/app:||<alias> or <executable path> Remote application program
/app-name:<app name> Remote application name for user interface
/app-icon:<icon path> Remote application icon for user interface
/app-cmd:<parameters> Remote application command-line parameters
/app-file:<file name> File to open with remote application
/app-guid:<app guid> Remote application GUID

So instead of /app:program:"...",cmd:"..." it would be /app:"..." /app-cmd:"..."

I tried this and it didn't work on my machine.

Really not sure how to fix this error....

[enderleoDJ]

I don't think it will help but, I had a recurring problem after installing linoffice and rebooting Linux I often couldn't launch the apps, after some digging I found that the docker launched but freerpd couldn't connect to it. However, I actually could connect with VNC, so I entered to gpedit.msc, and went into Computer Configuration>Administrative Templates>Windows Components>Remote Desktop Session Host, and put everything I found on the most permissive option, especially inside the Security folder, I straight up just disable everything. It might not be the safest option but hey it worked.

[ifalatik]

Can you connect via freerdp just using xfreerdp3 /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388 (the virtual machine needs to be running and Windows user logged out)?

I get the same error here.

xfreerdp3 /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388
[20:59:13:135] [9937:000026d2] [WARN][com.freerdp.core.nego] - [nego_enable_aad]: This build does not support AAD security, disabling.
[21:00:42:609] [9937:000026d2] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core.transport] - [transport_read_layer]: BIO_read returned a system error 11: Resource temporarily unavailable
[21:00:42:609] [9937:000026d2] [ERROR][com.freerdp.core] - [transport_read_layer]: ERRCONNECT_CONNECT_TRANSPORT_FAILED [0x0002000D]

since this already doesn't work I don't really know what "syntax" tests I could run next.

While writing this comment I stumbled upon: FreeRDP/FreeRDP#10229
Turns out: If I run podman unshare --rootless-netns and then run the xfreerdp command from within this session they work.. Now I don't really have any experience with podman networking, but this seems to at least point into the correct direction.

[ifalatik]

Blessed to have tooling available that will help with stuff I have no idea about:
removing NETWORK: "slirp" from the compose.yaml and restarting (podman compose down && podman compose up -d) resolved the issue.

[eylenburg]

Hi @ifalatik that's very interesting.

Does either removing "slirp" from the compose.yaml or adding "podman unshare --rootless-netns" to all xfreerdp commands fix it?

[ifalatik]

Hi @eylenburg ,

I'm not able to start the apps via the applications menu / links, but running the commands manually works (xfreerdp3 /cert:ignore /u:MyWindowsUser /p:MyWindowsPassword /v:127.0.0.1 /port:3388 /app:program:"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\POWERPNT.EXE")

The AI overlords tell me it's because the installed podman networkBackend is netavark.

[mitiemann]

Can confirm that my network backend is netavark. Can be checked via podman info | grep backend. However, neither removing NETWORK: "slirp" nor podman unshare --rootless-netns fixed it for me - but I might have messed up some of the commands in between. Will continue for trouble shoot and report back if I make progress.

Thanks for pushing this forwards 🫶

Edit: UPDATE

I think I've used podman-compose wrong and the intermediate errors I've seen had been due to waiting on the Windows container to finish it's setup. Removing NETWORK: slirp did work for me after all.