Use existing Xorg session for chrome-remote-desktop

use_existing_session.patch

Add an option to use the existing Xorg session with
chrome-remote-desktop.

The original idea of the patch: https://superuser.com/a/850359
--- a/chrome-remote-desktop	2024-03-27 16:03:20.518579015 +0000
+++ b/chrome-remote-desktop	2024-03-27 16:17:58.241912847 +0000
@@ -110,6 +110,8 @@
 
 X_LOCK_FILE_TEMPLATE = "/tmp/.X%d-lock"
 FIRST_X_DISPLAY_NUMBER = 20
+EXISTING_X_DISPLAY_FILE_PATH = os.path.join(CONFIG_DIR, "Xsession")
+X_SESSION_FILE_TEMPLATE = "/tmp/.X11-unix/X%d"
 
 # Amount of time to wait between relaunching processes.
 SHORT_BACKOFF_TIME = 5
@@ -738,16 +740,33 @@
       return True
     return False
 
+  def _use_existing_session(self):
+    with open(EXISTING_X_DISPLAY_FILE_PATH) as fh:
+      try:
+        display_raw = fh.readline().rstrip()
+        display = int(display_raw)
+      except ValueError:
+        logging.error("Display must be a number; got: '%s'" % display_raw)
+        sys.exit(1)
+    if not os.path.exists(X_SESSION_FILE_TEMPLATE % display):
+      logging.error("Xorg session file doesn't exist")
+      sys.exit(1)
+    logging.info("Using existing Xorg session: %d" % display)
+    self.child_env["DISPLAY"] = ":%d" % display
+
   def launch_session(self, server_args, backoff_time):
     """Launches process required for session and records the backoff time
     for inhibitors so that process restarts are not attempted again until
     that time has passed."""
     logging.info("Setting up and launching session")
     self._setup_gnubby()
-    self._launch_server(server_args)
-    if not self._launch_pre_session():
-      # If there was no pre-session script, launch the session immediately.
-      self.launch_desktop_session()
+    if os.path.exists(EXISTING_X_DISPLAY_FILE_PATH):
+      self._use_existing_session()
+    else:
+      self._launch_server(server_args)
+      if not self._launch_pre_session():
+        # If there was no pre-session script, launch the session immediately.
+        self.launch_desktop_session()
     self.server_inhibitor.record_started(MINIMUM_PROCESS_LIFETIME,
                                       backoff_time)
     self.session_inhibitor.record_started(MINIMUM_PROCESS_LIFETIME,

@nightuser setup_audio doesn't seem to be called

It is invalid

Below is the one-liner from @mike-callahan post and individual commands, modified to create the Xsession file as well. I tested it on Arch Linux with chrome-remote-desktop version 128.0.6613.44 and it worked.

@jack9603301 Audio doesn't work for me either.

echo $DISPLAY | tr -d ':' >> ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession && cd /opt/google/chrome-remote-desktop && sudo cp chrome-remote-desktop chrome-remote-desktop_bak && sudo wget -qO- "https://gist.githubusercontent.com/nightuser/2ec1b91a66ec33ef0a0a67b6c570eb40/raw/b09250dcc9a28f09de93192a948dffb4963c2aca/use_existing_session.patch" | tail -n +5 > ~/use_existing_session.patch && sudo patch -Np1 -i ~/use_existing_session.patch && rm ~/use_existing_session.patch && systemctl --user restart chrome-remote-desktop.service && systemctl --user status chrome-remote-desktop.service

echo $DISPLAY | tr -d ':' >> ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession && cd /opt/google/chrome-remote-desktop
sudo cp chrome-remote-desktop chrome-remote-desktop_bak
sudo wget -qO- "https://gist.githubusercontent.com/nightuser/2ec1b91a66ec33ef0a0a67b6c570eb40/raw/b09250dcc9a28f09de93192a948dffb4963c2aca/use_existing_session.patch" | tail -n +5 > ~/use_existing_session.patch
sudo patch -Np1 -i ~/use_existing_session.patch
rm ~/use_existing_session.patch
systemctl --user restart chrome-remote-desktop.service
systemctl --user status chrome-remote-desktop.service

I already had the host configured before applying the patch and for some reason it no longer appeared in https://remotedesktop.google.com/access. I had to do again the entire process from https://remotedesktop.google.com/headless

Below is the one-liner from @mike-callahan post and individual commands, modified to create the Xsession file as well. I tested it on Arch Linux with chrome-remote-desktop version 128.0.6613.44 and it worked.

@jack9603301 Audio doesn't work for me either.

echo $DISPLAY | tr -d ':' >> ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession && cd /opt/google/chrome-remote-desktop && sudo cp chrome-remote-desktop chrome-remote-desktop_bak && sudo wget -qO- "https://gist.githubusercontent.com/nightuser/2ec1b91a66ec33ef0a0a67b6c570eb40/raw/b09250dcc9a28f09de93192a948dffb4963c2aca/use_existing_session.patch" | tail -n +5 > ~/use_existing_session.patch && sudo patch -Np1 -i ~/use_existing_session.patch && rm ~/use_existing_session.patch && systemctl --user restart chrome-remote-desktop.service && systemctl --user status chrome-remote-desktop.service

echo $DISPLAY | tr -d ':' >> ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession && cd /opt/google/chrome-remote-desktop
sudo cp chrome-remote-desktop chrome-remote-desktop_bak
sudo wget -qO- "https://gist.githubusercontent.com/nightuser/2ec1b91a66ec33ef0a0a67b6c570eb40/raw/b09250dcc9a28f09de93192a948dffb4963c2aca/use_existing_session.patch" | tail -n +5 > ~/use_existing_session.patch
sudo patch -Np1 -i ~/use_existing_session.patch
rm ~/use_existing_session.patch
systemctl --user restart chrome-remote-desktop.service
systemctl --user status chrome-remote-desktop.service

I already had the host configured before applying the patch and for some reason it no longer appeared in https://remotedesktop.google.com/access. I had to do again the entire process from https://remotedesktop.google.com/headless

This worked for me (Linux Mint 22, version 129.0.6668.14) with some tweaks.

I had issues with chrome-remote-desktop erroring out, which I solved by changing ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession's contents to be 0 instead of 0.0. I also had to run the systemctl commands without --user and appending @$USER to the commands, so the last two commands became the following:

systemctl restart chrome-remote-desktop@$USER.service
systemctl status chrome-remote-desktop@$USER.service

@JovannMC I hope you are aware of the rm ~/ bomb in that one liner of yours.

I wonder if it is possible for a similar fix under wayland, given that without the patch you can use remote desktop without issue... albeit still under a different session. :p

@JovannMC I hope you are aware of the rm ~/ bomb in that one liner of yours.

that isn't me!! that was from the quote
but yeah, that almost got me, @SitramSoft might wanna edit both the one liner and individual commands 😅

@JovannMC I hope you are aware of the rm ~/ bomb in that one liner of yours.

that isn't me!! that was from the quote but yeah, that almost got me, @SitramSoft might wanna edit both the one liner and individual commands 😅

😱 Thanks for pointing out that mistake. It should be fixed now in both places.

I hope nobody deleted their home directory with that command 😂

@JovannMC I hope you are aware of the rm ~/ bomb in that one liner of yours.

that isn't me!! that was from the quote but yeah, that almost got me, @SitramSoft might wanna edit both the one liner and individual commands 😅

it's still in your quote reply. the sloppy readers like me will totally copypasta themselves into doom.

@JovannMC I hope you are aware of the rm ~/ bomb in that one liner of yours.

that isn't me!! that was from the quote but yeah, that almost got me, @SitramSoft might wanna edit both the one liner and individual commands 😅

it's still in your quote reply. the sloppy readers like me will totally copypasta themselves into doom.

fixed also

@JovannMC I hope you are aware of the rm ~/ bomb in that one liner of yours.

that isn't me!! that was from the quote but yeah, that almost got me, @SitramSoft might wanna edit both the one liner and individual commands 😅

😱 Thanks for pointing out that mistake. It should be fixed now in both places.

I hope nobody deleted their home directory with that command 😂

iirc for me it tried to but didn't really do anything (esp since it didnt have -rf thankfully)

FYI @JovannMC the gist referenced in your expanded one liner is from 2022. It's not the current patch.

Here is the steps to make it work and automatically start. Tested on Ubuntu 22.04 and 24.04

1. Install Chrome
2. Install Chorme Remote Desktop
3. Do the authorization steps on CRD
4. Disable Wayland
5. Enable user automatic login
6. Run

rm ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession
echo $DISPLAY | tr -d ':' >> ~/.config/chrome-remote-desktop/Xsession && cd /opt/google/chrome-remote-desktop
sudo cp chrome-remote-desktop chrome-remote-desktop_bak
sudo wget -qO- "https://gist.githubusercontent.com/nightuser/2ec1b91a66ec33ef0a0a67b6c570eb40/raw/b09250dcc9a28f09de93192a948dffb4963c2aca/use_existing_session.patch" | tail -n +5 > ~/use_existing_session.patch
sudo patch -Np1 -i ~/use_existing_session.patch
rm ~/use_existing_session.patch
systemctl restart chrome-remote-desktop@$USER.service
systemctl enable chrome-remote-desktop@${USER}.service
systemctl status chrome-remote-desktop@$USER.service

7. Coment these lines. They geretate an error when reading /tmp/.X11-unix/X%d on newer OS.

# X_SESSION_FILE_TEMPLATE = "/tmp/.X11-unix/X%d"
...
#if not os.path.exists(X_SESSION_FILE_TEMPLATE % display):
    #  logging.error("Xorg session file doesn't exist")
    #  sys.exit(1)

8. Reboot and test