Ubuntu Manpage: ltsp.conf - client configuration file for LTSP

name
synopsis
creation
syntax
parameters
examples
copyright
see also

NAME

       ltsp.conf - client configuration file for LTSP

SYNOPSIS

       The  LTSP  client  configuration  file  is  placed at /etc/ltsp/ltsp.conf and it loosely follows the .ini
       format. It is able to control various settings of the LTSP  server  and  clients.  After  each  ltsp.conf
       modification,  the  ltsp  initrd command needs to be run so that it's included in the additional ltsp.img
       initrd that is sent when the clients boot.

CREATION

       To create an initial ltsp.conf, run the following command:

       install -m 0660 -g sudo /usr/share/ltsp/common/ltsp/ltsp.conf /etc/ltsp/ltsp.conf

       The optional -g sudo parameter allows users in the sudo group to edit ltsp.conf  with  any  editor  (e.g.
       gedit) without running sudo.

SYNTAX

Open and view the /etc/ltsp/ltsp.conf file that you just created, so that it's easier to understand its
syntax.

The configuration file is separated into sections:

• The special [server] section is evaluated only by the ltsp server.

• The special [common] section is evaluated by both the server and ltsp clients.

• In the special [clients] section, parameters for all clients can be defined. Most ltsp.conf
parameters should be placed there.

• MAC address, IP address, or hostname sections can be used to apply settings to specific clients.
Those support globs, for example [192.168.67.*].

• It's also possible to group parameters into named sections like [crt_monitor] in the example,
and reference them from other sections with the INCLUDE= parameter.

• Advanced users may also use [applet/host] sections, for example [initrd-bottom/library*] would
be evaluated by the ltsp initrd-bottom applet only for clients that have a hostname that starts
with "library".

The ltsp.conf configuration file is internally transformed into a shell script, so all the shell syntax
rules apply, except for the sections headers which are transformed into functions.

This means that you must not use spaces around the "=" sign, and that you may write comments using the
"#" character.

The ltsp initrd command does a quick syntax check by running sh -n /etc/ltsp/ltsp.conf and aborts if it
detects syntax errors.

PARAMETERS

The following parameters are currently defined; an example is given in each case.

ADD_IMAGE_EXCLUDES="/etc/ltsp/add-image.excludes"

OMIT_IMAGE_EXCLUDES="home/*"
Add or omit items to the ltsp image exclusion list. Some files and directories shouldn't be
included in the generated image. The initial list is defined in
/usr/share/ltsp/server/image/image.excludes. It can be completely overridden by creating
/etc/ltsp/image.excludes. ADD_IMAGE_EXCLUDES and OMIT_IMAGE_EXCLUDES can finetune the list by
adding or removing lines to it. They can either be filenames or multiline text.

AUTOLOGIN="user01"

RELOGIN=0|1

GDM3_CONF="WaylandEnable=false"

LIGHTDM_CONF="greeter-hide-users=true"

SDDM_CONF="/etc/ltsp/sddm.conf"
Configure the display manager to log in this user automatically. If SSHFS is used, the
PASSWORDS_x parameter (see below) must also be provided. AUTOLOGIN can be a simple username like
"user01", or it can be a partial regular expression that transforms a hostname to a username. For
example, AUTOLOGIN="pc/guest" means "automatically log in as guest01 in pc01, as guest02 in pc02
etc". Setting RELOGIN=0 will make AUTOLOGIN work only once. Finally, the *_CONF parameters can
be either filenames or direct text, and provide a way to write additional content to the generated
display manager configuration.

CRONTAB_x="30 15 * * * root poweroff"
Add a line in crontab. The example powers off the clients at 15:30.

CUPS_SERVER="$SERVER"
Set the CUPS server in the client /etc/cups/client.conf. Defaults to $SERVER. You're supposed to
also enable printer sharing on the server by running cupsctl _share_printers=1 or system-config-
printer or by visiting http://localhost:631. Then all printers can be managed on the LTSP server.
Other possible values are CUPS_SERVER="localhost", when a printer is connected to a client, or
CUPS_SERVER="ignore", to skip CUPS server handling.

DEBUG_LOG=0|1
Write warnings and error messages to /run/ltsp/debug.log. Defaults to 0.

DEBUG_SHELL=0|1
Launch a debug shell when errors are detected. Defaults to 0.

DEFAULT_IMAGE="x86_64"

KERNEL_PARAMETERS="nomodeset noapic"

MENU_TIMEOUT="5000"
These parameters can be defined under [mac:address] sections in ltsp.conf, and they are used by
ltsp ipxe to generate the iPXE menu. They control the default menu item, the additional kernel
parameters and the menu timeout for each client. They can also be defined globally under [server].

DISABLE_SESSION_SERVICES="evolution-addressbook-factory obex"

DISABLE_SYSTEM_SERVICES="anydesk teamviewerd"

KEEP_SESSION_SERVICES="at-spi-dbus-bus"

KEEP_SYSTEM_SERVICES="apparmor ssh"

MASK_SESSION_SERVICES="gnome-software-service update-notifier"

MASK_SYSTEM_SERVICES="apt-daily apt-daily-upgrade rsyslog"
Space separated lists of services to disable, permit or mask on LTSP clients. They mostly
correspond to systemctl disable/mask [--user] invocations. Setting these ltsp.conf parameters
adds or omits items from the default lists that are defined in
/usr/share/ltsp/client/init/56-services.sh. Disabled services can be started on demand by e.g.
dbus or socket activation, while masked services need to be manually unmasked first. Currently,
MASK_SESSION_SERVICES also deletes the non-systemd user services from /etc/xdg/autostart.

DNS_SERVER="8.8.8.8 208.67.222.222"
Specify the DNS servers for the clients.

FSTAB_x="server:/home /home nfs defaults,nolock 0 0"
All parameters that start with FSTAB_ are sorted and then their values are written to /etc/fstab
at the client init phase.

HOSTNAME="pc01"
Specify the client hostname. Defaults to "ltsp%{IP}". HOSTNAME may contain the %{IP}
pseudovariable, which is a sequence number calculated from the client IP and the subnet mask, or
the %{MAC} pseudovariable, which is the MAC address without the colons.

HOSTS_x="192.168.67.10 nfs-server"
All parameters that start with HOSTS_ are sorted and then their values are written to /etc/hosts
at the client init phase.

IMAGE_TO_RAM=0|1
Specifying this option under the [clients] section copies the rootfs image to RAM during boot.
That makes clients less dependent on the server, but they must have sufficient memory to fit the
image.

INCLUDE="other-section"
Include another section in this section.

LOCAL_SWAP=0|1
Activate local swap partitions. Defaults to 1.

MULTISEAT=0|1

UDEV_SEAT_n_x="*/usb?/?-[2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18]/*"
MULTISEAT=1 tries to autodetect if an LTSP client has two graphics cards and to automatically
split them along with the USB ports into two seats. Optional lines like
UDEV_SEAT_1_SOUND="*/sound/card1*" can be used to finetune the udev rules that will be generated
and placed in a file named /etc/udev/rules.d/72-ltsp-seats.rules.

NAT=0|1
Only use this under the [server] section. Normally, ltsp service runs when the server boots and
detects if a server IP is 192.168.67.1, in which case it automatically enables IP forwarding for
the clients to be able to access the Internet in dual NIC setups. But if there's a chance that the
IP isn't set yet (e.g. disconnected network cable), setting NAT=1 enforces that.

OMIT_FUNCTIONS="pam_main mask_services_main"
A space separated list of function names that should be omitted. The functions specified here
will not be executed when called. This option can be specified in any [section].

PASSWORDS_x="teacher/cXdlcjEyMzQK [a-z][-0-9]*/MTIzNAo= guest[^:]*/"
A space separated list of regular expressions that match usernames, followed by slash and
base64-encoded passwords. At boot, ltsp init writes those passwords for the matching users in
/etc/shadow, so that then pamltsp can pass them to SSH/SSHFS. The end result is that those users
are able to login either in the console or the display manager by just pressing [Enter] at the
password prompt.
Passwords are base64-encoded to prevent over-the-shoulder spying and to avoid the need for
escaping special characters. To encode a password in base64, run base64, type a single password,
and then Ctrl+D.
In the example above, the teacher account will automatically use "qwer1234" as the password, the
a1-01, b1-02 etc students will use "1234", and the guest01 etc accounts will be able to use an
empty password without even authenticating against the server; in this case, SSHFS can't be used,
/home should be local or NFS.

POST_APPLET_x="ln -s /etc/ltsp/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf"
All parameters that start with POST_ and then have an ltsp client applet name are sorted and their
values are executed after the main function of that applet. See the ltsp(8) man page for the
available applets. The usual place to run client initialization commands that don't need to
daemonize is POST_INIT_x.

PRE_APPLET_x="debug_shell"
All parameters that start with PRE_ and then have an ltsp client applet name are sorted and their
values are executed before the main function of that applet.

PWMERGE_SUR=, PWMERGE_SGR=, PWMERGE_DGR=, PWMERGE_DUR=
Normally, all the server users are listed on the client login screens and are permitted to log in.
To exclude some of them, define one or more of those regular expressions. For more information,
read /usr/share/ltsp/client/login/pwmerge. For example, if you name your clients pc01, pc02 etc,
and your users a01, a02, b01, b02 etc, then the following line only shows/allows a01 and b01 to
login to pc01: PWMERGE_SUR=".*%{HOSTNAME#pc}"

REMOTEAPPS="users-admin mate-about-me"
Register the specified applications as remoteapps, so that they're executed on the LTSP server via
ssh -X instead of on the clients. For more information, see ltsp-remoteapps(8).

RPI_IMAGE="raspios"
Select this LTSP image to boot Raspberry Pis from. This symlinks all $BASE_DIR/$RPI_IMAGE/boot/*
files directly under $TFTP_DIR when ltsp kernel $RPI_IMAGE is called. See the Raspberry Pi OS
documentation page ⟨https://ltsp.org/docs/installation/raspios⟩ for more information.

SEARCH_DOMAIN="ioa.sch.gr"
A search domain to add to resolv.conf and to /etc/hosts. Usually provided by DHCP.

SERVER="192.168.67.1"
The LTSP server is usually autodetected; it can be manually specified if there's need for it.

X_DRIVER="vesa"

X_HORIZSYNC="28.0-87.0"

X_MODELINE='"1024x768_85.00" 94.50 1024 1096 1200 1376 768 771 775 809 -hsync +vsync'

X_MODES='"1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"'

X_PREFERREDMODE="1024x768"

X_VERTREFRESH="43.0-87.0"

X_VIRTUAL="800 600"
If any of these parameters are set, the /usr/share/ltsp/client/init/xorg.conf template is
installed to /etc/X11/xorg.conf, while applying the parameters. Read that template and consult
xorg.conf(5) for more information. The most widely supported method to set a default resolution
is X_MODES. If more parameters are required, create a custom xorg.conf as described in the
EXAMPLES section.

EXAMPLES

       To specify a hostname and a user to autologin in a client:

       [3c:07:71:a2:02:e3]
       HOSTNAME=pc01
       AUTOLOGIN=user01
       PASSWORDS_PC01="user01/cGFzczAxCg=="

       The password above is "pass01" in base64 encoding. To calculate it, the  base64  command  was  run  in  a
       terminal:

       base64
       pass01
       <press Ctrl+D at this point>
       cGFzczAxCg==

       If  some clients need a custom xorg.conf file, create it in e.g.  /etc/ltsp/xorg-nvidia.conf, and put the
       following in ltsp.conf to dynamically symlink it for those clients at boot:

       [pc01]
       INCLUDE=nvidia

       [nvidia]
       POST_INIT_LN_XORG="ln -sf ../ltsp/xorg-nvidia.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf"

       Since ltsp.conf is transformed into a shell script and sections into functions, it's possible to directly
       include code or to call sections at POST_APPLET_x hooks.

       [clients]
       # Allow local root logins by setting a password hash for the root user.
       # The hash contains $, making it hard to escape in POST_INIT_x="sed ...".
       # So put sed in a section and call it at POST_INIT like this:
       POST_INIT_SET_ROOT_HASH="section_set_root_hash"

       # This is the hash of "qwer1234"; cat /etc/shadow to see your hash.
       [set_root_hash]
       sed 's|^root:[^:]*:|root:$6$VRfFL349App5$BfxBbLE.tYInJfeqyGTv2lbk6KOza3L2AMpQz7bMuCdb3ZsJacl9Nra7F/Zm7WZJbnK5kvK74Ik9WO2qGietM0:|' -i /etc/shadow

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright 2019-2022 the LTSP team, see AUTHORS.