Introduction

1. What is the NoMachine Server UI?

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The NoMachine Server User Interface (UI) is a graphical interface to allow managing the most common settings of the server and tune access to this remote host, where the server is installed. Use it to administer your personal server (it's available also for the free version) or that of your Company or University.

The default configuration is suitable for the greatest number of environments but if a special set-up or behavior is needed, you may configure the server from its graphical interface as explained below.

Most advanced configurations are also possible via configuration files or server commands, and they are detailed in the Installation and Configuration Guide of your server.

NoMachine server packages provide three interfaces:

1. The server UI ("server side") which manages the services and configurations of the remote host. This is available when installing any of the NoMachine packages (free version and 'Server' products, including the Terminal Server Node.).
2. The Player UI ("client side"). This is available when installing any of the NoMachine packages including Enterprise Client and allows to connect to another remote machine with NoMachine server installed.
3. If the player is connecting in 'server admin' mode, it allows to administer the server remotely through an interface very similar to the local server UI.

This guide will look at what services and settings can be configured in the server side interface. For guidance on installation and how to start a session to the remote computer, please consult the Tutorials and Installation Guides available in the Support Section of the website: https://www.nomachine.com/all-documents.

The NoMachine Server User Interface

Let's distinguish between the local Server UI, accessible on the computer where a NoMachine server is installed, and the remote Server UI which allows to administer the server without the need to be on that machine. You need to connect to the remote server by Player in 'server admin' mode to access the remote server UI. The remote Server UI almost mirrors the local Server UI.

2. How to access the Local Server UI and its Functions

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You may access the graphical interface to administer your server and choose your custom settings in three ways:

First way - Click on the !M icon in the system tray and choose Show server status:

You can then navigate among the available panels from the menu on the left.

Second way - Mouse click on the !M icon in the system tray to open the NoMachine Monitor menu. Then click on Show main window: it opens the Player window for connecting to other computers. Click on Settings.

You can then choose between settings for Server and for Player (client), as listed in the right area. Choose 'Server' and one of the available settings on the right area. You enter the same view mode of (I) and you can then navigate among the panels from the menu on the left.

Third way - Similar to II, but launch NoMachine from your program menu or Application, instead than from the !M icon in the system tray.

The local NoMachine Server interface is made of a number of items to switch about the available configuration panels: Status, Ports, Security, Devices, Performance and Updates.

If the server is not the free version, a further item named 'Clouds' appears in the list above. That's because a server (not the free one) can be added as a node to any of the products of the cloud server family. From the 'Clouds' panel, you can interact with the cloud server being the parent of this server.

When the server is a Cloud Server, also the 'Nodes' item is present. In the Nodes panel, if you're a system administrator or a NoMachine administrator, you can administer all the NoMachine servers being part of this Cloud Server multinode environment.

Administrative rights are required to change server settings!
When you enter any of the available items, check on the bottom left of the Server Settings UI to see if 'Changes are disabled' (default) or not.
By clicking on the Changes disabled link you will be requested to provide authentication credentials for a user with administrative privileges. You will be prompted with the same request also when trying to modify any of the available settings if changes have not been previously enabled.

Desktop shared/not shared

The !M menu in the system tray provides also the option for 'Desktop shared' or 'Desktop not shared' to this host and disable the sharing of the physical screen.

If you launch the NoMachine UI ('Show main window' from the Monitor menu), at the bottom of the UI there is small icon which controls fast track acces to the physical desktop of this host. Switching on/off this icon makes the same as clicking the 'Desktop shared/Desktop not shared' in the menu.

If the computer is your own and you need to access it remotely, you can still connect even when the desktop is not shared, if your user is also the owner of the remote desktop and you didn't disabled his/her access in Server Settings -> Security.

2.1. The Status Panel. Restart, Stop or Shutdown the Server

Server status
In the Status panel you can find the IP of this server host: use it to connect from another machine.

This panel reports also the current status of the NoMachine server: click on 'Restart the server' to restart it, on 'Stop the server' to disable accepting new connections (current connections will be not terminated) or on 'Shut down the server' to shut down the server and all services. You will be able to choose if restarting automatically the server at next reboot or not.

Server logs
From this panel you can also set the log level of the server, default is 6 - Standard.

Scroll down to see all the other information:

Server activity
All connected users
All users connected to this server, also those who are not yet connected to a desktop
This desktop
Users already connected to the desktop from which you opened this Server Status panel.
All active transfers
All file transfer operations made from users wonnected to the desktop from which you opened this Server Status panel.

Server statistics
It reports statistics about users' connections and sessions on this server and file transfer operations, with the possibility to reset data.

2.2. The Ports Panel. Start and Stop a Service or Change its Port

The Ports panel shows the current status of NoMachine services necessary to accept connections over the network, but not of the server itself.

In the Ports panel, NoMachine Free and Terminal Server Node provide only 'NX' which is the NoMachine network service (nxd) in charge of accepting connections by NX protocol.

The other NoMachine servers list also the HTTPS service necessary to serve sessions on the web. NoMachine Enterprise Desktop and a Cloud Server on Windows have an additional built-in service to accept connections by SSH protocol (nxsshd):

Service Name (UI)	Program name	Default port	Scope	Note
NX	nxd	4000	Accept connections by NX protocol	With all servers and on all platforms
HTTPS	nxhtd	4443	Accept web connections	With all servers (except NoMachine free) and on all platforms
SSH	nxsshd	4022	Accept connections by SSH protocol	With a Cloud Server and Enterprise Desktop on Windows (on macOS and Linux, NoMachine relies on the system SSH server)

Click on any of the services listed in the UI to access its administrative panel, or select it and click on 'Configure'. In the next panel you can:

a) Change the local port for the service (e.g. NX is using by default port 4000, you may change it to for example 4200. The new port must be free). This is the Service port TCP.
b) Enable UPnP to map the port on the router or firewall to allow connections over the Internet and define the external port number (check 'Enable UPnp to map the port on the gateway IP').
c) Choose the starting mode of the service: automatic at each reboot or manual.
d) Check the status of the service, stop/start or restart it.
e) Export logs of this service, by clicking on the 'Export' button.

Some remarks:

1. Changing the service's port requires to restart NoMachine.
   When changing the service port, it's always requested to restart the NoMachine server. This will terminate all current connections and on Linux it will terminate also all virtual desktops, even those disconnected.
2. Port mapping is not enabled by default, it's necessary to flag it. The automatic port mapping requires that the router supports the UPnP or NAT-PMP protocol. Otherwise it will be necessary to configure the router manually.
3. You may disable the port mapping by unflagging it if you do not expect connections from outside your private network.

In the Ports panel you can also manage the visibility of this computer to NoMachine users in the same local network. Select Advertise this computer on the network to let other computers running NoMachine find this computer on the local network. This computer will not be visible outside the private network.

2.3. The Nodes Panel. Manage the Nodes of this Cloud Server

This panel is available for all Cloud Server types. It allows to add servers as nodes of this Cloud Server, manage and remove them. Giving a name to this Cloud Server is mandatory:

Mouse click on the node to show a menu for editing the server, removing it or retrieving information.

From the same menu you can also 'Stop the node' (the node will not accept new connections but current sessions stay running), connect to the node in 'Server admin' mode to open the remote server administration UI, display the position of the node in a tree graphical representation of the multinode infrastructure, useful especially in case of multilevels.

Editing the node allows to change some settings, included its IP:

The Node info panel shows various information about the node host and average connections statistics:

scroll down to see also its status and statistics:

Statistics not available means that nobody connected yet to this host.

2.4. The Clouds Panel. Add this Server to a Cloud Server

The Clouds panel is available for all servers except NoMachine free. It allows to add this server as a node of a Cloud Server by 'inverse connection'. I.e. the connection is established from the node to the Cloud Server. Use this way when the node is in a protected area and the Cloud Server cannot connect to it. You can also decide if this server can still accept direct connections to its IP (and continue to work as an autonomous server) or must accept connections only through the Cloud Server. Select 'Let this server work only as a node of a cloud server' for this last option.

Mouse click on the parent Cloud Server to open a menu for managing it:

Click on 'Edit server' to modify settings for the Cloud Server, included its IP:

The Cloud Server info panel info panel shows various information about the Cloud Server host and average connections statistics:

Scroll down to see also status of the Cloud Server and statistics:

Statistics not available means that nobody connected yet to this host.

2.5. The Security Panel. Configure Desktop Access, Notifications, File Transfer and Copy&Paste

The Security panel allows to configure:

a) Guest Desktop Sharing access and interactive/view-only mode for guests.

b) Access to the physical desktop and to virtual desktops (for Linux terminal servers only).

c) User Acceptance, i.e. request or not for desktop owner's authorization to share the desktop. This is not applicable to guests.

d) Ineractivity or view-only mode when connected to the desktop. This can be changed later at runtime via the !M menu from the system tray.

e) Desktop notifications (hide the !M menu from the system tray, show when the desktop is shared.

f) Screen blanking while someone is connected to the desktop and lock of the screen upon session disconnection. These options are valid only for connections to the physical dekstop.

g) File transfer settings.

e) Clipboard settings for copy&paste operations.

Some remarks:

• Settings for the physical desktop of a Cloud Server or an Enterprise Terminal Server apply only to that server, to modify settings for a node it's necessary to open the UI on that node.
• It's possible to disallow connections to the physical desktop in all products except NoMachine free and the Entrprise Deskop.
• A substantial difference between terminal servers like the Workstation and the other server types is that terminal servers have also a section to configure behaviour for virtual desktops.

This means that the Security section may slightly differ from one server type to another, either for labels or sections. Images below are taken from a Cloud Server.

Server security
Allow visitor desktop sharing through this server
Visitors are system users who logged to the Cloud Server with a valid account and can then login to the nodes as Guest Desktop Sharing users, i.e. without the need to have an account on that node.

Allow guest desktop sharing through this server
If guests are enabled on this Cloud Server, allow them to connect to the nodes as guests.

Physical desktop
Don't allow connections to the physical desktop
Access to the physical desktop of this Cloud Server is not possible. Access to the physical desktop of the nodes is still possible, unless the nodes are configured to forbid it.

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Only allow users connections for desktop sharing
Use this option when you want to explicitly accept or deny the incoming user's request for access.

Make access available when the system is still in the login screen
When enabled, users can connect to the login screen i.e. when nobody is already logged.

Don't allow the owner of the desktop to connect if the desktop is not shared
This option is related to the Desktop shared/not shared setting.

Don't require acceptance if the user logged in as system user
Disabled by default. By checking the box, users with a valid account on this host can connect without the need of the desktop owner's approval. This configuration is suitable for unattended computers.

Don't require acceptance if the user logged in as the owner of the desktop
Enabled by default. If someone is trying to connect to your desktop, a pop up message asking for your permission appears. By default such authorization is not requested if the connecting user is also the desktop owner, or if he/she is a system administrator or a NoMachine administrator or trusted user.

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Only allow connections in view-only mode
Disabled by default. Checking the box means that all users (either guests or users with a valid account) will connect in view only mode and will not control keyboard and mouse.

Only allow connections by guest users in view-only mode
Disabled by default. Checking the box means that guest users will connect in view only mode. Users with a valid account will connect instead in interactive mode.

Desktop notifications
Hide the NoMachine icon in the system tray
By selecting this option, the !M menu in the system tray is no longer displayed.

Use sound notifications when there is an event
Enabled by default. If a user connects or requests to connect to the desktop, or a user disconnects, a sound will be emitted.

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Show desktop is viewed info when somebody is connected
Enabled by default. Display a pop-up to remind you that a user is connected and can see all activities made on your desktop.

The following two options apply only to physical desktops:

Blank the physical screen when somebody connects
Disabled by default. Check the box to enable screen blanking and block mouse and keyboard input. Useful for unattended remote computers to p event others from entering data or viewing the monitor while you are remotely accessing it.

Lock the physical screen on disconnect
Disabled by default. This option can be used in conjuction with the screen blanking: even when the last user didn't lock the screen before disconnecting by NoMachine, as soon as the screen is unblanked the system lock screen will be activated automatically to keep the remote desktop protected even if the computer is running unattended. Useful for unattended remote computers to prevent others from entering data or viewing the monitor while you are remotely accessing it.

File transfers
Allow clients to upload files - enabled by default, it ensures that others connecting to this computer can send files to the server.

Allow clients to download files - enabled by default, it allows users connected to this computer to download files from the server.

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Clipboard
Allow the clipboard functionality - allow or forbid copy and paste operations from local to remote and/or vice-versa. You can decide on which side the it's allowed to transfer data.

Terminal server products, i.e. Workstation, Small Business Terminal server, Terminal Server, Enterprise Terminal Server and Enterprise Terminal Server Cluster have a further section to configure Virtual desktops:

Virtual desktops
Don't require acceptance if the user logged in as a system user
Users with a valid account can connect to NoMachine virtual desktops without the need of desktop owner's approval.

Don't require acceptance if the user logged in as the owner of the desktop
Enabled by default.The owner of the virtual desktop can connect to any of his/her virtual desktops already running without the need of owner's approval.

Only allow connections in view only mode
Disabled by default. By selecting this option, all users included guests will connect to a virtual desktop in view-onChecking the box means that all users (either guests or users with a valid account) will connect in view only mode and will not control keyboard and mouse.

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Only allow connections by guest users in view only mode
Disabled by default. Checking the box means that guest users will connect in view only mode. Users with a valid account will connect instead in interactive mode.

2.6. Devices Panel. Enable or Disable the Sharing of Printers, Disks, USB Devices and Others

From this panel it is possible to manage which kind of devices can be shared within the session. Uncheck any of the available options to forbid the sharing of the selected device. This will apply to both directions: users will be not able to mount a local device from their machine to the remote session and a remote device will be not connected from the server host to the user's machine.

Devices that may be connected inside the NoMachine session are:

a) Disks
When this option is enabled, disk partitions can be mounted inside the session making their file system accessible. This is a two-way service and can be used for example for transferring a file from the remote desktop directly to a folder on the user's computer or vice-versa.
Users may decide if their connected disks will be private or public. A private disk is accessible only by the user who connecte it, public disks will be available for all users who will connect to the same (physical or virtual) desktop. By default private disks are mounted in the user's desktop, while public disks are mounted in the following directories:
- on Windows in C:\Users\Public
- on Linux in /media
- on macOS in /Volumes

Other ways to copy a file between the user's device and the remote server host:
- Drag and drop the file from the local desktop to the remote desktop in the NoMachine session or vice-versa.
- Use the transfer file option available in the !M menu (click on the !M icon in the system tray to open it).

b) Printers
When this option is enabled, two-way printing is supported: client-side printers can be integrated with the server-side printing subsystem and vice-versa.
Note that since the CUPS printing subsystem (on Linux and Mac) doesn't accept printer names containing spaces, NoMachine replaces a blank space with an underscore.
When users print from their PC to a printer on the remote printer in a session running on Linux, they cannot have feedback on the print job status due to a limitation of the printing subsystem.
When connecting their printer, users may make it private or public. A private printer is accessible only to the user who shared it, while a public printer will be available for all users.

Troubleshooting
Specific system configurations may be requested when the NoMachine server is on Linux or Mac systems. When the NoMachine Server is installed on Linux or Mac it's possibile that the printing system doesn't work out-of-the-box and some configurations on the server host may be required. In particular:

• - Print with CUPS 1.4 or later: https://www.nomachine.com/AR05K00674
• - Print to Mac 10.10: https://www.nomachine.com/AR09M00860

c) USB devices
When this option is enabled, users can forward USB devices over the network such as hard disk, web cams, barcode readers, and pen drives from local to remote desktops and vice-versa.
Note that when users forward a local USB device to the remote session, this devices is connected on the remote machine and is no longer visible on the user's computer. For example, if it's a pendrive, it will stop to blink on the user's computer until it is connected with NoMachine. If it's a mouse, all inputs will be transferred on remote and will not have any effects on the user's local cursor.

Troubleshooting
This applies to NoMachine server installations on Linux. If the USB service is disabled in the Server preferences interface, it is likely that the USB module has not been compiled on your Linux during the installation of NoMachine. Instructions for manually compiling the USB module are available here: https://www.nomachine.com/AR12J00658

c) Smart card readers
When this option is enabled, users may forward the smart card reader plugged into their computer to the server host and make available the smartcard authentication inside the session. This can be integrated with a Kerberos Ticket system for example to implement single sign-on (SSO).
The users's smart card device should support the PKCS#11 industry standard for smart card interfaces.

e) Network ports
When this option is enabled, users can create virtual network interfaces and establish a bridge between local and remote sides or vice-versa to provide transparent access to network resources. This service allows access to any of the default network servers like Samba, CUPS, FTP, SSH and Telnet or any other type, for example a MySQL server.

f) Enable audio streaming and microphone forwarding
This further option in the Devices panel allows to disable audio to avoid that sounds or music played inside the session is forwarded to the user's device. The same applies to the user's microphone.

For end-users
When users connect to the physical desktop, they may decide if forwarding their audio or not in the 'Audio streaming' panel that is displayed at session start-up. By default the 'Mute audio on the server while I'm connected' option is enabled and audio played inside the NoMachine session is not played on the server host.
By default microphone is always disabled: users will have to activate it from the NoMachine menu panel inside the session, by clicking on the 'Mic in' icon button. Click on the right upper corner of the session window to open the menu or press Ctrl+Alt+0

Some remarks:

1. Connecting disks, printers, USB devices and Network ports are all two-ways services. It's possible to disable the device forwarding only from client to server or vice-versa by manually editing the node configuration file (node.cfg).
2. A strong connection with a low ping time minor than 30ms and without spikes of ping time is strongly recommended to grant stable USB forwarding.

2.7. The Performance Panel. Choose the Display Encoding Method and Others

From this panel you may select the display encoding to be used for the NoMachine video streaming technique.

Among the other options, you can enable/disable from this panel the use of HW acceleration for display processing and the X11 vector graphics mode for Linux virtual desktops.

In the Performance panel you can:

a) Select Use a specific display encoding if you need to modify the encoding.
In general VP8 and H.264 are suitable for all situations, while MJPEG can be an alternative when the end-user's computer is less powerful and the user is experiencing slow responsiveness.

b) Use hardware encoding
Enabled by default, use H.264 HW encoding when the graphic card supports it and hardware decoding is available on client side.

H.264 SW encoding
All NoMachine server packages, included the evaluation and the free version, provide libraries for H.264 software encoding.
NoMachine Enterprise Client provides libraries for H.264 software decoding.

H.264 HW encoding
NoMachine supports H.264 hardware encoding provided by graphics cards with Nvidia Kepler microarchitecture onward, Intel Quick Sync video cards on Windows and Linux (with manual configuration) and AMD card at the moment only on Windows.
H.264 hardware decoding is supported on Windows and Mac hosts with hardware accelerated video cards (GPUs).

c) Use a specific frame rate
This option refers to the number of images that are displayed in one second of video streaming.
If you enable this option, consider that using a higher frame rate allows to reproduce motions more smoothly but requires more CPU and may slow down other applications running on the server host. Deciding to use a higher or lower frame rate mainly depends on what users will play and on the server host HW resources. For example watching an action movie or game may require a higher frame rate while a lower frame rate should be enough for surfing the web or using an application.

d) Use acceleration for display processing
Enable/disable using HW acceleration for frame processing on the server. To enable support for HW acceleration, select the Use acceleration for display processing option.
HW acceleration for display processing is applicable to Windows only with support for DirectX (OpenGL on Mac and Linux coming soon).

Due to the huge possible combinations of drivers, video cards and operating systems, it is possible that hardware acceleration doesn't work with NoMachine. In this case it's suggested to disable it.

Note that it's possible to use HW acceleration for Linux virtual desktops in X11 vector graphics mode through the use of the VirtualGL library. This is independent from the 'Use acceleration for display processing' option in the GUI.

e) Use X11 vector graphics mode in virtual sessions
On Linux, enable/disable the X11 vector graphics mode by means of the Use X11 vector graphics mode for virtual desktops option. This applies only to virtual desktops and custom sessions running in a virtual desktop. Note that custom sessions running in a floating window are always in X11 vector graphics mode. X11 vector graphics mode can instead be disabled/enabled for custom sessions running in a virtual desktop.
The X11 vector graphics mode is enabled by default. It reduces the bandwidth usage (and the HW requirements because it is less CPU intensive) on both client and server by optimizing the X11 protocol by means of compression techniques, round trip suppression and cache algorithms. This method is convenient when working with traditional GUIs or large amount of text to avoid loss of image quality, but it's not suggested for multimedia contents or applications with many graphical effects.

2.8. The Updates Panel. Configure the Automatic Software Updates, Check Version and Updates and Replace your License

From the Updates panel you may check the version currently installed and manage the automatic software updates and your licenses.

The Updates panel shows information about the server type which is installed (e.g. NoMachine Enterprise Cloud Server) and the NoMachine version (e-g- 8.0.168).

In this panel you can also manage how NoMachine must handle software updates.
NoMachine software by default is configured to fetch the repository for automatic updates. To disable it, unflag the Automatically check for updates option. When this is instead enabled, it's possible to let the software download the updates automatically by selecting Install updates in background.
Installing updates always require an explicit approval.

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The last part of the Updates panel (in case scroll it down) shows information about the license. Server installations need only one license file: 'Server subsctiption'.
You may read the license by clicking on the Server subscription link:

Scroll down to replace the license:

Click on Update subscription and upload the new server.lic.

Replacing the license is needed in two cases:
a) to install your customer subscription in order to replace the license for evaluation that comes with the package.
b) to replace your customer license when it's expired, to continue to use the software.

3. How to access the Remote Server UI and its Functions

To open the UI for administering any server from remote, open the client UI on your computer, select the remote server that you want to administer in the 'Machines' panel and right mouse click to open the menu. Choose 'Server admin' and login as administrator to that server host when requested:

3.1. The Remote Server UI

Once logged - if you have privileged permissions, i.e. you're a 'sudo' user on macOS and Linux and an 'administrator' on Windows, you will see an interface very similar to the Server UI you can open on localhost:

The 'Server admin' label at the top left reminds you that you're connected from remote.

All the items in the left menu are the same of the local Server UI, please check the previous chapter to find out their description.