In X11 SSH forwarding, keyboard isn't working properly (Only Ctrl + .. and numeric keypad works!)

Question

I'm using Ubuntu 18.04 desktop at the office.

In order to work with server, we're required to connect to a remote Windows 8 machine, and then open SSH connect to an Ubuntu 16.04 server from here.

So, Local (ubuntu18.04) ---> Remote (windows8server) ---> Server (ubuntu16.04)

On the Remote Windows Machine, I use Git Bash (MINGW64) this command to open connection to the Server:

export DISPLAY=localhost:0
ssh -Y -C -i "C:/path/to/key" user@serverIP

I was able to run most apps like Nautilus, Geany, VSCode, Git... in GUI Mode.

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However, there's a huge issue: Most keys on the keyboards doesn't work, except Ctrl + S, Ctrl + V, Ctrl + Z ... (most hotkeys) and keys 1,2,3..9 on the numeric keypad.

Also, I notice a strange behavior: Sometimes dozens of the same characters "got typed" at the same time, like: "zzzzzzzzzz" "aaaaaaaaaaaa"

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What I've tried:

• Verified that the keyboard layout is correct on the Server

user@serverIP~$: localectl status
System Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LANGUAGE=en_US:en
VC Keymap: us
X11 Layout: us
X11 Model: pc105+inet
X11 Options: terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp

• Followed VSCode keyboard troubleshooting guide: https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/wiki/Keybinding-Issues#troubleshoot-linux-keybindings

I've added this to settings.json but it didn't work:

"keyboard.dispatch": "keyCode"

• Looked into this thread: https://askubuntu.com/questions/203173/run-application-on-local-machine-and-show-gui-on-remote-display. One has suggesting using "x2x package". Seems that need installing on the Remote Windows machine. However, I don't have administrator priv.

Answer 1

I ended up with an alternative solution - using code-server: https://github.com/codercom/code-server

First off, download the binary and paste it into /usr/local/bin on your server, then run it from anywhere.

nohup code-server --password=123456 &

On my remote machine, I tunneled server's localhost via SSH by enter the following command in git-bash:

ssh -i "/path/to/yourkey" -L 8080:127.0.0.1:8443 user@ipaddress -N

(make sure that you keep this windows of git-bash opened)

Finally, I opened Chrome and opened http://localhost:8080 to start using code-server!