Developer Workstations with Proxmox VE and X11

Introduction

Proxmox VE is primarily used as virtualization platform with NO additional software installed. In some case it makes sense to have a full desktop running on Proxmox VE, for example for developers using Proxmox VE as their primary workstation/desktop.

Installing additional packages could lead to a hardly upgradeable system and is not supported from the Proxmox support team and therefore only for expert use.

Install a standard Proxmox VE system

Just install the standard Proxmox VE, following this guide: Installation

Install X-windows

Adapt your sources.list

Adapt your sources.list to include non-free (needed for the sun-java6-plugin). The repositories where programs are searched are listed in text file: /etc/apt/sources.list

deb http://ftp.debian.org/debian lenny main non-free

# PVE packages provided by proxmox.com
deb http://download.proxmox.com/debian lenny pve

# security updates
deb http://security.debian.org/ lenny/updates main

Update your repository and system by running:

aptitude update
aptitude upgrade

Install xorg and your favorite desktop

I choose xfce4 desktop as this a lightweight desktop environment. If you prefer another one, just replace xfce4 with gnome, icewm, kde, ...

aptitude install xorg xfce4 iceweasel sun-java6-plugin

Start X-windows

Just enter:

startx