A working Linux desktop that runs in your browser, at ncsvdi.northlandcentral.org. Nothing to install, nothing to configure, and nothing left behind on whatever machine you were sitting at.
What it’s actually for
The honest answer is that most of the time you won’t need it. It earns its keep in specific situations.
You’re on a computer that isn’t yours — a hotel business centre, a relative’s laptop, a work machine you’d rather not sign into personal accounts from. You need a real browser or a mail client for twenty minutes and you don’t want to leave a trace of yourself on that machine.
You’re on a locked-down device that won’t let you install anything.
You need to reach something on the home network from outside it, and would rather not set up a VPN client on the device you’re holding.
Or you’re on a Chromebook, a tablet, or something else that can’t run the software you need.
Signing in
Go to ncsvdi.northlandcentral.org. You’ll be sent to NCSMFA to sign in, exactly like every other service, and then dropped onto a page showing the workspaces available to you.
Starting a workspace
Click the one you want. A box appears describing it, with a dropdown for where to open it — current tab is fine — and a Launch Session button.
Then wait. This is the part worth warning about. A container has to start, and the screen will sit at “100% Complete — creating a secure connection” for a while before anything happens. Twenty to thirty seconds is normal. It looks stuck and it usually isn’t. If it’s still sitting there after a couple of minutes, reload the page and launch it again.
Once it connects, you’re looking at a real desktop application running on our hardware, drawn in your browser. Type in it, click in it, browse with it. It behaves like software because it is software; it just isn’t running on the machine in front of you.
The control panel, which you will not find on your own
There’s a small tab on the left edge of the screen. Click it and a panel slides out. Almost everything people ask about lives in there, and almost nobody notices it exists.
Clipboard. The important one. Copy and paste between your own computer and the session does not work the way you expect — the session is a picture of a remote screen, not a local window, and the usual Ctrl+C / Ctrl+V bridge doesn’t cross that gap cleanly. The control panel has a clipboard box: paste into it to send text into the session, and copied text from the session appears there for you to take out. Clumsy, but it works, and knowing about it is the difference between mildly annoying and completely infuriating.
Upload and Download Files. How files get in and out. Downloading something inside the session puts it on the server, not your machine — use the Download option in the panel to bring it the rest of the way.
Streaming Quality. Turn it down on a bad connection. Video quality for responsiveness is usually the right trade.
Fullscreen, sound, and microphone controls are also in there.
Keyboard shortcuts are worth a thought too: some key combinations get caught by your browser before the session ever sees them. If a shortcut isn’t working, fullscreen mode usually fixes it by giving the session the keyboard.
Leaving versus ending
Two different things, and the panel offers both.
Workspaces leaves the session running and takes you back to the launcher. Come back later and it’s where you left it.
Delete Session destroys it. Anything in it is gone.
Closing the browser tab does neither. It just stops you watching. The session keeps running until it’s deleted or times out.
What’s available
Firefox — a browser, by itself. The quickest option when you just need to look at something.
Thunderbird — a mail client, which works with NCSMEP or any other mail service.
Remmina — a remote desktop client, for connecting onward to other machines.
Ubuntu Noble — a complete Linux desktop, for when you need more than a single application.
Things worth knowing
It needs a decent connection. You’re streaming video of a desktop. It works on modest bandwidth but it feels bad on a bad connection, and turning down streaming quality helps more than you’d think.
It isn’t a place to keep things. Treat a session as scratch space — get in, do the thing, take the file with you.
Nothing stays on the computer you used it from. That’s the entire point of the thing. When you close the tab on someone else’s machine, there’s no profile, no cached password, no downloaded file, and no browser history sitting there with your name on it.
Problems
If a session hangs at “creating a secure connection,” reload and try again before reporting it. If it happens twice in a row, that’s worth a ticket.
Open a ticket at ncshds.northlandcentral.org, email support@ncsmx.org, or call (210) 904-8005.
