RDP to Windows from Ubuntu

This article is part of my series on exploring Linux.

If I am to replace my desktop computer with the Ubuntu OS, I need to be able to do everything I was doing in the Windows days. As a networking guy maintaining servers, I am constantly using RDP to administer servers and lab computers remotely. This is functionality I'm not willing to live without.

I didn't need to worry. There's a product for Linux called rdesktop which includes an interface called Terminal Server Client (tsclient). It does exactly what I'm used to with RDP - with a few more options available.

The software is available via Ubuntu's package manager. I installed it by simply typing the following command from the terminal window:

sudo aptitude install rdesktop

Wow! the software looks just like the RDP I use in Microsoft land:


It works as you'd expect. I had absolutely no issues accessing Windows computers via the RDP protocol.