I want to repurpose some old tablets as secondary displays. They're slow, but fast enough to run a VNC or RDP client. If I could set up some virtual/headless outputs that are accessible via VNC or RDP, I would find it very useful, because I could use any old tablet to extend my screen real estate. Gnome and Sway can already do this, and so can KWin with X11: - Sway has had an option to configure headless outputs since 2020, you can then run a VNC server on those outputs: https://www.reddit.com/r/swaywm/comments/k1zl41/thank_you_devs_free_ipad_repurposed_as_a_second/, https://github.com/swaywm/sway/issues/5553 - Gnome has support for virtual monitors via RDP since Gnome 42, support was merged a few months ago: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-remote-desktop/-/merge_requests/69 - With KWin X11 I used to be able to achieve this in a hackish way by setting up a virtual output in XRandR, similar to this: https://askubuntu.com/questions/28608/how-do-you-use-an-android-tablet-as-a-second-display.
Kwin also has support since 5.25
Thank you! That's great information.
I just upgraded to Plasma 5.25, so are there instructions somewhere on how to enable it? I didn't see anything that looks relevant when going through System Settings.
I have been trying to find a way to use this feature, are there any guides on how to set it up?
It appears the way to do this is with the `krfb-virtualmonitor` program, so Krfb needs to be installed, and what you do is you run `krfb-virtualmonitor --name WirelessDisplay --resolution 1920x1080 --password pAsSwOrD --port 5900` (change the resolution, port and password as needed), then with your phone/tablet/whatever you can connect to your system using a VNC client (on Android you can try bVNC for example, but just about any should work). You'll also need to know your system's IP address, I think that is shown in the Plasma System Monitor, and you need to make sure whatever port you pick is allowed through your system's firewall if you have one. Also, I think that might only work on Wayland, never tried it on X11 but I know it uses PipeWire.
(In reply to Prajna Sariputra from comment #5) > It appears the way to do this is with the `krfb-virtualmonitor` program, so > Krfb needs to be installed, and what you do is you run `krfb-virtualmonitor > --name WirelessDisplay --resolution 1920x1080 --password pAsSwOrD --port > 5900` (change the resolution, port and password as needed), then with your > phone/tablet/whatever you can connect to your system using a VNC client (on > Android you can try bVNC for example, but just about any should work). > You'll also need to know your system's IP address, I think that is shown in > the Plasma System Monitor, and you need to make sure whatever port you pick > is allowed through your system's firewall if you have one. > > Also, I think that might only work on Wayland, never tried it on X11 but I > know it uses PipeWire. I tried it but you can only share the screen. So it will show the same output but there is now way to configure it as a second monitor on which you can place other application windows alongside your main monitor. Unfortunately like this it is not useful to me.
This allows only to share the screen it is not really a second screen. Therefore reopening this ticket
(In reply to Robert from comment #7) > This allows only to share the screen it is not really a second screen. > Therefore reopening this ticket Sounds like you're just running the Krfb GUI program, which will indeed only share your existing screens, what you're supposed to do is type "krfb-virtualmonitor --name WirelessDisplay --resolution 1920x1080 --password pAsSwOrD --port 5900" in a terminal without the quotes (adjusting the resolution, password and port as needed), press Enter, and then connect with the VNC client on your other device. To be sure I just tested that command again on my Arch Linux system with Plasma 6.3.2 and Krfb 24.12.3 and it does create a virtual monitor separate from the existing screens. Granted a GUI way to do it would be great so this bug report could be left open for that I guess, or maybe a new report should be opened instead. I vaguely remember KDE Connect having such an option somewhere but no idea how well that works if it's there at all.
Apologies for reopening. It works with the command line tool krfb-virtualmonitor, not with the application from the application menu.
Kde connect seems to only work with other linux computers and not with android