Allow Locked Remote Desktop GNOME Shell Extension

Author: Jonathan Kamens ([email protected])

Currently supported GNOME shell version(s):

• 3.38, 40, 41 on "GNOME41" branch
• 42 on main

Home page GNOME Shell Extensions page

Purpose

By default, GNOME shell does not allow remote desktop connections when the screen is locked. If the screen locks while a remote desktop session is connected, it is disconnected. If a user attempts to connect while the screen is locked, the username and password are accepted but then the connection is closed.

There are legitimate security concerns motivating this default behavior. In particular, if someone is allowed to connect to the screen remotely and unlock it, then the local computer display is also unlocked, not just the remote display. Anyone could walk up to the computer and do whatever they want without the remote user being able to do anything about it.

However, it is reasonable to allow this restriction to be removed, i.e., to allow remote connections to locked screens, in contexts where these security concerns are inapplicable. Unfortunately, GNOME does not provide a build-in mechanism for removing this restriction. This extension fixes that.

When this extension is installed and enabled, remote desktop connections are allowed while the screen is locked. When it is disabled or uninstalled, they aren't. It's that simple!

Credits

This extension uses the workaround suggested by Elliott Sales de Andrade here.

Copyright

Copyright (c) 2021 Jonathan Kamens ([email protected])

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-or-later