Enhanced remote desktop experience: Amazon DCV with Amazon Linux 2023

Amazon DCV has evolved as a powerful remote display protocol, enabling secure high-performance remote desktop access and application streaming. This blog talks about how DCV remote display capabilities are now integrated with Amazon Linux 2023 (AL2023).

Overview

This post introduces new Graphical Desktop with AL2023 and provides an overview of new features available through DCV. The Graphical Desktop comes with GNOME 47 for a smooth UI experience that you can connect using DCV, enabling remote desktop access from anywhere. It also provides an overview of more tools such as a terminal emulator with Ptyxis for improved CLI experience, Mozilla Firefox for secure web browsing, an image viewer with Loupe, a text editor, and a file manager for file navigation, and.

Core features

AL2023 introduces an enhanced desktop experience, specifically tailored for remote access needs, as shown in the following Figure-1. DCV technology allows you to connect seamlessly to Graphical Desktop interface with GNOME 47. Users benefit from native DCV protocol support that enables high-performance remote access, featuring dynamic resolution adaptation and hardware-accelerated video encoding. Enhanced security features include advanced encryption and granular access controls.

Although DCV supports multiple desktop environments, the use of GNOME 47 is specifically part of the AL23 current release. The GNOME 47 system uses Mutter 47.0 as its window manager and compositor, alongside the GTK 4 toolkit for its user interface. This includes window management capabilities that provide more precise control over application placement and sizing, while improved multi-monitor support makes sure that workspaces expand seamlessly across displays. Most importantly, there is a native desktop-like experience with the DCV local features such as clipboard sharing, audio redirection, and multi-monitor capabilities, which deliver a seamless and responsive remote environment.

Figure 1. DCV desktop interface with AL2023

Ptyxis delivers exceptional performance with SSH, SFTP, and TLS/SSL support, as shown in the following figure. You can experience GPU-accelerated text rendering with a crystal-clear display, supporting UTF-8/16 and Unicode 15.0, while maintaining minimal input lag at 60 Hz refresh rates. The DCV 4K support enables high-resolution (3840 x 2160 pixels) remote desktop streaming, which allows users to work with graphically intensive applications while maintaining excellent visual quality. Ptyxis is deeply integrated with GNOME through D-Bus and GNOME I/O (GIO) interfaces, providing access to global search and system notifications. Users can use advanced session management with JSON-based configurations, tab groups, split views up to 16 panes, and automatic session restoration. The terminal includes full 256-color and true-color support, compatible with Bash, Zsh, and Fish shells, while maintaining robust connection stability.

Figure 2. Terminal Emulator

Firefox in AL2023 is optimized specifically for remote desktop scenarios, as shown in the following figure. The browser features hardware-accelerated rendering and WebGL 2.0 support, delivering smooth graphics and responsive page loading. Enhanced browser capabilities provide better performance for 3D applications and interactive web content. Users can experience optimized video playback with minimal frame drops and improved synchronization, which are particularly important for remote streaming needs. Integration with DCV streaming technology enables efficient resource usage and provides a local-like experience when accessing remote workstations, featuring seamless audio-video synchronization, smooth multi-monitor support, and native peripheral device integration.

Figure 3. Mozilla Firefox with DCV

More features

The GNOME Text Editor seamlessly integrates with AL2023, providing a modern, distraction-free interface for coding and text editing within the DCV environment, as shown in the following figure. As the default text editor in the AL23 GNOME desktop, it offers essential features such as syntax highlighting, dark/light themes, and autosave functionality, making it ideal for remote development work.

Figure 4. GNOME Text Editor

Loupe offers a sleek and intuitive image viewing experience in AL2023 when accessed through DCV, as shown in the following figure. It features a clean interface with smooth animations, efficient image loading, and gesture support, all while maintaining responsive performance over the DCV remote desktop connection. This makes it ideal for viewing and basic image manipulation tasks.

Figure 5. Image Viewer features and options

The GNOME File manager in AL2023 provides a robust and intuitive interface for managing files and folders when accessed through the DCV remote desktop environment, as shown in the following figure. It offers essential features such as drag-and-drop functionality, list and grid views, file search, and seamless integration with cloud storage, all while maintaining responsive performance over the DCV optimized remote connection protocol. You can use DCV to upload files to and download files from DCV session storage. For instructions on how to enable and configure session storage, go to Enabling session storage in the DCV Administrator Guide.

Figure 6. File Manager

Conclusion

The Amazon DCV team is committed to delivering the best remote desktop experience possible, and these enhancements demonstrate that commitment. In this post, we demonstrated how our integrated solution, from the GNOME 47 intuitive interface to the powerful terminal capabilities of Ptyxis, creates a seamless remote workspace. Using these improvements allows you to enhance productivity and overall user experience in remote desktop environments. These enhanced capabilities offer a significant step forward in remote computing, thereby providing tools and optimizations designed to meet the evolving needs of the distributed and flexible work environments today.

For a deeper dive into setup and advanced configurations, you should review our comprehensive DCV admin guides, which provide detailed information to help you maximize the potential of these new features.