Amazon EC2 Ubuntu server - opencv::imshow() causes ": cannot connect to X server localhost:10.0"

Question

So I am trying to run my code on an Amazon EC2 instance running Ubuntu Server 14.04 LTS.

I realized that my code is breaking with the following error when imshow() is called:

: cannot connect to X server localhost:10.0

I an connecting through putty and I have selected "Enable X11 Forwarding".

I can remove all imshow calls but I actually need to use them. Is there a way to enable this functionality while connecting to the EC2 instance through Putty ?

Answer 1

You also need to be running an X windows server on your desktop (where you're running putty). There are several available, and setup depends on which you choose. If you want a very easy solution, there's MobaXterm, which is an ssh client and X11 server combined. There's a commercial version and a free home edition (with some limitations).