Mailing List Archive: VNC suggestion for those with two machines.

Several people have indicated that they have to use Windows occasionally but prefer to use Unix most of the time, and so want to access a PC under the desk from the Unix box.

Here's a suggestion: all other things being equal, I recommend using the Windows box to view the Unix machine rather than the other way around. This is chiefly because Windows generally works better as a client than as a server, and also because PC graphics cards are often better than those in Unix workstations. Remember, you can create a VNC session of any pixel depth you like. For my day-to-day work I use a Solaris 16-bit VNC session displayed on my PC. Few of our Sun machines have more than 8-bit color hardware, but the PC has plenty of bits to spare.

If you're very anti-Windows you can make your VNC desktop the same size as the screen and set the taskbar to 'Auto hide' and just pretend you're on an X terminal, but pop up the Start menu when you have to use PowerPoint....

Just a thought....
Quentin

------
Dr Quentin Stafford-Fraser
ORL - The Olivetti & Oracle Research Lab
http://www.orl.co.uk/~qsf

Quentin Stafford-Fraser wrote:

> Several people have indicated that they have to use Windows
> occasionally but prefer to use Unix most of the time, and so want to
> access a PC under the desk from the Unix box. Here's a suggestion: all
> other things being equal, I recommend using the Windows box to view
> the Unix machine rather than the other way around. This is chiefly
> because Windows generally works better as a client than as a server,
> and also

As much as I dislike Windows, I have to agree with you. Even Windows NT
is slowed down quite a bit by the act of serving the display.
Unix does not seem to notice it any more than any other X server.

It might be possible for someone to write a virtual video card driver
that does actually display anything, and combines the
windows VNC server code directly into the driver. It seems like that
would speed up things quite a bit.

If a speedier solution for serving windows could be made, than having a
Windows box tucked away would be very suitable and agreeable for me and
many people I know.

One big advantage of VNC over running an X-Server on a Windows PC is
this, if Windows crashes while running a X session with an X-Server, you
lose your session. If it crashes while running it with a VN C server,
you lose nothing.

My number one complaint so far is not being able to cleanly kill the
X-Session from the viewer client. (Apart from killing the VNC server
task
from within the X session)

--
Dwight Schauer

School: schauerd@letu.edu
Work: dschauer@vcsd.com