Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

I don't really like using VNC. I think VNC itself is pretty neat -- it's PFM[*], and can be a real problem solver -- but my experience using it has been slow and laggy and has not felt "transparent enough" to make me happy. That said, it's still a Hell of a tool, and it can be a real lifesaver sometimes. For example, despite finding it laggy over a 10Mbit LAN, I was quite willing to put up with even worse lag to use it over a 56Kbit dialup in order to use tools that were in MD when I was in ON and get paid for the work I was thus able to complete while on the road. If I'm going to use it all day every day, it'd have to be pleasant to use. But to solve an unusual problem once in a while, I don't have to enjoy it; it just has to solve my problem.

It's an impressive tool. Being able to run a Windows machine from a PalmOS device has entertaining amounts of geek-fu. Throwing Linux/Unix graphical apps at a Windows machine that doesn't have an X server is useful. And occasionally taking over the screen of one Windows machine from another, or from a Linux desktop, can save some running back and forth between rooms. It's just that I've always been aware of the extra layer between my brain and my results, the lag of the mouse cursor, the squinty fonts to make another machine's entire desktop fit into one window (possibly on a smaller monitor). So if it turns out that I can build the setup I described in my previous entry using VNC, and that gives me enough extra usability to make VNC worth putting up with, then I'll do that, but I'm wishing for something oomphier.

OTOH, I don't know how snappily VNC performs on modern hardware that I can't afford, and how I'd like using it with larger monitors on the current workstation than the systems I'm controlling from there. Maybe on the right equipment it really does manage to be everything that it sounds like it ought to be, and thus manages to be more of an everyday tool than a last resort?

Anyhow, I first installed it to experiment with and decided it wasn't up to snuff on my hardware (at the time a 386/33 running Linux and a slowish Pentium running Win95), but I didn't uninstall it. Since then I've installed it on more machines, and even though I don't like it well enough to use it often, when I've needed it, it has saved my ass. (That and port forwarding on my NAT box so that the Windows machines are reachable from outside the house in the first place.) If the performance issues go away on current hardware, making use of VNC transparent from a user's point of view, then I could imagine someday setting up "thin client" workstations around the house.

If you've got a situation where something like VNC sounds like it might be useful, don't let my griping about a laggy interface stop you from checking it out. a) It might not be a problem on your hardware, and b) For special circumstances it can be a lifesaver even if it's too slow to use comfortably all the time.

[*] "Pure F'ing Magic"