I have a Xvnc server that is running with a size of 2560x1024. Basically, a dual monitor setup. I am using two vncviewers, where each viewer is set to a size of 1280x1024. These two viewers then show the entire area of the server.

My problem is that when the vncviewer's start up the initial position of the viewport is set to display the far left hand side of the area and for the second vncviewer i have to scroll to the right to have it setup correctly.

I have read things about using the .Xresource file or using the -xrm parameter to pass in new resources and I have messed around with them, but I have not been able to find a resource setting that works.

My current setup is:
FC2
xf4vnc 4.4.0.0 (fvmn 2.4.19 as the window manager)
Gnome

Any help on getting the vncviewer to display a different area of the viewport at startup would be great.

Thanks in advance.

You could try to connect with vncviewer ipaddresshere:1 to see the right monitor.

It is a single display port. So, display:0 is the entire 2560x1024 and there is no display:1.

I did find a solution around it, but I can't use it because it makes the reaction time really slow.

There is a program called x11vnc which acts as an intermediate between the vnc server and the vnc viewer.

Basically, I can start a vnc viewer and then start two x11vnc's which I can tell to only show a certain portion of the server. Then I can connect to each x11vnc's output port with a different vncviewer. This does solve the problem, but it runs very slowly.

Any other ideas involving just a vncserver and vncviewer would be great!

Thanks.

Are the two vncviewers, the two x11vnc's and the one Xvnc all running on the same machine?

If so, you may want to dial up the polling rate, e.g. "-wait 5" and "-defer 5", or even smaller values. And of course make sure the raw VNC encoding is being used. Do you know if the Xvnc X server supports the DAMAGE extension?

Please detail which activities are too slow (inc. which desktop, which vnc viewer, etc). I just reproduced your case with 2560x1024x24 and it is not that slow, but I don't know what you are trying to acheive...

Can't you just start one VNC server (2560x1024) and connect to it with the vnc viewer and then scroll to the left and the right? Or maybe even when you point your mouse cursor to the right border that it scrolls right and vice versa?

krunge - Yes, all vnc utilites being used are on the same machine. I will try upping the polling rate and see if it helps. I will also figure out if the raw VNC encoding is being used.

I checked and it does not look like there is a DAMAGE extension for the X server. I just looked at the command line options and did not see the damage option. If the damage extension is in a configuration file or something than I am not sure where to find it.

nan0meter - Yes, I can start the second viewer and scroll to the right, but that is definitely not user friendly and that option will not fly. Hehe, the user probably wouldn't be able to figure out how to scroll... Thanks though.

Using the wait and defer arguments worked wonders. I also lowered the deferupdate on the Xvnc server down to 20 and that helped as well. x11vnc looks like it is the way to go. I also found some other fun options when I started looking a bit deeper.

Thanks for all the help!

Good, I'm glad cutting down the delays helped. In recent x11vnc's the default for both is 20 ms, but it used to be 30. I suggest 5-10 for local viewing.

Not clear how Xvnc's deferupdate would come into play here (since it is not doing the VNC), but maybe it makes some difference in the timing.

You would have to run "xdpyinfo" pointed at the display and you'd see it listed:

If your Xvnc doesn't support DAMAGE (however I think some versions do), an alternate is to use Xvfb. Recent versions of x11vnc automate much of this for you. E.g.

for the left x11vnc, and after connecting to that one with a viewer (connecting creates the Xvfb desktop)

for the right one. This assumes you have no other X sessions on the machine (otherwise they will use it instead).