A good cross-platform VNC client/server

TL_CLD · 01-20-2008, 07:57 AM

Hey all,

Can anybody recommend a VNC system that works with both Linux (Slackware 12), Windows XP and Mac OSX?

I need to be able to manage a bunch of different computers while travelling. My laptop will be running Slackware or OSX.

Regards,
Thomas

psychicist · 01-20-2008, 08:14 AM

I can recommend TightVNC, it works on Linux and Windows x86 and it should be possible to make it work on Mac OS X x86 too. I've got it working on little-endian MIPS too but it doesn't work on big-endian architectures such as SPARC.

Be sure to use 32-bit binaries because the 64-bit ones have crash bugs. Because of these two issues I'm thinking of porting TightVNC to modular Xorg.

TL_CLD · 01-20-2008, 08:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by psychicist

I can recommend TightVNC, it works on Linux and Windows x86 and it should be possible to make it work on Mac OS X x86 too. I've got it working on little-endian MIPS too but it doesn't work on big-endian architectures such as SPARC.

Be sure to use 32-bit binaries because the 64-bit ones have crash bugs. Because of these two issues I'm thinking of porting TightVNC to modular Xorg.

I'll check out TightVNC. Thanks.

How about NX? Have you tried that?

http://www.nomachine.com/download.php

Thomas

psychicist · 01-20-2008, 10:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TL_CLD

How about NX? Have you tried that?

http://www.nomachine.com/download.php

Thomas

I know of NX and that it's even much faster and lighter. But ever since I started porting Slackware to MIPS and SPARC, I've become much more conscious of architecture-dependent software in general and binaries in particular.

I'll try to build the sources that are available and see if I can get those working across all three architectures. If that doesn't work out I'll try the official binaries on x86 and let you know how well those work.

TL_CLD · 01-20-2008, 02:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by psychicist

I know of NX and that it's even much faster and lighter. But ever since I started porting Slackware to MIPS and SPARC, I've become much more conscious of architecture-dependent software in general and binaries in particular.

I'll try to build the sources that are available and see if I can get those working across all three architectures. If that doesn't work out I'll try the official binaries on x86 and let you know how well those work.

I've tried FreeNX and boy oh boy is it great!

I don't think I can ever go back to VNC again. Using NX is almost like sitting at the computer, even though it's connected using a standard ADSL connection. It's amazing!

And it comes with clients for Linux, OSX and Windows.

NX is the way to go for me.

Thomas

psychicist · 01-20-2008, 03:50 PM

So did you install it yourself or did you just try a live CD such as Knoppix?

I'm thinking of building (Free)NX packages, because I know how great it is (not actually having tried it yet). But it would be nice if NoMachine wasn't so focused on a few architectures, even though they depend on the support revenue that they generate that way. I'll try to contact them to see what the possibilities are for official Linux support on non-x86 architectures.

Alien Bob · 01-20-2008, 04:00 PM

I know from experience that NoMachine is not cooperative when it comes to supporting non-X86 architectures... when we were teaming with the dutch reseller of NX technology some time ago, it would have given us a big advantage over our competition when we could offer x86_64 builds of NX binaries but even that proved impossible...

Eric

TL_CLD · 01-21-2008, 12:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by psychicist

So did you install it yourself or did you just try a live CD such as Knoppix?

I'm thinking of building (Free)NX packages, because I know how great it is (not actually having tried it yet). But it would be nice if NoMachine wasn't so focused on a few architectures, even though they depend on the support revenue that they generate that way. I'll try to contact them to see what the possibilities are for official Linux support on non-x86 architectures.

http://rdircio.no-ip.org/blog/index....2-package.html

That's the package I'm using.

Perhaps one could request a slackbuilds.org script in this thread?

Thomas