VNC and VMWare

[Steve Langasek]

On Tue, 21 Mar 2000, Dan Kaminsky wrote:

> Luke--

> 	You talked about being able to switch between different VMWare
> sessions using alt-F1 through F12.

> 	You ought to try out XVNC and svncviewer--they make a *beautiful*
> combination.  As you may(or may not) know, X...can occasionally lack a
> certain level of stability that servers require.  svgalib is *far* more
> stable than XFree86, though it isn't nearly as fast.

I have to disagree with that assessment.  I've had several video cards which
were poorly supported under SVGAlib--to the point that the video card would be
left in an unclean state when the application exited, and the only way I would
be able to use the console at all was by starting X.

Moreover, if an X application crashes, you can click on the x and kill it.  Or
go to an xterm and kill it.  Or switch to a virtual console and kill it.  If
an SVGAlib application dies in nasty ways (something I've seen happen in the
past), it can conceivably keep hold of your video hardware and your keyboard,
requiring you to log in remotely to get console control back.  With X, this is
only even possible when the X server itself crashes, something I haven't seen
on any of my video cards in a very long time..

Steve Langasek
postmodern programmer