Jeremy Brown said: [snip] > That's true...I guess I should have said "each VNC session can only do > one thing at a time". In order for N users to have separate VNC access > to a machine, you'd have to start at least N VNC servers on it, and > assign ports/passwords to each user. This quickly ends up being a > hassle in my opinion, since the equivalent X forwarding setup requires > almost zero configuration. > > Also, AFAIK each VNC server requires a completely separate running > instance of X, which can gobble up your memory quickly. Again, the > equivalent X forwarding setup only takes as much memory as the client > application needs. If you are willing to give up persistent connections, VNC can also be set up to run out of xinetd to work around assigning ports/passwords to users. At that point, though, you are losing the big advantage of VNC and X forwarding starts looking better. And if you are running over an insecure network so you need to tunnel that VNC through SSH, then X forwarding should really be considered. On a secure network where encryption isn't required though, it still can be a trade off. For example, VNC has a smaller client footprint than X on MS Windows clients. It basically comes down to your needs and usage. It just proves the Unix adage that there is more than one way to do everything. -- William Hooper
