linuxcaffe; distros and desktops

[Taavi Burns]

On Fri, 29 Oct 2004 19:48:25 -0400 (EDT), Robert Brockway
<rbrockway-wgAaPJgzrDxH4x6Dk/4f9A at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> X is heavier than GDI but to be honest the only really bad bit is the
> negotiation of colour mapping between the server and client.  Once you get
> past that X is quite snappy even over a relatively slow encrypted ssh
> session (without compression).

But is that displaying any transparency?  ;)

AFAIK the way KDE currently does its transparency is that the client
fetches a bitmap of the to-be-superimposed area, composities it on the
client, and then sends that bitmap back to the server.  That's got to be
pretty nasty on the bandwidth, if not just the lag it induces.

For plain opaque X, it's not all that bad.  Compress the ssh tunnel
("ssh -C -X user at host") and it can be almost snappy, and definitely
useable, though I often find that I'd rather use vnc so I can disconnect
and reconnect (I love 'screen' for the same reason).

> People used to use thinclients on 10Mb/s hubs (and slower).  On a 100Mb/s
> switch it is a breeze.

The GIMP works wonderfully over a full 10Mb/s link.  But if you stick 20
clients on an 802.11b wireless network...  Perhaps some 802.11g cards
would be in order anyway. ;)

-- 
taa
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