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Home / I-Opener Areas / I-Opener Technical Stuff Xwindows or similar? Possible to use IO "as-is" w/QNX as client to a host Windows PC?

Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) laserfan Profile I did a search on "xwindows" and didn't learn much so have to ask: What options might exist for the iopener to become a "diskless terminal" on a network to a Windows machine? I'm sure I'm not using the right terminology here, but I'm trying to find an alternative way to use the iopener without the attendant hard drive/fan/bootup etc. downsides. It seems like it ought to be possible to use it to run apps on another PC over an Ethernetwork. Since I want to use the IO as a convenient terminal (in fact it's on my bar which happens to also be in my music/home theater room which is why I want silence) to retrieve email and surf, and leave the attendant Favorites or archived messages on my main PC. Is this a.)wildly impractical/expensive, or b.)trivially simple ie. already done, or c.)somewhere in-between. I've surfed the Citrix site (there's a client for UNIX and even one for a Pocket PC but the server is real expensive and I think only works on 2000 machines), found a cheap Xwindows server at http://www.microimages.com/mix/ and poked-around the QNX site a bit and so far have only a suspicion that what I want to see may be possible, but all this is a little over my head. Please, somebody suggest a way I can keep my little IO "instant on" and disk-free (silent!) yet have access to my main Pentium III computer and at least its email/web apps if not the whole shootin' match. 03-30-2001 20:36:04

RE:Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) laserfan Profile Oh, and another idea is VNC: http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc/screenshots.html where it appears you could run VNC on the Windows PC and then the Xviewer client on the IOpener? 03-30-2001 20:44:19

RE:Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) jbarr Profile Hi! To answer your first question, to accomplist what you want to do, to me the best solution seems to be to install something like Jailbait Linux. It includes Netscape, VNC, and some other stuff. To me, this would be the truely the best type of "diskless terminel". You would have full remote control over another computer located elsware on your LAN and you could use Netscape to Web browse. That said, I have not done ANY i-opener hacking (yet!! I'm trying to find one to hack on eBay!!)) but do know a lot about VNC! I use it every day at work to remotely control a couple servers located across the street in our Data Center. Basically, you install the VNC server program on the computer you want to control and then install the client program on the PC (or i-Opener) that you want to use to control the remote PC. You have to be connected on a LAN, and it all works very transparantly over TCP/IP. Check out the VNC development web site at: http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc/index.html The programs (server and clients) are very small and available for many platforms. A couple hints: Make sure the screen resolution on the machine you are controling is the same or smaller than the resolution of the controlling machine, otherwise you will have to scroll around a lot more. Also, keep the color depth on the machine you are controling to as low as you can to save bandwidth. -Jim jim@barr.net 04-09-2001 11:54:03

RE:Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) laserfan Profile Thanks, Jim-- After many, many hours of wading thru this board and surfing my brains out, I have to say that your suggestion fits best with my own research, i.e. the shortest route to a diskless terminal is Jailbait on the Sandisk running VNC for linux over a network connection. But what has discouraged me from trying this is the 800x600 resolution of the IO vs. 1024x768 I usually run my PIII desktop. Also, as I have no Linux experience whatsoever I've finally decided to "stick with what I know" or at least what I have the most experience with and which will involve the shortest learning curve, namely Win98SE. I already installed a 128Mb SODIMM ($50 at Best Buy), have a Winchip2 ready-to-install (I have the V1 bios), 98lite (tho not cuz I need it since...) I've ordered a 2.5" 9.5mm drive (4G Hitachi only $79 at computergeeks), and also have a fan and USB-to-Ethernet adapter (Netgear just $32) on order as well. Hopefully the motors will not be too loud, but with all the help on this board I'm confident that it will come-up and run easily enough. But now that I've listed this stuff I realize I'll have spent another $250 by the time I'm done (over and above the $400 I sunk into it initially for the IO and a yr's service for my Mom). Not a cheap computer by any stretch, but a cute little bugger nonetheless! I'll miss the simplicity/convenience of the NPLI service but it'll also be good to use the same apps and OS everywhere around the house. Next I'll take a deep breath and install my Enet card to my Tivo box as well! 04-10-2001 20:37:10

RE:Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) eddavis Profile laserfan, VNC can scale so if you give it a 78:100 ratio (I forget the format) you can view a 1024x768 screen on a 800x600 machine without scrolling. You may want to experiment with that. 04-10-2001 20:52:25

RE:Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) laserfan Profile >VNC can scale Thanks Ed. I didn't know and might indeed try this. I also have System Commander laying around here and wonder if it can be put to work to switch between Jailbait and Win98 if only to give me the experience. What with the notion that IOs may be in plentiful, cheap supply at some point maybe I could put another one in the Kitchen or whatever. 04-11-2001 04:55:21

RE:Xwindows or similar? (modified 0 times) Programmer Profile you could always upgrade the display.. 04-11-2001 09:28:25

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