Using A Laptop as KVM Head?

Dune asks: "I tote around a nice laptop all day and then have to sit down in front of a lot of different boxes. I'd love to be able to use my laptop as a KVM head. Has anyone every seen something that would allow this? Maybe a USB device which has keyboard, video and mouse cables to plug into a box (or KVM switch)? With a corresponding app/driver of course..." My first knee-jerk answer to this question was "maybe VNC would work", and while that will let you log in and get you a desktop with which you could use the machine, it's only a hack and not a true KVM head, which would show you exactly the same thing that's on the console. Could VNC possibly be hacked to serve this purpose? Of course, and I'm sure that many people would be interested in such if someone knows how to do it. However I'm wondering if someone out there has already developed (or is working on) a better solution?

I should make a caveat to this: The Windows98 VNC server will export the current user's desktop to the internet. So some of you windows users can do this already. Warning: Those of you who do, should look into extra security for your desktop, especially if it has an internet connection.

Comments

Re:VNC or Terminal Server are your best choices

[compwizrd]

Go change a setting in the bios. Go reboot a locked up computer.

VNC isn't going to handle this, unfortunately.

x0rfbserver

[bluestar]

I should make a caveat to this: The Windows98 VNC server will export the current user's desktop to the internet. So some of you windows users can do this already.

There's a modified VNC server for Unix (Linux only?) called x0rfbserver that exports the "real" desktop. It reads the system frame buffer and exports that using the VNC protocols.

Performance isn't quite as good as regular VNC but should be fine on a decent LAN. You find it here

crypto and VNC but its not terminal

[johnjones]

basically you can export you desktop to any client running TCP/IP

this can be done with VNC for windows(NT/2k/9x/winCE) / X /MACOS
even it can be done to a java applet so you can do sysadmin through a webpage

you can then patch VNC to do crypto and away you go secure computeing over TCP/IP
(as long as your login is secure)

but you seem to fail to understand what most KVM are used for TERMINALS and that would be Serial ones at that most of them hook into that nice serial port out of a SOLARIS/SUN OS/AIX/ HP-UX /LINUX/(net/free)BSD boxen

why you dont have a kick arse display on a web/printer/data server because it does not need it and I for one would not like to load my machine with it
(plus when a unixlike box falts and has to reboot where does it put the output if no monitor attached ;-)

if you dont mind loading you box and want graphics then VNC is the way to go
(please ignor RDP as it has serious falts and you cant tune it to your connection speed)

regards

john jones

Re: RDP

[bonezed]

I have to take issue with yr comment on RDP...

in a Windows environment RDP wins hands down. I admin my Windows servers from a Linux box with a native RDP client called rdesktop and it works better than VNC! If I'm admining my Linux boxes I do use VNC or native X, although I mainly use SSH for everything.