Multiple Desktop Users on a Single Machine?

_Sharp'r_ asks: "I'm trying to design the least expensive way to make OpenOffice, email, and a web browser available to students in a new charter elementary school. In my past experience working with charitable computer donations, I can usually get three to four working computers out of five donated 'broken' computer systems, usually with plenty of monitors, keyboards and mice left over. I'd like to use one computer for multiple students by attaching multiple monitors, USB keyboards and mice. What drivers/OS versions support multiple local input devices and monitors that can be attached to a specific login session? Will this require virtualization? Is there a config I haven't found that you can use to assign these devices to specific ttys? Have you done this before?"

Comments

Not likely with Windows

[Dan East]

At one point I did some extensive searching to find an application / driver that would allow even partial multiuser control over Windows. We have a multimedia PC with two video outputs, one of which is dedicated to projection. Due to the physical layout of our control room, there are two keyboards and mice attached to the computer. All I wanted was a utility that gave each mouse its own pointer, so that two people could interact with my two custom programs at once. I never could find anything providing even that simple functionality, and it wasn't necessary enough for me to implement it myself.

So, an Microsoft OS is most likely out of the question for what you want to do.

Dan East