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RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol)

Started by Saijin_Naib, 2007.11.06, 11:07:09

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Saijin_Naib

Okay, first thing is first: Im a GUI n00b, and Im a pretty useless end user, so keep that in mind.

So today, my roomate finally got Gutsy Gibbon working on his laptop with compvis and beryl and all those nice effects and he was playing around with everything and finally came across the Terminal Services client software that Ubuntu has for communicating over multiple protocols. So, he opens it up, tells me to boot to windows XP so we can test it out, I then remember that I saw a PM VNC server app that I never have used before.

Today, I saw VNC, and it was AWESOME. However, I was eventually frustrated by the less than stellar performance across RIT's blazing fast network (usually 10+mpbs over DC++) and the lack of sound and ability to share files across the connection. This lead me to do some research, and I then found out that VNC is a very simplistic protocol, and that RDP has many, many more features.

This then lead me to these pages:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_Desktop_Protocol
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VNC

where I learned about the protocols, then drilled down further to these apps/source codes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rdesktop
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsclient

So basically, my question is this:

Who else but me would love to have a RDP compliant client/server suite that is ported to eCS and has a nice GUI so nub-cakes like myself can use it?

Basically, PM VNC but with RDP and all the other features that rdesktop and tsclient provide?
Also, some optimizations in the code would be stellar. I read somewhere (dont quote me on this) that PM VNC is a pretty quick/dirty port and because of that, can perform poorly on eCS.

Thoughts?

John

Totally agree with you here too, Saigin.

Played with PM VNC in the past and can be great fun mucking your friends about :-) Also has advantages of taking over control of others' desktops to show them where and how to do things. I found that performance was slow on PM VNC but thought it may be the fact that OS/2 installed on an Old P1 233Mhz, 384MB ram. Going back to your question about OpenGL, perhaps hardware accelerated display drivers may also help with performance? I'm not sure neither and only recently came back to computer scene as it's only a part time hobby.

Saijin_Naib

#2
The hardware accelerated drivers would MOST certainly help the performance, but the poor performance was also on my room-mates end, and his hardware is fully accelerated under Gutsy Gibbon, so the lag must be in the program/protocol itself, because both of our computers are not exactly what you would call "weak" performers.

Anyone else like to see RDP? I will submit it to be a bounty if I hear enough support!
I think that this would be a nice bonus for eCS so that people will give it a little more consideration, plus, added functionality is never a bad thing right?

And! RDP is more secure than VNC protocol!

jep

Would be insteresting to use access my machine @ home from work as it'll hopefully cut some corners and therefore be faster :-D

Remember that nicer graphics (or hardware) on the machine doesn't help as I guess it is the capturing, compression and transmission that cause the slowness. It'll help if you disable animations ( e.g. clock, ip-monitor, CPU etc.) to as it then can focus on what has really been updated, smaller portion of the screen.

Hide the clock in eCS and see if that'll help you, otherwise let open windows be placed near or over the clock/ip-monitor...

Mvh / WKR / MfG
//Jan-Erik

Saijin_Naib

Okay, I will try that. Ideally though, I shouldnt have to change my desktop whenever I want to use it for a VNC connection, because honestly, I will forget to do so. I have used RDP under windows and between Windows and Linux and it FLIES. It feels way smoother and quicker than the VNC connection between me and my room-mate. You can see my computer specs in my sig, its not a slow computer. His laptop is simiar in performance (dual core 64bit with ATI on-board graphics) so it really should not be our computers. From what I read of the VNC protocol, that is just the protocol. Somehow RDP has methods that improve performance and add features. It sounds like its the better protocol overall, and I firmly believe it should be implemented on eCS just like it is on OSX, Linux, and Windows.

Criguada

Hi Saijin_Naib.
I have a few thoughts to share.

First: RDP is a M$ proprietary protocol closely derived from the protocol used by Citrix ICA. I prefer VNC because of its openness.

Second: base VNC is quite simplistic and it performs poorly even on fast networks. I don't believe the eCS port is any slower than other implementations. There are a lot of derivatives of the base VNC protocol, that remain backwards compatible while adding a lot of performance tweaks. There is RealVNC, TightVNC, UltraVNC, etc. I use both RDP and VNC at work for various reasons (which I won't describe here). Of those derivatives, the best IMHO is UltraVNC which is virtually indistinguishable from RDP performance-wise. Since all these derivatives are backwards compatible, we can connect to an UltraVNC server with our PMVNC client, but we lose all the performance enhancements. Note however that UltraVNC is Windows only, so Linux users are in the same boat.

Third: I did a search out there fro RDP clients usable in OS/2-eCS. There is an old port of rdesktop, but that is not usable anymore. There is a java client called "Proper RDP Client" IIRC, and I have used it to connect to my PC at work through a VPN. It works well, even if it doesn't have all the bells of the Windows client. Unfortunately it seems it is not developed anymore, so if the RDP protocol is updated in the future, this client may break.

Hope this helps
Bye
Cris

Saijin_Naib

I know that it is a Microsoft protocol, based upon the Citrix protocol, but it is supported and developed quite actively for Linux with rdesktop and the GUI app TSC. Rdesktop has the ability to use RDP, VNC, and other methods (which I cant remember but will post later when roomie wakes up). My thought was that if we implemented a native port of Rdesktop with a simple GUI front end we would have a solution that would allow us to use RDP and all its many advantages, VNC and its wider compatability (especially with older clients) and the other protocols as well. I think that gripping tight to VNC because its not a "M$" (god that irks me) protocol is a little bit silly, seeing as Linux has the ability to communicate over RDP and so does OSX. That again, leaves eCS behind.

abwillis

I built rdesktop 1.3.1 a few years ago and it works with hoblink/xfree86.  There is also a newer version (1.5.1) available that uses SDL so doesn't need xfree86.  I've been using the 1.5.1 release as it has an advantage with screen painting (1.3.1 doesn't repaint itself if something is moved over it so it stays black until the server side forces a paint) but it doesn't allow the clipboard to transfer data between host and guest like 1.3.1 does.

Criguada

Saijin_Naib,
why in the world should that leave eCS behind? As I (and abwillis) said you, eCS does have the ability to use RDP. But if we have to develop/port something for OS/2-eCS, I'd prefer to build upon an open protocol, rather than playing (as usual) by the rules dictates by M$ (sorry if this annoys you :-D ).

That said, a recent port of rdesktop would be a good thing, but I wonder if it's worth the effort. I can't help but notice (in your messages on this forums) that you try to duplicate on OS/2 your experiences in the Windows world, and I really have to ask you what it is that makes you want to stay with OS/2. PLEASE understand that I absolutely don't want to scare you away, it's just a way to make you think about what you really want from OS/2-eCS. Wouldn't it be better to really dive into the OS and try to discover how to make things "the OS/2 way" instead of trying to port the world over?

If there is something that can't be done on OS/2, a solution is welcome. But rather than instantly turning to the known Windows solution, a better approach would be to find what is available on OS/2, if it can be enhanced or not, if there already is a (usable) java solution to the problem, if there is an opensource alternative that can be easily ported (i.e. we already have the dependencies in place), and - finally and most importantly - how much is it needed.

This case is a perfect example: while I applaud you research in the opensource field for a solution to use RDP, the point is why you want to use RDP in the first place. Just because it is faster? There are VNC implementation that are as fast or faster. And they have advantages too. And since we already have a VNC server in place, it may be quite easier to enhance it with the code from UltraVNC rather than porting another new package.

OTOH there could be a REAL need for RDP (that's why I went looking for an RDP client in the first place). If I want to work from home I have to use RDP because our network admins will not let us use VNC outside of our intranet. There is no real added security (UltraVNC implements certificate-based encryption and can sync with M$ Active Directory for authentication), but they want this just out of lazyness.

I found a way to use RDP through java, but I'm still depending on a Windows box because of the VPN issue (obviously, they don't use an open standard... how could they?). See? If you want to go with M$, you're always one step behind, not in terms of functionality, but in terms of compatibility. And this is deliberate.

Bye
Cris

Saijin_Naib

I did not learn of RDP from Microsoft Windows, in fact, I have yet to use any VNC or RDP software under windows. I learned of it from using VNC with my roomate's linux boot last night. We both were shocked at the poor performance that was being shown to us by our computers, especially in light of the fact that we are on a very, very fast network. I also looked at his TSC program and I saw that it supported other protocols, which I knew nothing of. When I went back to eCS I saw that I could only do VNC. That made me question what VNC and RDP were, so I went looking for information. I then found that RDP has a larger feature set, allows things like audio channels, redirecting of data to hardware ports, and sharing of clipboard/files. With VNC on eComStation, I cant do anything productive really. I can get to my eCS desktop. But then what? If I am in lab working on a large data set and I want music, I am shit out of luck. If I want to grab a folder of data and put it on my workstation at school, shit out of luck. You are right, I do consider a lot of the features that Windows offers, and I do feel like they are missing from eCS, but that does not mean I do not appreciate what eCS offers. Clearly, I do. I keep using it, and I have paid for it out of a budget that is tighter than you know. However, it does have limitations. My point was, RDP has more features, features I desire, and it has been developed for other platforms like Linux and Linux variants, as well as OSX. I saw it first there, and that is what caused me to want it, not my experience on Windows, because I still have yet to use any VNC/RDP software under windows. So you see, I think that eCS should have it because it offers useful features, and it will be a 1+ for eComStation to be able to interface with RDP like all the other big players, whether or not that means accepting the fact that it is using a Microsoft Protocol. Lets not forget eCS uses SMB, but I hear no crying over that. Basically, everything eCS cant do, is another potential user who has lost interest. I want eCS to succeed, and I think that having a good, fast client like rdesktop and TSC (which are open source and actively developed) will be only a good thing for it. I dont see what is wrong with my position here?

Saijin_Naib

Quote from: abwillis on 2007.11.06, 17:17:56
There is also a newer version (1.5.1) available that uses SDL so doesn't need xfree86.  I've been using the 1.5.1 release as it has an advantage with screen painting...
Is there a precompiled binary package? I have not yet figured out how to get xFree86 set up correctly, and using a window manager (I found a port of BlackBox, gotta figure that out somehow :( ). Sorry to be a pain :\

lazy

So, nothing is changed? No OS/2 native rdesktop, basaed on SDL?

Paul Smedley

Quote from: lazy on 2008.10.01, 16:50:45
So, nothing is changed? No OS/2 native rdesktop, basaed on SDL?

I googled and found http://glebk.newmail.ru/rdesktop/Rdesktop-gcc-SDL-OS2.html which whilst in russian, offers the following binary: http://glebk.newmail.ru/rdesktop/rdesktop-1.5.0-gcc-SDL-a2.zip

saborion2

Re:

Quote

[.....I googled and found http://glebk.newmail.ru/rdesktop/Rdesktop-gcc-SDL-OS2.html which whilst in Russian,......]


No problem; How about trying "Google Translate" to translate from Russian to English and so on and so on.....?.  ;) 

IBManners

QuoteNo problem; How about trying "Google Translate" to translate from Russian to English and so on and so on.....?.

And I can just, barely, hear everyone thinking, why don't you ?
I am the computer, it is me.