[unios] Re: Networked GUI (was Posix and Networks)

[Anders Petersson]

From: Anders Petersson <anders.petersson@mbox320.swipnet.se>

>From: Pat Wendorf <beholder@ican.net>
>
>> >1) Remote Dumb (graphical) Terminal Access
>>
>> I'd want a remote access that does not differ from local access.
>
>There may be a problem implementing high performance graphics (such as
games),
>over a remote session, if the terminal was dumb.  There has to be a line
drawn
>somewhere, where a set of useful generic objects can work remotely, while
some
>others would just not be practical.  We'd need smart terminals to do all
objects.

I don't expect demanding games to run well remotely... however, simple uses
are well-suited for remote access. Transparently.

>> >4) Multiple Desktops using the same or multiple servers (done in Unix,
>> nice to
>> >have)
>>
>> Hmm... do you mean multiple GUI desktops? That would be easy, different
>> windows could even be used by different servers. No problem if networking
>> is sufficiently transparent.
>
>Have you ever used X-Windows?  Same type of deal.  You have a desktop that
you
>start in, and a bunch of virtual desktops you can switch to.  This makes
>multitasking much nicer, as it allows all your programs to run full
screen, while
>still being able to jump back and forth without minimizing and such.  What
I mean
>is that you can have multiple users logged into the same system, in the same
>GUI... It's only one user doing anything, but there are two user profiles
active
>on the same desktop.

OK, I know what you mean. mOS does that. (Or, will do.)

>> >8) Shared Program Use - multiple people working in the same program, on
>> the same
>> >data, live over a network.  (hard to implement but useful, "last entry"
>> update
>> >model)
>>
>> Oh yes. I see no need to use the same program (as long as the effect is
>> equal, the method dones't matter), but sharing data is very useful. Just
>> have all users open the same file in a special shared mode, and they are
>> notified when changes are made by others and what's changed (changes are
>> seen directly). This requires little effort from the application
programmer.
>
>I was thinking more of the white board example, where multiple users
access the
>same program at the same time... you can see them typing and mouse
movement and
>such... I don't think it translates well for most applications, but it
could be
>useful for some.

My parade example is text editing, even if not as exciting as white boards.
:) Several users may open the same document, with possibly different
editors, and the text is updated for everyone when someone types something.
It's like online chatting. Actually, just apply some rules, and you have
got a chat program.

>> I have another suggestion. Redundance in networking, which allows one or
>> several nodes to fail without loss of the joint computation or information.
>> To how big degree this can be done by the OS I don't know, but it's
>> certainly useful. What if you could just declare some data to logically
>> exist on the network, and it's automatically mirrored on several nodes,
>> with accesses made to the nearest copy without any effort from the
>> application's side?
>
>This is something to think of. I'm not too sure of how it works in
reality, but I
>do know AS/400's can do it.  I think this should be considered, and I do
believe
>it can be just another addition to the system abstract... just like
distributed
>processing...

Maybe the two features even can be seen as different sides of the same
coin. In the former case it's data that's global, in the latter it's
processes.
What about some kind of 'network' user account (can be nested)...
Everything put there is distributed.

binEng

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