Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 23:14:27 +0000 From: setantae <setantae@submonkey.net> To: Anthony Atkielski <anthony@atkielski.com> Cc: questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: home pc use Message-ID: <20011120231427.GA83038@rhadamanth> In-Reply-To: <012701c17216$9e31df00$0a00000a@atkielski.com> References: <0111191831240Q.60958@chip.wiegand.org> <20011119220243.A268@prayforwind.com> <009a01c171a9$4eedbee0$0a00000a@atkielski.com> <20011120061026.A2767@prayforwind.com> <014601c171d2$22ada240$a50410ac@olmct.net> <008a01c171fa$7110be90$0a00000a@atkielski.com> <20011120200746.GA80963@rhadamanth> <00c101c17204$4070bb50$0a00000a@atkielski.com> <20011120224137.GA82211@rhadamanth> <012701c17216$9e31df00$0a00000a@atkielski.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Tue, Nov 20, 2001 at 11:56:34PM +0100, Anthony Atkielski wrote: > Ceri writes: > > > That's not the situation you described though, is it? > > It's exactly the situation I described. Not as I parsed your mail; see below. > > You said : > > `` I would not run any X server on a large system > > with many users connected; let the users gobble > > resources on their own workstations, not on the > > central system.'' > > > > If, however, you are running the X server on the > > same machine, then the server and workstation are > > one and the same. > > Yes, and if there are other users connected to the machine, then the situation I > described obtains. If that's honestly what you meant, then I aplogise for the misunderstanding. I thought you meant that each user would be running their own copy of Netscape with the display on their own workstation (which is not as resource hungry as it sounds; I believe Netscape was originally designed with this in mind, and most of the memory requirements do not significantly increase with multiple copies running). > > However, I think you are failing to realise that > > the X server and the workstation are always one > > and the same. > > But the workstation and the server (the server being the UNIX system running the > clients) are not. I meant server in the sense of the central system serving > many users. > > Each user runs their own X server. > > If the user is running the X server on the console of his FreeBSD system, then > everything is running on a single machine. This appears to be the way many > people do it, from what I've read here. Again, this is not how I understood the situation described. As someone else mentioned, however, I think you may be doing a better job of context switching than the kernel I compiled this morning. > > I'll say it again, in case you still don't get it : > > The X server runs on the workstation. > > If you are running KDE, typically it is > running on the console of the same machine that runs the X clients, as I > understand it. So everything is running on one machine ... just like a desktop. Yes, but with multiple displays and multiple users, so not much like a desktop at all really. > I supposed you could split things over two machines, but is anyone really doing > that? I do it if I need to run Internet Explorer, as I have a Solaris machine that can run it, but I can rarely be bothered to move into the other room to use it. > To run a GUI, you need intimate communication with the hardware. Which is why the X server runs on the workstation. The X server runs on the workstation and talks to the display hardware, and Netscape (or whatever) runs on the remote machine and sends it's display output to the X server on the workstation. > > As in, each user runs their own X server on their > > own workstation, the machine that all the users they > > are logged into doesn't run an X server at > > all, it runs X clients. > > These two machines may be one and the same. They don't have to be. If you want to talk about specific subsets of situations, you should explicitly say so before you start. Ceri -- keep a mild groove on To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20011120231427.GA83038>