Monday, September 29, 2008

The Benefits of VNC

Virtual Network Computing is a protocol used to control one computer’s keyboard and mouse over a network from a different computer. This protocol creates many advantages and disadvantages for those who use it. Since VNC is simply a protocol, many software developers have created programs for many platforms making the protocol cross-platform. The implementation of VNC for businesses allows IT departments located anywhere on a wide or local area network able to diagnose and fix problems. Many people have also discovered VNC to be a valuable protocol to use at home for personal uses Once fully set up and configured, VNC is powerful and extremely stable but the set up for many users tends to be difficult.

The VNC protocol is very functional and robust as a cross platform solution. With many software solutions for many platforms, interchangeability is a clear advantage. Most of the business world runs Windows while some users prefer Mac OS X. The majority of IT setups run a variation of UNIX or Linux for their operating systems, this creates incompatibility in a business environment. Luckily VNC allows users running one operating system control and interact as if they are using a different operating system. This allows IT departments to help other areas of a business with any problems they run into with software they may be unfamiliar with.

In a personal setting, VNC isn’t as flexible when compared to a business setting. Many users use VNC to access a desktop computer with intense applications from a less powerful laptop somewhere else in the house. The average user will have difficulty setting up a VNC server, especially if they don’t understand the basics of networking. The only way to make a connection to a VNC server is through a direct IP address. This makes both local and remote access rather difficult to set up. If a user wants to control a computer on a local network from the Internet they need to worry about dynamic IPs and port forwarding but with the simplicity of modern hardware and software, most people can overcome these initial issues.


Users interested in using VNC should check out some freeware VNC applications. For Windows and Linux, a simple but powerful VNC server and client is
TightVNC. For Mac users, A VNC server is built right into OS X but a compatible client such as Chicken of the VNC must be used to connect using OS X. Each of these examples can connect to each other this makes them interchangeable. Sure the set up is a little tedious but anybody can benefit from a VNC setup. Don’t be shy, give VNC a go sometime.

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