Text Mode

[Quentin Stafford-Fraser]

McGee, Michael wrote:

> We are interested in writing a VNC server that would run on a text-mode
> screen. Does the RFB support text mode or do we have to translate the
> characters into a bit map?

You would have to translate the characters into bitmaps. You could even
calculate the full RFB equivalent of each character at startup, store it in
memory, and just send it down the line with the appropriate coordinates
when the character needed to be displayed.  You could even check to see if
the character was already on the screen and use CopyRect from that
location. That might save some bandwidth.

And yes, telnet already makes a good alternative, but you would get the
stateless-endpoint advantages of VNC (disconnect and reconnect where you
left off) and you could also connect from Java browsers.

Regards,
Quentin Stafford-Fraser

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Dr Quentin Stafford-Fraser                  http://www.orl.co.uk/~qsf
   ORL - The joint research laboratory of Olivetti and Oracle
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