HP seeks programming... VNC related

[Seth Cohn]

On the Sourcexchange site:	

http://www.sourcexchange.com/devel/RfpBrowse?rfpID=4

An RFP is a Request For Proposals. A project sponsor has offered to fund a
project and is soliciting informal comments and interest from the
developer community, as well as formal Proposals that describe how
developer or team plans to do the work.

Project Title: Portable network desktop 

 RFP:
 4
 Reference RFP:
 0 (if re-submitted or based upon prior RFP)
 Sponsor:
 Hewlett-Packard
 Project:
 Portable network desktop
 Detail:
 The project is to develop an application which gives access to
applications
 on a remote desktop from across the network. Applications like this have
 been developed before, but in this case HP wishes to have a remote
 desktop written which exposes the features of e-speak. 

 E-speak is a system for connecting clients and services across networks.
Its
 primary features are: security, manageability, dynamic resource location,
 and intermediation. 

 Specifically, e-speak is an infrastructure that enables development and
 deployment of global distributed services. These services will be able to
 discover other resources and services from a variety of different
locations
 by using search techniques. Services can communicate with all kinds of
 machines, from large, datacenter-based servers, to small, portable,
 hand-held devices. Communication can be through public networks, past
 network firewalls, and via low level serial protocols to non-networked
 devices. Services can use other services, or be invoked by clients in
 specialized environments that they were never specifically written to
 interact with. Once a service has been written to communicate in e-speak,
 it can be used as a client or server for a new service being developed -
 without changing a line of code in the original service. 

 E-speak will be released under an open source license (TBD, but probably
 GNU LGPL) by December 1999. 

 Proposals for the portable network desktop should take advantage of the
 e-speak security and manageability features. The desktop client should
 locate the desktop it will interact with from among the desktops that are
 currently available and to which the user has access. Communications
 between the desktop client and the desktop server should be take place
 entirely through the data forwarding facilities of the e-speak API. 

 There are some general features of a network desktop that we think are
 probably important to make it usable. The following represents our
initial
 impressions although these are open to change if the developer can
 produce compelling argments for another way of looking at the problem. 

 If using the X-windows server/client model then the network desktop
 server should refuse to map windows which do not meet security rules.
 Citrix (www.citrix.com) has some technology that allows individual
 windows applications to be exported to X display servers. The network
 desktop server and client should negotiate screen depth and size so that
the
 applications can be displayed correctly on the destination equipment. 

 HP will provide pre-release versions of the e-speak product and APIs,
 including all currently available developer documentation and if needed
 the product architecture overview. These must not be disclosed until the
 product release no later than December 1999. 

 Proposals should include an outline of the approach that will be taken,
and
 the general features that the developer thinks can be supported together
 with a description of how a typical session would proceed in the
 developer's vision. If the solution will be based on changes to an
existing
 product, the proposal should state this. 

 The developer may incorporate existing applications available under an
 open source license. The following resources may yield interesting
starting
 points for delivery of the required software. 

 References: 

 VNC (Virtual Network Computing)
 http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc/ 
 XMX (X-protocol Multiplexor) ftp://wilma.cs.brown.edu/pub/xmx 
 SHX (Shared X) http://ftp.x.org/R5contrib/shX.tar.Z 
 X11R6 (RECORD & XTEST extensions) 
 xmove ftp://ftp.cs.columbia.edu/pub/xmove 
 dxpc (Differential X-Protocol Compression)
 http://ccwf.cc.utexas.edu/~zvonler/dxpc 

 Bonus points: 

 plays well with both Unix and Windows, or Java 
 provides separate cursors and window focus to each participant 
 can remove apps from one location to another 
 can share control of a single desktop from multiple locations 
 works at modem speeds 
 Deliverables:
 Developer shall provide:

 1. Design document for the approach outlined in the proposal.

 2. Source code to the portable network desktop application client and
 server as described above, and released under an open-source license
 compatible with e-speak. Functional source matching these 
 requirements should be completed near December 1999.

 3. Monthly feedback on the e-speak API's; specifically any changes 
 required to implement or simplify the implementation of the project
 proposal. Feedback should be provided at least on a monthly basis
 until the project is completed.

 Milestones:
 1. Initial feedback on e-speak APIs: 5%
 2. First draft of project design document: 15%
 3. Feedback on e-speak APIs: 5%
 4. Completed design document: 15% 
 5. Feedback on e-speak APIs: 5%
 6. Working prototype of network desktop client/server: 30%
 (To be completed by December 1999).
 7. Feedback on e-speak APIs: 5%
 8. Completed source code to network desktop client/server: 20%

 Compensation:
 $10,000

 Target Date:
 2000-06-01
 Skills:
 Distributed applications development experience. X11 and Windows
 development experience. Java development experience
 License:
 LGPL



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