Monday, April 19, 2010

VNC - Basics

VNC(Virtual Network Computing) helps you to access the remote desktop. It makes the remote access simpler and easier by way of transferring the frame buffer updates across the network. So, It gives the feel like sitting in front of a remote machine and accessing it.

It is a proven model of accessing the remote desktops. The great thing about VNC is, it's platform independent. So, it is possible to take control of a windows machine from Linux/Mac/Cent or any.,

So, you doesn't need to bother the remote machine's platform or flavour, all you need to do is launch the VNC viewer and connect to the remote host(which should run the VNC server). In short, it allows you to access your desktop from any part of the world.

VNC works with the simple server-client architecture. VNC server has to run in the remote machine( Desktop which you need access ), VNC viewer has to be launched from where you're going to access it.


VNC server captures the screen updates from video frame buffer and sends to the VNC viewer. In order of responding to the server, the viewer transmits the mouse and keyboard events and gets back the screen updates for the events sent.

VNC server:
    VNC server is a program which waits for the clients to connect and when some clients are connected, authenticate them, do the protocol negotiations and send the frame buffer updates to the clients.


VNC client:
    VNC client is the program which connects to the VNC server, send password for authentication, do protocol negotiations with server, receive the frame buffer updates from server and display it to the user(in case of VNC viewer).

It doesn't only helps to access the remote desktop, but it has a bunch of features like,
  • File transfer between the remote machine and you machine.
  • Secure access by way of authentication. The server will ask for a password, when some clients try to connect.
  • It also allows the transactions to be encrypted.
Further reading:
    Rfb protocol - To know about the protocol used by VNC.
    RfbProxy - To know about the tool to record, stream & convert FBS files