Re: X Windows

[toddpw@cco.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel)]

glyn@cs.UAlberta.CA (Reade Glyn Devin) writes:

>Come to think of it, how many out there could _actually_ make use
>of a full X implementation on your IIgs's?  This means that you
>are networked; I don't think a modem connection would give sufficient
>throughput.  I suspect the number is fairly small.

Throughput is not the problem, it's the round trip time. Percieved performance
under X is very dependent on the time it takes an event notification (like a
keypress or mouse click) to go over to the client and for the response action
message(s) to come back. Turning off modem compression improves this because
characters are not held up briefly in the hopes that more will be transmitted
(thus providing better opportunities for compression).

NCD makes X terminals that connect over low speed (9600/14.4) modems, however
they use a proprietary protocol of their own to send less characters. If
anything their protocol suffers from the compression-buffering effect a lot
more than the full X protocol (which is based on stream connections, usually
TCP) would.

Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ cco.caltech.edu