At 01:24 AM 5/22/01 +0100, you wrote:
>If someone tries to connect to my VNC server running on Windows XP (Beta
>2), and fail, my wallpaper is removed.

First, before I start, let me acknowledge that without bug reports, issues
are never found and fixed.  But I also wanted to make sure that no one has
unrealistic expectations concerning Windows XP Beta 2.

Re: MAJOR bug with 3.3.3r9 on Windows XP

Just a semantic issue...  I would have phrased your message "MAJOR bug with
Windows XP Beta 2".  When comparing a program that has been around a long
time and stable to a BETA operating system that has been around for less
than a month, I would generally assume that bugs are in the Beta OS.
Especially given Microsoft's not-so-sterling track record concerning bug
populations in released products.  I never use a wallpaper myself, so I
haven't experienced this problem.  Your post states that it only happens in
XP, other users have stated it exists in NT and 2000 as well.  I would tend
to suspect that the problem is the _failure_ to connect.  If VNC turns the
wallpaper off at the beginning of the connection, then fails to re-enable
it on a failed connection, that would explain some of the reproducibility
issues (people who log in and log out don't see it, people who fail to log
in see it).  This is all guesswork...

Also, regarding the "Quick User Change" feature.  Microsoft made a
fundamental change to the underlying graphics system, and a program that is
intricately tied to it doesn't behave exactly as expected.  Not surprising.
 There is a very great potential that Microsoft has re-"engineered" XP in
such a way that VNC and other non-Microsoft products cannot function
properly.  Consider:

1. Microsoft makes a product called Terminal Server that is great, but
fairly expensive, especially considering all the per-user / per-application
licenses you end up needing.  VNC, pcAnywhere, etc. all have a negative
impact on this branch of MS's income stream.
2. Much of the functionality VNC needs is not documented, is documented
incorrectly, or is actively mis-represented in other ways, even in current
OSs.  XP is highly unlikely to improve this situation.
3. Even assuming fair play and niceness on MS's part -- the easiest way to
handle switching desktops on a single display would be to discard all
graphics operations for desktops that are not visible.  Then, when a
desktop becomes visible, invalidate all the rectangles on the screen,
causing the applications to refresh them.  If this is the case, there are
no graphics for VNC to retrieve, because the graphics operations and
framebuffer are being ignored.  VNC can't get the actual hardware
framebuffer, because XP is going to protect that VERY heavily to make sure
that User A doesn't go scribbling on User B's desktop.  If you can't write
to it, you can't read from it -- Windows doesn't have security settings on
device contexts or graphics operations.

Again, always good to see bug reports and areas for improvement, but I just
wanted to make sure that people understand that these problems can very
easily be in Windows XP, rather than in VNC.

Also, I don't represent VNC, AT&T, anyone else in the project, or my
company, so if you feel like flaming, it's just me...

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