Remote desktop client for Roku?

[John]

Greetings,
I'm a proud new owner of a Roku HD1000. Picked it up
last weekend after researching the different digital
media servers currently available on the market and
reading all the positive reviews on the Roku message
thread at avsforum.com A week later I have no regrets
about my purchase decision. It's so nice to be able
to listen to my MP3 collection through my home stereo
directly from my network shares, and view my digital
photos in 1080i resolution on my Toshiba HDTV. I'm
really looking forward to seeing what new applications
are developed for the Roku over the next several
months. I wish I could contribute to the Roku app
development efforts, but unfortunately my programming
abilities are limited to ASP, VB and other web
technologies in the Windows world.

A couple days ago an idea came to me for a potential
Roku application that I think would really blow people
away and probably help sell a few more Roku HD1000's.
I posted my idea on the Roku message thread at
AVSForum.com. I figured I should post my idea here as
well and get some feedback from developers whether
this can be done. The idea I came up with is to have
a thin client application that will allow the Roku to
remotely "take control" of any PC on your home network
running Windows XP Remote Desktop or Win2K Terminal
Services. The same technology already being used by
many to telecommute from home. Just think what a thin
client app like this would do for the Roku... It
would allow the Roku to remotely run any applications
you already have installed on your home networked
PC's. There'd be no reason to develop a web browser
for the Roku. Just take control of a PC running XP
Pro and run IE or whatever browser you normally use.
Remotely run through the Roku other installed PC apps
like email, chat, DivX, MAME, Windows Media Player 9,
Real Player, etc etc. Not only would the video from
the remote PC get streamed to the Roku, but the sound
as well. Now you've got a device that does A LOT more
than serve digital music, photos and video.

I've done a little bit of research. There's already a
commercial app for Linux called WinConnect that
connects to XP Remote Desktop and Terminal Services.
It's made by ThinSoft.
http://www.thinsoftinc.com/products_winconnect_info.html
WinConnect requires less than 16MB of memory to run.
It uses so little memory, the've even ported this
application to the Sharp Zaurus PDA.

Even better, there's a free solution available, a GNU
Open Source project named rdesktop. They managed to
reverse-engineer the RDP protocol used by XP Remote
Desktop/Term Services and built this app for UNIX.
The source code is available for downloading. Just go
to http://www.rdesktop.org
Rdesktop requires X-Windows, but I'm sure the code
could be ported to the Roku graphics system.

I realize you're going to need a wireless
keyboard/pointing device in order for this to really
work. Perhaps the RS-232 port or USB port could be
used to connect a wired keyboard to the Roku, at least
until an IR wireless keyboard becomes available?


John

__________________________________
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New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing.
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[Bill Arnett]

...have
a thin client application that will allow the Roku to
remotely "take control" of any PC on your home network

Nice idea. But ...

running Windows XP Remote Desktop or Win2K Terminal
Services...

... please don't limit it only to Windows. Use one of the
cross-platform standards like X or VNC.

--
Bill Arnett
***@nineplanets.org http://nineplanets.org/
Emerald Hills CA USA 37 27 N 122 15 W

[Todd Mathews]

Windows Terminal services were originally derived from Citrix. Citrix has a
Linux client that can connect to either Citrix or WinTerm (RDP)..

Might be a good place to start. I don't think you'll ever get the
performance level of VNC high enough to match the level of performance of
Citrix or RDP.

[Anthony Wood]

Hi John,

This is an interesting idea that we plan to check into. One issues is that
it is my understanding that remotedesktop doesn't handle video streams
currently.

anthony

----- Original Message -----
From: "John" <***@yahoo.com>
To: <roku-***@lists.rokulabs.com>
Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2003 12:31 AM
Subject: [Roku-tech] Remote desktop client for Roku?

Post by John
Greetings,
I'm a proud new owner of a Roku HD1000. Picked it up
last weekend after researching the different digital
media servers currently available on the market and
reading all the positive reviews on the Roku message
thread at avsforum.com A week later I have no regrets
about my purchase decision. It's so nice to be able
to listen to my MP3 collection through my home stereo
directly from my network shares, and view my digital
photos in 1080i resolution on my Toshiba HDTV. I'm
really looking forward to seeing what new applications
are developed for the Roku over the next several
months. I wish I could contribute to the Roku app
development efforts, but unfortunately my programming
abilities are limited to ASP, VB and other web
technologies in the Windows world.
A couple days ago an idea came to me for a potential
Roku application that I think would really blow people
away and probably help sell a few more Roku HD1000's.
I posted my idea on the Roku message thread at
AVSForum.com. I figured I should post my idea here as
well and get some feedback from developers whether
this can be done. The idea I came up with is to have
a thin client application that will allow the Roku to
remotely "take control" of any PC on your home network
running Windows XP Remote Desktop or Win2K Terminal
Services. The same technology already being used by
many to telecommute from home. Just think what a thin
client app like this would do for the Roku... It
would allow the Roku to remotely run any applications
you already have installed on your home networked
PC's. There'd be no reason to develop a web browser
for the Roku. Just take control of a PC running XP
Pro and run IE or whatever browser you normally use.
Remotely run through the Roku other installed PC apps
like email, chat, DivX, MAME, Windows Media Player 9,
Real Player, etc etc. Not only would the video from
the remote PC get streamed to the Roku, but the sound
as well. Now you've got a device that does A LOT more
than serve digital music, photos and video.
I've done a little bit of research. There's already a
commercial app for Linux called WinConnect that
connects to XP Remote Desktop and Terminal Services.
It's made by ThinSoft.
http://www.thinsoftinc.com/products_winconnect_info.html
WinConnect requires less than 16MB of memory to run.
It uses so little memory, the've even ported this
application to the Sharp Zaurus PDA.
Even better, there's a free solution available, a GNU
Open Source project named rdesktop. They managed to
reverse-engineer the RDP protocol used by XP Remote
Desktop/Term Services and built this app for UNIX.
The source code is available for downloading. Just go
to http://www.rdesktop.org
Rdesktop requires X-Windows, but I'm sure the code
could be ported to the Roku graphics system.
I realize you're going to need a wireless
keyboard/pointing device in order for this to really
work. Perhaps the RS-232 port or USB port could be
used to connect a wired keyboard to the Roku, at least
until an IR wireless keyboard becomes available?
John
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing.
http://photos.yahoo.com/
_______________________________________________
Roku-tech mailing list
http://lists.rokulabs.com/mailman/listinfo/roku-tech

[John]

I was just reading the VNC documentation at
http://realvnc.com
I like that it's cross-platform and can run on
Windows, UNIX and Macs, but one thing I noticed is
that unlike XP Remote Desktop, VNC doesn't support
audio redirection to the client. It only does video.
That would rule out running remotely any multimedia
apps that output sound. But with the open nature of
the Roku, there's no reason you couldn't have
different flavors of a remote desktop client. For
users like myself running Windows XP Pro with the
Remote Desktop already included with the OS, a remote
desktop client app that supports the RDP protocol
would make sense. For UNIX and Mac users, develop a
separate client that talks to a VNC server. Then
everyone's happy.

John

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing.
http://photos.yahoo.com/

[John]

Anthony,
You're right about streaming live video through Remote
Desktop. I've been experimenting with that a bit this
afternoon. I can stream small-sized videos with
sound, like the Windows Media/RealMedia news clips on
CNN.com and MSNBC.com. Playback is a little choppy
and the sound isn't always in sync with the video, but
still watchable. Trying to stream MPEG2 high-quality
video across a remote desktop connection, forget it.
Sound quality is surprisingly good though when
steaming audio from apps like WinAmp and Internet
radio stations. Even without the ability to stream
high-quality video, a remote desktop app for the Roku
would still have many uses.

John


__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing.
http://photos.yahoo.com/

[Kon]

Post by Anthony Wood
This is an interesting idea that we plan to check into. One issues

is that

Post by Anthony Wood
it is my understanding that remotedesktop doesn't handle video streams
currently.

Using remote desktop for video playback makes absolutely no sense. In
effect you are decompressing your MPEG2 (or other) files, then
compressing them with gzip or whatever compression mechanism RD is
using and retransmitting them over the network.

Remote desktop has uses but this isn't one of them.

Cheers
Kon

[4***@comcast.net]

I agree, audio/video is not a good use of remote desktop. Things like a web browser would be good, maybe you need to move files around on the pc or delete some, maybe setup recordings on your hidef tuner...

Post by Anthony Wood

Post by Anthony Wood
This is an interesting idea that we plan to check into. One issues

is that

Post by Anthony Wood
it is my understanding that remotedesktop doesn't handle video streams
currently.

Using remote desktop for video playback makes absolutely no sense. In
effect you are decompressing your MPEG2 (or other) files, then
compressing them with gzip or whatever compression mechanism RD is
using and retransmitting them over the network.
Remote desktop has uses but this isn't one of them.
Cheers
Kon
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