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HP's Remote Workstation Access Promises "Just Like Local" Experience September 29, 2004 Sharing Screens via TCP/IP Remote-control or remote-access software is nothing new; utility programs like Symantec's pcAnywhere have been sending a host computer's screen image to a distant system, while sending the latter's keyboard and mouse input back to the former, since the DOS and dial-up modem days. But in October, HP says, it'll ship a new network display solution created especially for complex 2D and 3D workstation graphics: HP Remote Graphics Software, a cross-platform foundation for real-time remote access to workstation desktops over standard TCP/IP networks. Jim Zafarana, vice president and marketing manager of HP's Workstation Global Business Unit, says that HP Remote Graphics Software "does for graphics-intensive industries what [AOL] Instant Messenger does for communication," with benefits ranging from reduced travel costs (thanks to virtual instead of face-to-face meetings) to improved collaboration on design and animation projects. Like other workstation applications, the new software is targeted at professionals in industries such as digital content creation (DCC), computer-aided design (CAD), finance, and oil and gas, as well as the scientific computing community. HP anticipates it'll be used for geographically dispersed design review and collaboration; remote access to workstations from a home or hotel PC; and software support, training, and demonstrations. What makes Remote Graphics Software different from pcAnywhere and its peers is that it's designed for the complex, high-resolution graphics of the workstation world, letting users work with large 3D models even on remote desktops or notebooks that don't have 3D graphics processors. It also offers both one-to-one and one-to-many desktop sharing, supporting both solo remote access and multiple kibitzers or collaborators with simultaneous keyboard and mouse operation. Return to Sender HP's system consists of two software packages, installed on the "sender" or host workstation and on each "receiver" or remote system, respectively. A starter kit with licenses for one sender and one receiver will cost $399, with additional receiver licenses $99 each; Windows 2000/XP, Red Hat Linux, and HP-UX versions are available. The sender software works with any application, with no modifications necessary, and takes full advantage of the host's graphics-accelerator hardware. Its primary layer is a platform-independent Remote Graphics extension that resides alongside the OpenGL, X, DirectX, and/or Graphics Device Interface application program interface (API), between an application and the graphics driver. The extension monitors the display frame buffer and any application calls to the OpenGL API, tracking operations that change the appearance of windows on the sender's screen. Real-time screen images are transmitted over the network to the receiver or receivers, using a proprietary, patented compression/decompression technology or codec called HP2 that the company describes as "visually lossless." In fact, HP2 uses lossless compression (preserving 100 percent of original image quality) for text, lines, and blocks of single colors, with lossy compression for photos and complex images; compression can be adjusted on the fly to optimize the balance between image quality and performance. HP says the codec retains high image quality in areas where differences would be most noticed, with higher compression in other areas such as white space -- and overall higher compression than familiar image formats such as JPEG. One HP marketing sample shows an engineering diagram compressed 50:1 with JPEG (i.e., needing only one-fiftieth the transmission time over the network that the raw screen image would), then the same diagram with arguably better quality using HP2 -- at 170:1 compression. The Remote Graphics receiver software decompresses and displays the workstation screen image -- the final, 2D rendering, without needing the CPU and graphics power that went into creating it -- and transmits remote keyboard and mouse input back to the host. It acts as a stateless client, meaning that it doesn't transmit or store source data, so a network disruption or receiver disconnect won't cause any data loss or otherwise affect the sender. Nor does the host's CAD program or other application, or even the same operating system, need to be present on the remote system. Even though the system permits remote access to large datasets while maintaining data security, HP has built in multiple levels of security including authorization and authentication, with users assigned and administered from a central database. A single-sign-on feature uses the credentials of the current user to establish connections between receivers and senders in the same network domain, while the Microsoft password authentication protocol NTLM and Kerberos authenticate other connections. The sender sees receiver connection requests as pop-up dialog boxes for approval, and can disconnect all receivers with one command. HP says early testers of its Remote Graphics Software have included DreamWorks Animation, whose Northern and Southern California creative teams shared production artwork for Shrek 2, and the Savannah College of Art and Design, which has opened online courses in interactivity and game design to students at its campus in Lasoste, France as well as in Georgia. In addition, the National College of Singapore is letting students access CAE applications running on high-end HP-UX workstations from their desktop PCs.