Dual monitors vs. Dual Machines

[Monty J. Harder]

"Jonathan Hutchins" <hutchins at tarcanfel.org> wrote:

> It seems to me that two "real" uses for multihead systems are 1) Expanded
> desktop real-estate, as with the sound editing, and 2) running a process
in
> one window while controlling or monitoring that process in another, when
you
> need full-screen or near-full-screen window size in one or more of them.

  I run dual monitors at work because of 1) - I was able to get two 17"
monitors going at no marginal cost (all the hardware was already paid for)
compared to having to justify to my boss why I would need a larger monitor
that would cost hundreds of dollars.  Between LookOut and the Citrix client
to access our customer-information database, where I document what I've done
each day to justify my pay, a couple of terminal windows (for my modem to
dial into the customer's system and fix things, and the SCO server in the
back room so I can rtfm so that I don't break something else in the process)
and the various IM windows I use to ask someone how to do something I don't
know, or they ask me how to do something they don't know... it's a lot of
windows, and I =hate= having to grab title bars with the mouse and move them
around.  I like to keep the windows in the same place so that I can just
alt-tab between them.

  The only downsides I've found to this arrangement is that I can only use
the Citrix server that's configured to also work outside the firewall, as
the internal servers don't seem to play nicely with the dual head setup, and
that VNC will only let me view my left (primary) monitor