Open source/Free real time remote desktop software for linux/Mac Operating systems?

Question

Use case: Accessing my office desktop, from home, as if I am sitting in front of the office desk :)

Tools Used:

• Chrome remote desktop (latency, seems to be very slow)
• Team Viewer (not free)

Any other tools apart from the ones above mentioned ?

Answer 1

VNC

Virtual Network Computing (VNC) is an open protocol for remote screen sharing. It transmits the keyboard and mouse events from one computer to another, relaying the graphical screen updates back in the other direction, over a network. The protocol is intended to be cross-platform, enabling a BSD or Linux computer to display a remote Mac for example.

Implementations

Some implementations are open-source and free-of-cost, while other implementations are commercially supported products. The remote computer must be running an VNC server app while the local computer runs a VNC client app.

Apple

Apple has bundled client and server implementations such as Screen Sharing.app in various versions of macOS.

RealVNC

RealVNC is one prominent vendor of VNC products. I have successfully used older versions of their products. There are many other vendors to choose from as well.

How it works

VNC is pixel-based. Basically, VNC works by taking the screen's display at any moment, dividing it up into a grid of squares, and then shipping an image of each square to the client.

This approach generally works well enough for monitoring a computer. But it has limitations. Slower network connections may cause the user to notice the squares occasionally being updated so the screen is not quite complete. Some apps that use unconventional drawing within their windows rather than the drawing methods provided by the host OS may not function properly, you may see little or no content of such apps’ windows. And video playing may, of course, be quite choppy.

Keep in mind that no screen-sharing solution will give you an absolutely smooth intact “as if I were there” experience.