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Ask HN: Working environment with Mac and Linux

1 points by geophile ↗ HN
I have an MBP with a Linux VM. My monitor is a Thunderbolt display. I would like to change to the following environment:

- Add a Linux laptop (looking seriously at a System 76 Galago Pro).

- Keep the MBP for Mac development, syncing my iPhone, iTunes, etc. (Get rid of the VM.)

- Have ONE keyboard/mouse combination, and use it for both Linux and Mac.

- Keep the Thunderbolt display or replace it with another 27" monitor plugged into the Linux machine, either is fine.

- On the Linux machine, use both the laptop screen and the 27" monitor.

So this seems to present two options: 1) Plug monitor/keyboard/mouse into Mac, VNC to Linux. 2) Plug monitor/keyboard/mouse into Linux, VNC to Mac.

The problem is that I can't get Mac screen sharing or VNC to work in either direction.

I'm looking for advice on how to make this work, or alternatives I hadn't considered.

3 comments

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jerengie
I had a quite similar setup ~2 years ago. I purchased a basic version of Synergy [1], which lets you connect your keyboard and mouse to only one PC an still use it on both. There is such a low latency that I could play FPS on my Windows machine, while keyboard and mouse were attached to my Linux machine. The setup was quite bearable at that point, so I won't consider this a problem.

Base version costs around 30 bucks, I don't know if there is a free alternative though.

Disclaimer: I am in no way affillated with Symless or Synergy. I'm just a user.

[1] https://symless.com/synergy

geophile
Looks really good, thank you.