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Review For: Synergy
Date Written: May 2, 2005
Compatibility: Windows, Unix (Linux, Solaris, etc.), & Mac OS
License: Free
Download/Site Link: http://synergy2.sourceforge.net/ 
Rating: 5 out of 5

     If you have ever had more than one computer and their monitors sitting around you (whether they are laptops or just normal computers) and wished that you could share one mouse and keyboard with them all without expensive equipment, now you can!  Synergy allows you to share one mouse and keyboard with as many computers as you want, considering they each have their own monitor, are running Windows, Unix (which includes Linux, Solaris, etc.), or Mac OS, and are all networked together.  Not only that, but it is completely free!  The fun doesn’t end there however, because unlike using external hardware to share a mouse and keyboard, you can simply drag your mouse off the screen and over to the other computer’s monitor next to the one you are using (you can even have it work where you have monitors above and below a middle monitor).  Additionally, the clipboards are shared between all of the computers, so you can copy from one computer and then paste what you copied onto a different computer.  However, you can’t drag things from one computer to the next currently, but that could change in the future.

     Setup was very easy on windows and was as simple as configuring and then running the server and client.  On the server computer (the computer which has the keyboard and mouse you are using) you fill in the computer’s network name, add the network names of the other computers, and then specify where all the computers are physically so you can move your mouse from one monitor to the next.  As for all of the other computers, you simply run the client and your done.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have another monitor for my personal Linux server so I can’t tell you how easy or difficult setting up the config files are, but from reading the documentation it doesn’t look that difficult and you probably won’t have any trouble setting it up.  Anyways, this is an excellent program that anyone who has laptops and or multiple computers on his or her desk would find extremely useful.


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