TightVNC 2.0 Beta 2 available

See also: press release

Hello everyone,

I am glad to inform you that TightVNC 2.0 Beta 2 is available for download. The files can be downloaded here:

https://www.tightvnc.com/download.php

TightVNC 2.0 will deliver completely new TightVNC Server for Windows. It was redesigned and reimplemented from scratch. It features new component-based architecture which is perfectly compatible with the latest operating systems, Windows 7 and Windows 2008 Server R2. Older versions of Windows are supported as well – the minimum requirement is Windows 2000. More information on new TightVNC Server can be found in the TightVNC 2.0 Beta 1 announcement.

TightVNC 2.0 Beta 2 is the second public preview of the upcoming TightVNC 2.0 release. As compared to the previous Beta version, it features improved installer, new command-line options available in TightVNC Server, and adds tons of minor enhancements and bugfixes. For more details, see the list of changes below.

I would like to thank all the people worldwide who spent their time on testing TightVNC 2.0 Beta 1 and submitting bug reports, and everyone who made donations, ordered our services or otherwise helped the TightVNC project. Thank you!

--
With Best Wishes,
Constantin Kaplinsky,
GlavSoft LLC.

What's New?

Below you can find the list of changes in TightVNC 2.0 Beta 2, as compared to the previous Beta version.

Part 1. Changes in the Installer

• Valid digital signatures have been added to the installer and installed TightVNC executable files. That makes it easy to verify the integrity of the package. Make sure TightVNC has a valid signature of GlavSoft LLC., otherwise it's not the original distribution.

• Featuring new option to add exceptions for TightVNC Server and Viewer to Windows Firewall (supported in Windows XP SP2 or any later version of Windows). This makes TightVNC ready to accept connections right on finishing the installation.

• Featuring new option to enable system services simulate Ctrl-Alt-Del keyboard combination under Windows Vista and above. This allows TightVNC Server handle remote Ctrl-Alt-Del events in all supported operating systems from Windows 2000 to Windows 7 and Windows 2008 Server R2.

• The service configuration page (where initial passwords can be set) has become completely optional. And that page will not be auto-selected if the passwords have been set already.

• An issue with file sharing failure has been fixed – it could be experienced after trying to set both passwords via the service configuration page. Also, there were potential problems with not actually enabling authentication on setting passwords from the installer – they have been fixed as well.

• There was a number of other minor changes such as user interface enhancements and improvements to the installation logic.

Part 2. Changes in TightVNC Server for Windows

• Keyboard handling has been fixed. Previous Beta version could handle combinations like Ctrl-C or Ctrl-V incorrectly – it could insert literal C or V instead. New version fixes that – it should interpret keyboard modifiers properly. In addition, it fully supports Windows and Menu keys. Finally, sending Ctrl-Alt-Del remotely should work on all supported versions of Windows.

• Authentication subsystem has been improved – now it would prevent brute-force attacks on passwords by introducing delays after failed authentication attempts. This works for both RFB connections and for administrative passwords. Another authentication-related fix eliminates erroneous authentication requests on reverse connections.

• Tight encoder has been fixed – it could work incorrectly in previous Beta version. It did not preserve the state of its data stream in situations when it was disabled and then re-enabled by the viewer. As a result, the viewer could not decode compressed data and had to disconnect. Corrected code accurately preserves the state of each encoder to eliminate such protocol synchronization problems.

• Clipboard handling has been recovered. Clipboard transfers could fail in either direction due to text format translation problems – resolved now.

• Mouse position tracking over multiple monitors has been fixed. Previously, coordinates of the mouse cursor could be calculated incorrectly if the primary monitor was not the leftmost and topmost one within a composite desktop.

• New version sends viewers descriptive error messages if it must close their connections in the very beginning of the session. For example, if the server does not allow "loopback" connections, the viewer will report that fact. Similarly, the viewer should report other errors like protocol version mismatch or rejects caused by repetitive authentication failures.

• Several useful command-line options have been re-implemented: -connect, -disconnectall, -reload and -shutdown (they must be preceded with either -controlservice or -controlapp in the command line). Similar options (with slightly different names) were supported by TightVNC 1.x, but there were no counterparts available in TightVNC 2.0 Beta 1. You requested them, and here they are.

• Compatibility with other software has been improved. In particular, palette-based pixel formats are now properly supported. TightVNC Viewer never requests indexed colors, but other RFB-compliant software may do that. Previous version of the TightVNC Server could calculate palette colors incorrectly, effectively converting all colors to black. That issue has been resolved.

• In TightVNC file transfer protocol, file modification timestamps are represented in milliseconds. However, previous version erroneously decreased precision and actually operated with pure seconds. That has been fixed.

• There was a number of other improvements, including architectural adjustments, additional logging, fixes for real and potential memory leaks, code cleanups, and so on.

Part 3. Changes in TightVNC Viewer for Windows

• A bug with registering .vnc file extension has been fixed. The viewer wrote incorrect command line to the registry and then could not restore connections saved in .vnc files.

• Keyboard handling has been improved. New version is able to send Windows and Menu keys over the RFB protocol (and new TightVNC Server can handle that correctly).

• File modification time format has been corrected in file transfer panels. Timestamps were formatted in UTC for some reason, but now they should show up in local time zone, as we would normally expect that.

• "Local cursor shape" setting has been recovered. Now it should take immediate effect on pressing the Ok button in the Connection Options window. In addition, pressing that Ok button would not hide remote cursor – that was another bug fixed in this version.

• TightVNC Viewer could write repetitive entries to the connection history and it could create meaningless directories in the registry when parsing its command line. Both problems have been fixed.

Note that the above list does not pretend to be complete. Other minor improvements and fixes have been made as well.