How do I set up multi seat?

Question

I was hoping to have a 2 seat setup. One will be for my TV just going to run Boxee. The other is for my main Desktop.

I've been looking for a good guide to help me navigate this, I'd like to use ubuntu 10.10. I am assuming it's just a case of getting a box and two graphics adaptors as well as a usb mice and keyboard, and then another, which will be bluetooth for the TV.

I can't seem to find much documentation on this idea. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Also I am assuming that this is all possible with a standard ubuntu install, but with some additional configuration.

Answer 1

The Ubuntu Wiki has some instructions for 10.04 on this. Also mdm is mentioned sometimes, and maybe you can follow this 10.10 tutorial.

Answer 2

As far as I can tell, there's no (free) GUI-which-works-out-of-the-box solution for this. I guess what you have to do is to adapt your XOrg configuration file and tell it which monitor-keyboard-mouse combinations go together.

The best resource I can point you to is this AskSlashdot thread. You'll find plenty of links there. But beware: it looks like you should have some linux experience, especially with editing config files etc.

Answer 3

Have a look at the new Ubuntu 11.10. The key to multiseat seems to lie in configuring lightdm, the new display manager of Ubuntu. Unfortunately, the Ubuntu Wiki (as referred to above) only gives instructions for kdm, not lightdm.

Answer 4

I built exactly this system (but with MythTV) using an older version of Ubuntu and provided detailed set up instructions in this doc page https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MythTV_Multiseat?action=recall&rev=1 The page was "removed" because it was deemed out of date and no longer relevant.

While the instructions were from when I last rebuilt the system for 8.10, I have upgraded this system through 10.04LTS which I'm presently using.

Note that my TV output uses the Hauppauge PVR-350's audio / video out. The PVR-350 is an analog TV capture card which has a HW encoder for video output (and has not been supported by Myth for the last several releases). To my knowledge, this device has the unique property that it can handle the audio output entirely separately from the normal Linux sound path. This makes the multi-seat simple once the video and HID aspects of X.org are addressed.

If you don't use the PVR-350, you just need to substitute the appropriate video card info for your TV output. I do not know how to handle the audio, however. I am actively trying to find a solution for the audio since my PVR-350 is failing and I need to reconfigure my system since I am about to lose my analog cable.