27 ms·

Barrier: Share mouse and keyboard between computers

246 points by some1else 5y ago

tentacleuno 5y ago
I use this on my laptop and desktop when I bring my laptop into my office. It's totally seamless. You tell Barrier where the laptop "is" (relative to your monitor array -- just like setting up a secondary monitor) and then when you scroll your mouse onto your laptop everything is totally seamless. Your mouse and keyboard are then used solely for the laptop until you move the mouse back onto one of your desktop monitors. The only bug I experienced was that the Barrier client would infinitely connect until you set up where that client "is" (as above) on the server. This is a pretty well-known issue at this point, but it would be nice if Barrier would say a bit more about errors (instead of being stuck on "Barrier is starting..."). There's a Show Log button in the File menu though which is nice.
- grepfru_it 5y ago
  Nothing described here is different from synergy.
roddux 5y ago
I love the look of this, but haven't been able to find any information about latency... It seems to be a local network solution? Light on details about how it works, short of reading source.
- jeroenhd 5y ago
  You don't strictly need a local network, you could probably get it to work across a VPN. As long as you can get a TLS connection directly between the two devices. In my experience the protocol is quite light on the network, because this directly influences where the cursor is on your screen you probably want to keep latency down as much as possible.
- vermon 5y ago
  I've had issues running it over wireless so instead I connect the computers with an ethernet cable directly and configure static IP's. Haven't had any issues. Luckily my PC has two NICs and the laptop uses wifi anyway so the ethernet port is unused.
- falcolas 5y ago
  Synergy (off which this was forked) experience: On a hardwired pair of computers, no perceptible latency at all. On wifi connected computers, I'd see the occasional latency spikes where things stop moving, but effectively imperceptible the rest of the time.
- superkuh 5y ago
  I've been using synergy, literally, since the year 2000. I used to play a lot of first person shooters and over that time I never had a latency issue with using a mouse/keyboard on my old computer to play games on my new computers (over ethernet). No perceptible difference.
vintermann 5y ago
Just don't use it on any computer you play online games on. "Anti cheat" software tends to freak out on things like this.
- falcolas 5y ago
  Only for the rootkit style anti-cheat software. Personal opinion: Don't put anything that matters, or connections to anything that matters, on computers with rootkit anti-cheat software installed. Even if the company itself is perfectly respectful, there's too many instances of supply chain attacks and attackers loitering on internal networks to trust such a vulnerability. At all.
  - mijoharas 5y ago
    I've been out of the PC gaming scene for a fair while. Which anti-cheat software would you describe as the "rootkit anti-cheat" software? (and is that all the stuff that doesn't work on linux?)
    - thoughtpalette 5y ago
      CoD has Ricochet: https://www.callofduty.com/warzone/ricochet https://www.callofduty.com/warzone/ricochet ESEA for CS:GO: https://play.esea.net/client https://play.esea.net/client I've heard similar ones for Valorant, etc.
    - falcolas 5y ago
      To add to the sibling comment: - Denuvo Anti-cheat (used by Doom Eternal's multiplayer mode) - Vanguard for Valorant I refer to them as rootkits since they install Ring-0 kernel modules that are updated outside of your control.
ddalex 5y ago
How is this different from synergy ? I used to use Synergy all the time before the computer got so powerful that I didn't need multiple computers to drive all the monitors and run things in VMs
- sidpatil 5y ago
  > How is this different from synergy ? It's a fork of an older version of Synergy before they changed their license.
surajs 5y ago
rcarmo 5y ago
I use this daily between PC and Mac (as well as PC/PC) and it is great. Much more stable than Synergy for me, with the only caveat that it gets confused if you change monitor setups on the fly.
mwexler 5y ago
This still requires a dedicated monitor connection to each box with a hardware or source switch, right? Or a screen per device? That is, the KVM (in the VGA days) used to switch the mouse, keyboard, and video source so a single monitor, keyboard, and mouse switches across devices. But barrier doesn't try to solve that part, I think. Modern HDMI KVM hardware switches seem rather expensive; anyone found a good way to "switch" the monitors as well as keyboard and mouse?
- durazabu 5y ago
  No need for additional hardware. Take two Barrier-connected computers, the mouse can travel from one screen to the other. When using the keyboard, it inputs on the monitor with the mouse focus. Since it's UI based you need a screen per device yes.
- falcolas 5y ago
  There are some monitors which act as a KVM for their USB ports. They're rare and hard to find, but they exist. One (expensive) example: https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-ultrasharp-30-usb-c-hub-monitor-u3023e/apd/210-bdsn/monitors-monitor-accessories https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-ultrasharp-30-usb-c-hub...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- torstenvl 5y ago
  I use a multipairing mouse and keyboard (Logitech MX Keys and MX Anywhere) and have my personal laptop connect via Thunderbolt → DVI and work via HDMI. It means I have to press three buttons to switch but it's still pretty convenient, without the expense of a dedicated KVM solution.
- taffit 5y ago
  Some more modern monitors can also be switched by software. I personally use a laptop with an external monitor that is also connected to my desktop. Whenever I need to switch from laptop to desktop (using Barrier or Mouse without Borders on Windows) I then invoke the magic of ControlMyMonitor by the wonderful NirSoft [1] using an Autohotkey-shortcut. This way I can share my monitor with the desktop and laptop. Sharing the keyboard and mouse works with Barrier. I provided some short instructions in an SO-answer [2]. [1] https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/control_my_monitor.html https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/control_my_monitor.html [2] https://superuser.com/a/1556618/299215 https://superuser.com/a/1556618/299215
dukeofdoom 5y ago
I will soon have two macbooks on my desktop in front of me. I hope to use the older macbook to run background tasks, like uploading videos to youtube and as a third monitor. I have keychron k1 keyboard and an mx master mouse. Keychron is currently connected to the USB hub due to led lights, latency. But the keyboard has a battery and can work off of bluetooth. Mouse is connected through the tiny dongle that comes with logitech mouses. Both Keyboard and Mouse claim to work off Bluetooth. Can I use this program to share the keyboard and mouse between the two macbooks? Or is using Bluetooth or a kvm switch a better option?
- mjlee 5y ago
  I think Universal Control (in the current MacOS 12.3 Release Candidate, should be public next week) will do what you want.
  - weikju 5y ago
    "older macbook" might imply that one of the two machines will not support UC though
    - djrogers 5y ago
      Considering that 12.3 is supported on MacBooks going back 7+ years, that's not necessarily the case.
      - weikju 5y ago
        While 12.3 (and iPadOS 15.4) support older versions, Universal Control has more stringent requirements and only supports: MacBook Pro (2016 and later) MacBook (2016 and later) MacBook Air (2018 and later) iMac (2017 and later) iMac (5K Retina 27-inch, Late 2015) iMac Pro, Mac mini (2018 and later) Mac Pro (2019) All iPad Pros iPad Air (3rd generation and later) iPad (6th generation and later) iPad mini (5th generation and later)
ajolly 5y ago
If you are on Windows, check out Input Director instead, in particular it works great if you have non rectangular monitor configurations.
durazabu 5y ago
Barrier has been forked to https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap which has a hundred more commits by the same devs. The name is still barrier though, has anyone more info about this fork?
- 0xCMP 5y ago
  They have an issue where they explain that they have disagreements with how barrier is run and the current owner does not want to pass control to them. They are the most active recent contributors. personally I am waiting for them to cut a stable release and then try it out. https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap/issues/1414 https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap/issues/1414
  - durazabu 5y ago
    I see, I am surprised they don't mention the fact that barrier doesn't appear in github search [1], most likely because it is tagged as a fork. [1] https://github.com/search?q=barrier https://github.com/search?q=barrier
  - 0des 5y ago
    I only just recently heard about the synergy -> barrier transition and got everything dialed in on barrier... sigh. The aristocrats!
    - superkuh 5y ago
      Barrier and input-leap are nice and all, but they're written for only modern OSes using modern library versions and language features. If you want to share a mouse with an OS older than a decade or so you'll still have to use the original Synergy 1.x. It works on both old machines/OSes (all the way back to the 90s) and on the very newest released OSes. Given that, I don't really see a need for barrier or input leap. They're kind of niche, but it's nice someone's keeping the codebase going. Basically the only reason to use newer forks of synergy is if you have an abnormally high DPI screen in your span.
nyadesu 5y ago
It's pretty good, only thing I'd recommend is to always use wired connection, performance using wifi is not very stable
- acthrowthrow123 5y ago
  I wish there support for wired usb, e.g. I have laptop and surface go connected via usb-c. Not only should be faster but more reliable in case one end point connect to wifi ac and another to wifi n on the same router.
mmwelt 5y ago
Would be nice to have an Android client too!
justsomehnguy 5y ago
If you are in Windows only environment you can use Mouse wthout Borders [0] Works fine enough on WiFi, supports clipboard sync and file copy (but reliable only for small files). (and if I remember it right I learned about it here in some thread about Synergy...) [0] https://aka.ms/mm https://aka.ms/mm
torton 5y ago
I tried using Barrier in a fairly complex setup (Linux, Windows, Mac with all of them being sometimes unavailable). Found some annoying UX issues (Windows privileged/login screen kicks the mouse back into the original position on a different monitor) and more importantly the Linux machine would wedge itself with 100% CPU used by Barrier. This is a nice tool but not yet production ready.
- artificialLimbs 5y ago
  Interesting. I used it on Mac/win/Linux trio and it worked great except copy paste and when the machines went to sleep, it would have to manually be restarted.
- gigel82 5y ago
  Had the same issue for a while, then moved the "server" to the Windows machine and it now works as expected (with the latest build at least).
zanecodes 5y ago
I can't install Barrier on my work laptop for policy reasons, but I don't want to buy a KVM, so a project I've been interested in building when I have time is porting enough of the Barrier/Synergy protocol to the Particle Photon [1] or BeagleBone Black [2] I've had lying around for a while, and then configuring it to emulate a keyboard and mouse via its USB gadget driver, allowing it to control my work laptop over USB. On the Photon at least, emulating a keyboard and mouse is incredibly easy and is baked into the firmware, but implementing the Barrier protocol so that it can appear as a client on the network and pass on the keyboard/mouse input seems like it's going to take some effort. [1] https://docs.particle.io/photon/ https://docs.particle.io/photon/ [2] https://beagleboard.org/black https://beagleboard.org/black
- grepfru_it 5y ago
  They provide a version of some other keyboard and mouse sharing software that was approved. Then you can run that on the one work laptop with that problem while still using barrier, input director, synergy, etc on your other work computer
- avidiax 5y ago
  The annoying/challenging part is that you need to drive the 2nd machine using relative motions, but place the cursor accurately and keep track of it. If the 2nd OS skips frames or has acceleration, you are pretty quickly implementing a Kalman filter.
  - robocat 5y ago
    I recall some touchscreens use USB internally for the touch interface. A touchscreen has absolute coordinates, which does the trick, compared with the usual mouse/trackpad interfaces. I remember remote controlling an OS that needed me to install absolute touchscreen drivers to work best (probably a VM, but maybe Synergy drivers??)
  - zanecodes 5y ago
    According to the Particle Photon docs [1] it's actually capable of moving the mouse to absolute coordinates, but I haven't tried that yet. [1] https://docs.particle.io/reference/device-os/firmware/#moveto- https://docs.particle.io/reference/device-os/firmware/#movet...
uoaei 5y ago
Any tool that switches screens, too? Essentially one terminal for n computers, with a hardware or software switch between them?
- Jaruzel 5y ago
  That would be a KVM. (not the Virtualisation software, but a dedicated Keyboard, Video, Mouse switcher). Good ones can be as expensive as ~£200.
  - shabble 5y ago
    Can be a lot more than that! I was looking recently and came across https://www.aten.com/gb/en/products/kvm/desktop-kvm-switches/cs1944dp/ https://www.aten.com/gb/en/products/kvm/desktop-kvm-switches... (and similar in the range) Switching multiple monitors simultaneously seems to take you into a whole new bracket I tend to associate with the 15-monitor fintech/daytrader market, with pricepoints to suit :(
- muwtyhg 5y ago
  There was a post[0] from a couple months ago for a piece of software called 'display-switch'[1]. It turns a simple/cheap USB switch into a n-computer KVM (however many systems the USB switch supports) by detecting the presence of the USB switch device on either system and switching the video input of the monitors using DDC/CI. I've been using it for a couple of months and it's been a game changer. No more fiddling with monitor menus to switch inputs or wondering if the monitor is currently set to one computer or the other. You have to make sure your monitors support DDC/CI, though. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29608967 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29608967 [1] https://github.com/haimgel/display-switch https://github.com/haimgel/display-switch
jtnag 5y ago
I tried Barriers to share mouse+keyboard between work and private laptop in the same wifi. Somehow, I had issues with linking both PC. One of the alternatives is what I use currently - Microsoft Garage Mouse Without Borders ( https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35460 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=354... ) which suites my needs. ps. using 5GHz wifi significantly reduces mouse latency.
ck__ 5y ago
is it better than sharemouse ?
ck__ 5y ago
is it better than sharemouse?
checker659 5y ago
Just an FYI for mac users: Universal Control is a native macOS alternative to barrier that's about to debut with macOS 12.3 (currently in beta). As an ex-synergy user, let me just say how awesome the implementation is. What's crazy is you can share your mouse and keyboard not only between two or more macs but also between your mac and an iPad (if you have one, obviously). And the latency is crazy unnoticably low (even over wifi).
- thebeardisred 5y ago
  I'm assuming though this will be macOS only? I ask because the best use I had for Synergy was around 20 years ago: one Linux desktop (my daily driver) and other ones for non Linux applications (or ones I didn't want to pollute my system with). Over the years I've used it for Outlook (connecting to Exchange), Lotus Notes, Xcode, Adobe tools, etc.
  - djrogers 5y ago
    MacOS and iPadOS.
- superdug 5y ago
  I've noticed that this doesn't _always_ work. Sometimes I just mash my mouse into the side of my screen and never get on to my iPad. So I've just switched to Logitech bluetooth mouse and keyboard. It's easier than a KVM and more reliable than software.
lxe 5y ago
I'm using Synergy 1.x. Is this better in any way?
zackmorris 5y ago
Barrier looks great, but does anyone know why KVM switches with DisplayPort or HDMI are so outrageously expensive? It should just be a switch, no complex electronics, so I truly can't figure out why any KVM should cost more than say $30-50 US. I suspect DRM or patents for rent seekers are involved somehow. Or maybe they're playing on the naivety of the business community towards this stuff. I'd sure like to know, and also if there are any low-cost or open source KVMs available.
- wyager 5y ago
  > It should just be a switch, no complex electronics For any high-bandwidth thing like HDMI, you need to do clock recovery and copy over the bitstream at the very least. You can't just use relays or whatever. Doing this at 10gbps+ is going to cost a bit.
  - wlesieutre 5y ago
    How many plugs and unplugs is HDMI rated for? At the prices we're talking it would be cheaper for me to build a robot that physically swaps cables at the back of my computer. Of course then Windows gets confused by the lack of monitor and rearranges all the windows, so it's not a perfect solution.
  - spicybright 5y ago
    I don't see that much of a reason you can't do a relay to "disconnect" one hdmi and plug in another. The computers would see the HDMI cable/USB cords unplugging and re-plugging. Obviously this can be problematic, but I can't see it being that expensive.
    - bartvk 5y ago
      As soon as there's enough volume for someone to design a specialized IC (and reference PCB), and it gets produced by VIA or TI or whatever, sure, then it's neither a problem nor expensive.
    - Nextgrid 5y ago
ashayh 5y ago
This monitor with a built in KVM has been working well for me https://www.gigabyte.com/Monitor/M27Q https://www.gigabyte.com/Monitor/M27Q I use two of them with Linux and Mac.
timetraveller26 5y ago
I've been using x2x https://github.com/dottedmag/x2x https://github.com/dottedmag/x2x It's really old and has it's perks but it works for my setup.
marcodiego 5y ago
How does it compare to synergy?
ballenf 5y ago
Anyone else ever wanted multiple cursors and multiple mice on one computer? Sometimes I'd rather move my hand to a different mouse than drag the cursor across all that screen real estate. Also the different pointers would stay put when not in use.
- peeters 5y ago
  I've done that for paired programming, it was a decade ago, but IIRC Xorg made it pretty easy to set up. That said...do not recommend :). It's too jarring.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  I'm not sure about multiple cursors but for the large screen real estate problem some mice have a "precision" button that changes the DPI which can be leveraged. The intent is to make the DPI much lower while pressed (or toggled depending) but many allow you to set what DPI value you want it to use directly. This allows you to specify that the mouse will move say 4x as fast while you hold the precision button which is a lot less hand movement and coordination than switching over to another mouse. Basically manual static acceleration for those that hate automatic smooth acceleration but want to occasional move fast easily. Alternatively if you're lucky enough to have reasonably steady hands you'd be surprised what you can get used to as a default static speed. My multi-monitor setup is over 70 inches horizontally but I can get across it in a flick or still move pixel by pixel if I want.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Mindless2112 5y ago
  EitherMouse[1] can do multiple pointers on Windows. [1] https://eithermouse.com/ https://eithermouse.com/
rob_c 5y ago
Didn't synergy get there ages ago? Not saying it's not impressive, but what is the advantage?
- moffkalast 5y ago
  It's free vs. $30-$40 I suppose, but you pay in hours spend trying to configure an open source project.
  - rob_c 5y ago
    synergy was free too, the paid client never amounted to anything and had lots of promise of cloud inclusion-y nonsense that didn't pan out. (I know I was gifted a subscription through a friend)
greatgib 5y ago
Thanks for sharing, so awesome that someone did the fork of synergy to stay oss and free. I was a big user of synergy 1 and was quite disappointed by the takeover that led to the current partially proprietary Synergy. It was a slide, first "let's have a binary builds for paying users to fund the project" then "let's have important features only for paid users with a license code needed", then the guys goal was to create and develop a company, hiring dev and assistants... The original spirit was lost. This annoyed me a lot based on the fact that it was not the original developer of Synergy. So, for long time I was thinking of doing a fork. And so, I'm very grateful that some people did it and had the courage to continue it.
- nly 5y ago
  Don't worry. Synergy 3 will be out soon to continue the slide
icelancer 5y ago
Got this working on the 2.3.4 release branch. The 2.4.0 release has a critical error that hasn't been fixed in months (years?) so definitely look into the issues page on that one.
Beached 5y ago
I use barrier daily between my two laptops it take everywhere. it's great, except I have two issues. you can it copy /paste images between the two. and you cannot select which monitor the mouse moves off of. I find myself wanting to copy screenshots between the two constantly, and if you have two monitors stacked vertically, I can pick the bottom monitor to be the edge monitor to go to my other computer. I wish barrier devs were more active devs but it still works great

246 points by some1else 5y ago

I use this on my laptop and desktop when I bring my laptop into my office. It's totally seamless. You tell Barrier where the laptop "is" (relative to your monitor array -- just like setting up a secondary monitor) and then when you scroll your mouse onto your laptop everything is totally seamless. Your mouse and keyboard are then used solely for the laptop until you move the mouse back onto one of your desktop monitors. The only bug I experienced was that the Barrier client would infinitely connect until you set up where that client "is" (as above) on the server. This is a pretty well-known issue at this point, but it would be nice if Barrier would say a bit more about errors (instead of being stuck on "Barrier is starting..."). There's a Show Log button in the File menu though which is nice.

grepfru_it 5y ago
Nothing described here is different from synergy.

roddux 5y ago

I love the look of this, but haven't been able to find any information about latency... It seems to be a local network solution? Light on details about how it works, short of reading source.

jeroenhd 5y ago
You don't strictly need a local network, you could probably get it to work across a VPN. As long as you can get a TLS connection directly between the two devices. In my experience the protocol is quite light on the network, because this directly influences where the cursor is on your screen you probably want to keep latency down as much as possible.
vermon 5y ago
I've had issues running it over wireless so instead I connect the computers with an ethernet cable directly and configure static IP's. Haven't had any issues. Luckily my PC has two NICs and the laptop uses wifi anyway so the ethernet port is unused.
falcolas 5y ago
Synergy (off which this was forked) experience: On a hardwired pair of computers, no perceptible latency at all. On wifi connected computers, I'd see the occasional latency spikes where things stop moving, but effectively imperceptible the rest of the time.
superkuh 5y ago
I've been using synergy, literally, since the year 2000. I used to play a lot of first person shooters and over that time I never had a latency issue with using a mouse/keyboard on my old computer to play games on my new computers (over ethernet). No perceptible difference.

vintermann 5y ago

Just don't use it on any computer you play online games on. "Anti cheat" software tends to freak out on things like this.

falcolas 5y ago
Only for the rootkit style anti-cheat software. Personal opinion: Don't put anything that matters, or connections to anything that matters, on computers with rootkit anti-cheat software installed. Even if the company itself is perfectly respectful, there's too many instances of supply chain attacks and attackers loitering on internal networks to trust such a vulnerability. At all.
- mijoharas 5y ago
  I've been out of the PC gaming scene for a fair while. Which anti-cheat software would you describe as the "rootkit anti-cheat" software? (and is that all the stuff that doesn't work on linux?)
  - thoughtpalette 5y ago
    CoD has Ricochet: https://www.callofduty.com/warzone/ricochet https://www.callofduty.com/warzone/ricochet ESEA for CS:GO: https://play.esea.net/client https://play.esea.net/client I've heard similar ones for Valorant, etc.
  - falcolas 5y ago
    To add to the sibling comment: - Denuvo Anti-cheat (used by Doom Eternal's multiplayer mode) - Vanguard for Valorant I refer to them as rootkits since they install Ring-0 kernel modules that are updated outside of your control.

ddalex 5y ago

How is this different from synergy ? I used to use Synergy all the time before the computer got so powerful that I didn't need multiple computers to drive all the monitors and run things in VMs

sidpatil 5y ago
> How is this different from synergy ? It's a fork of an older version of Synergy before they changed their license.

surajs 5y ago

rcarmo 5y ago

I use this daily between PC and Mac (as well as PC/PC) and it is great. Much more stable than Synergy for me, with the only caveat that it gets confused if you change monitor setups on the fly.

mwexler 5y ago

This still requires a dedicated monitor connection to each box with a hardware or source switch, right? Or a screen per device? That is, the KVM (in the VGA days) used to switch the mouse, keyboard, and video source so a single monitor, keyboard, and mouse switches across devices. But barrier doesn't try to solve that part, I think. Modern HDMI KVM hardware switches seem rather expensive; anyone found a good way to "switch" the monitors as well as keyboard and mouse?

durazabu 5y ago
No need for additional hardware. Take two Barrier-connected computers, the mouse can travel from one screen to the other. When using the keyboard, it inputs on the monitor with the mouse focus. Since it's UI based you need a screen per device yes.
falcolas 5y ago
There are some monitors which act as a KVM for their USB ports. They're rare and hard to find, but they exist. One (expensive) example: https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-ultrasharp-30-usb-c-hub-monitor-u3023e/apd/210-bdsn/monitors-monitor-accessories https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-ultrasharp-30-usb-c-hub...
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
torstenvl 5y ago
I use a multipairing mouse and keyboard (Logitech MX Keys and MX Anywhere) and have my personal laptop connect via Thunderbolt → DVI and work via HDMI. It means I have to press three buttons to switch but it's still pretty convenient, without the expense of a dedicated KVM solution.
taffit 5y ago
Some more modern monitors can also be switched by software. I personally use a laptop with an external monitor that is also connected to my desktop. Whenever I need to switch from laptop to desktop (using Barrier or Mouse without Borders on Windows) I then invoke the magic of ControlMyMonitor by the wonderful NirSoft [1] using an Autohotkey-shortcut. This way I can share my monitor with the desktop and laptop. Sharing the keyboard and mouse works with Barrier. I provided some short instructions in an SO-answer [2]. [1] https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/control_my_monitor.html https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/control_my_monitor.html [2] https://superuser.com/a/1556618/299215 https://superuser.com/a/1556618/299215

dukeofdoom 5y ago

I will soon have two macbooks on my desktop in front of me. I hope to use the older macbook to run background tasks, like uploading videos to youtube and as a third monitor. I have keychron k1 keyboard and an mx master mouse. Keychron is currently connected to the USB hub due to led lights, latency. But the keyboard has a battery and can work off of bluetooth. Mouse is connected through the tiny dongle that comes with logitech mouses. Both Keyboard and Mouse claim to work off Bluetooth. Can I use this program to share the keyboard and mouse between the two macbooks? Or is using Bluetooth or a kvm switch a better option?

mjlee 5y ago
I think Universal Control (in the current MacOS 12.3 Release Candidate, should be public next week) will do what you want.
- weikju 5y ago
  "older macbook" might imply that one of the two machines will not support UC though
  - djrogers 5y ago
    Considering that 12.3 is supported on MacBooks going back 7+ years, that's not necessarily the case.
    - weikju 5y ago
      While 12.3 (and iPadOS 15.4) support older versions, Universal Control has more stringent requirements and only supports: MacBook Pro (2016 and later) MacBook (2016 and later) MacBook Air (2018 and later) iMac (2017 and later) iMac (5K Retina 27-inch, Late 2015) iMac Pro, Mac mini (2018 and later) Mac Pro (2019) All iPad Pros iPad Air (3rd generation and later) iPad (6th generation and later) iPad mini (5th generation and later)

ajolly 5y ago

If you are on Windows, check out Input Director instead, in particular it works great if you have non rectangular monitor configurations.

durazabu 5y ago

Barrier has been forked to https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap which has a hundred more commits by the same devs. The name is still barrier though, has anyone more info about this fork?

0xCMP 5y ago
They have an issue where they explain that they have disagreements with how barrier is run and the current owner does not want to pass control to them. They are the most active recent contributors. personally I am waiting for them to cut a stable release and then try it out. https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap/issues/1414 https://github.com/input-leap/input-leap/issues/1414
- durazabu 5y ago
  I see, I am surprised they don't mention the fact that barrier doesn't appear in github search [1], most likely because it is tagged as a fork. [1] https://github.com/search?q=barrier https://github.com/search?q=barrier
- 0des 5y ago
  I only just recently heard about the synergy -> barrier transition and got everything dialed in on barrier... sigh. The aristocrats!
  - superkuh 5y ago
    Barrier and input-leap are nice and all, but they're written for only modern OSes using modern library versions and language features. If you want to share a mouse with an OS older than a decade or so you'll still have to use the original Synergy 1.x. It works on both old machines/OSes (all the way back to the 90s) and on the very newest released OSes. Given that, I don't really see a need for barrier or input leap. They're kind of niche, but it's nice someone's keeping the codebase going. Basically the only reason to use newer forks of synergy is if you have an abnormally high DPI screen in your span.

nyadesu 5y ago

It's pretty good, only thing I'd recommend is to always use wired connection, performance using wifi is not very stable

acthrowthrow123 5y ago
I wish there support for wired usb, e.g. I have laptop and surface go connected via usb-c. Not only should be faster but more reliable in case one end point connect to wifi ac and another to wifi n on the same router.

mmwelt 5y ago

Would be nice to have an Android client too!

justsomehnguy 5y ago

If you are in Windows only environment you can use Mouse wthout Borders [0] Works fine enough on WiFi, supports clipboard sync and file copy (but reliable only for small files). (and if I remember it right I learned about it here in some thread about Synergy...) [0] https://aka.ms/mm https://aka.ms/mm

torton 5y ago

I tried using Barrier in a fairly complex setup (Linux, Windows, Mac with all of them being sometimes unavailable). Found some annoying UX issues (Windows privileged/login screen kicks the mouse back into the original position on a different monitor) and more importantly the Linux machine would wedge itself with 100% CPU used by Barrier. This is a nice tool but not yet production ready.

artificialLimbs 5y ago
Interesting. I used it on Mac/win/Linux trio and it worked great except copy paste and when the machines went to sleep, it would have to manually be restarted.
gigel82 5y ago
Had the same issue for a while, then moved the "server" to the Windows machine and it now works as expected (with the latest build at least).

zanecodes 5y ago

I can't install Barrier on my work laptop for policy reasons, but I don't want to buy a KVM, so a project I've been interested in building when I have time is porting enough of the Barrier/Synergy protocol to the Particle Photon [1] or BeagleBone Black [2] I've had lying around for a while, and then configuring it to emulate a keyboard and mouse via its USB gadget driver, allowing it to control my work laptop over USB. On the Photon at least, emulating a keyboard and mouse is incredibly easy and is baked into the firmware, but implementing the Barrier protocol so that it can appear as a client on the network and pass on the keyboard/mouse input seems like it's going to take some effort. [1] https://docs.particle.io/photon/ https://docs.particle.io/photon/ [2] https://beagleboard.org/black https://beagleboard.org/black

grepfru_it 5y ago
They provide a version of some other keyboard and mouse sharing software that was approved. Then you can run that on the one work laptop with that problem while still using barrier, input director, synergy, etc on your other work computer
avidiax 5y ago
The annoying/challenging part is that you need to drive the 2nd machine using relative motions, but place the cursor accurately and keep track of it. If the 2nd OS skips frames or has acceleration, you are pretty quickly implementing a Kalman filter.
- robocat 5y ago
  I recall some touchscreens use USB internally for the touch interface. A touchscreen has absolute coordinates, which does the trick, compared with the usual mouse/trackpad interfaces. I remember remote controlling an OS that needed me to install absolute touchscreen drivers to work best (probably a VM, but maybe Synergy drivers??)
- zanecodes 5y ago
  According to the Particle Photon docs [1] it's actually capable of moving the mouse to absolute coordinates, but I haven't tried that yet. [1] https://docs.particle.io/reference/device-os/firmware/#moveto- https://docs.particle.io/reference/device-os/firmware/#movet...

uoaei 5y ago

Any tool that switches screens, too? Essentially one terminal for n computers, with a hardware or software switch between them?

Jaruzel 5y ago
That would be a KVM. (not the Virtualisation software, but a dedicated Keyboard, Video, Mouse switcher). Good ones can be as expensive as ~£200.
- shabble 5y ago
  Can be a lot more than that! I was looking recently and came across https://www.aten.com/gb/en/products/kvm/desktop-kvm-switches/cs1944dp/ https://www.aten.com/gb/en/products/kvm/desktop-kvm-switches... (and similar in the range) Switching multiple monitors simultaneously seems to take you into a whole new bracket I tend to associate with the 15-monitor fintech/daytrader market, with pricepoints to suit :(
muwtyhg 5y ago
There was a post[0] from a couple months ago for a piece of software called 'display-switch'[1]. It turns a simple/cheap USB switch into a n-computer KVM (however many systems the USB switch supports) by detecting the presence of the USB switch device on either system and switching the video input of the monitors using DDC/CI. I've been using it for a couple of months and it's been a game changer. No more fiddling with monitor menus to switch inputs or wondering if the monitor is currently set to one computer or the other. You have to make sure your monitors support DDC/CI, though. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29608967 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29608967 [1] https://github.com/haimgel/display-switch https://github.com/haimgel/display-switch

jtnag 5y ago

I tried Barriers to share mouse+keyboard between work and private laptop in the same wifi. Somehow, I had issues with linking both PC. One of the alternatives is what I use currently - Microsoft Garage Mouse Without Borders ( https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35460 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=354... ) which suites my needs. ps. using 5GHz wifi significantly reduces mouse latency.

ck__ 5y ago

is it better than sharemouse ?

ck__ 5y ago

is it better than sharemouse?

checker659 5y ago

Just an FYI for mac users: Universal Control is a native macOS alternative to barrier that's about to debut with macOS 12.3 (currently in beta). As an ex-synergy user, let me just say how awesome the implementation is. What's crazy is you can share your mouse and keyboard not only between two or more macs but also between your mac and an iPad (if you have one, obviously). And the latency is crazy unnoticably low (even over wifi).

thebeardisred 5y ago
I'm assuming though this will be macOS only? I ask because the best use I had for Synergy was around 20 years ago: one Linux desktop (my daily driver) and other ones for non Linux applications (or ones I didn't want to pollute my system with). Over the years I've used it for Outlook (connecting to Exchange), Lotus Notes, Xcode, Adobe tools, etc.
- djrogers 5y ago
  MacOS and iPadOS.
superdug 5y ago
I've noticed that this doesn't _always_ work. Sometimes I just mash my mouse into the side of my screen and never get on to my iPad. So I've just switched to Logitech bluetooth mouse and keyboard. It's easier than a KVM and more reliable than software.

lxe 5y ago

I'm using Synergy 1.x. Is this better in any way?

zackmorris 5y ago

Barrier looks great, but does anyone know why KVM switches with DisplayPort or HDMI are so outrageously expensive? It should just be a switch, no complex electronics, so I truly can't figure out why any KVM should cost more than say $30-50 US. I suspect DRM or patents for rent seekers are involved somehow. Or maybe they're playing on the naivety of the business community towards this stuff. I'd sure like to know, and also if there are any low-cost or open source KVMs available.

wyager 5y ago
> It should just be a switch, no complex electronics For any high-bandwidth thing like HDMI, you need to do clock recovery and copy over the bitstream at the very least. You can't just use relays or whatever. Doing this at 10gbps+ is going to cost a bit.
- wlesieutre 5y ago
  How many plugs and unplugs is HDMI rated for? At the prices we're talking it would be cheaper for me to build a robot that physically swaps cables at the back of my computer. Of course then Windows gets confused by the lack of monitor and rearranges all the windows, so it's not a perfect solution.
- spicybright 5y ago
  I don't see that much of a reason you can't do a relay to "disconnect" one hdmi and plug in another. The computers would see the HDMI cable/USB cords unplugging and re-plugging. Obviously this can be problematic, but I can't see it being that expensive.
  - bartvk 5y ago
    As soon as there's enough volume for someone to design a specialized IC (and reference PCB), and it gets produced by VIA or TI or whatever, sure, then it's neither a problem nor expensive.
  - Nextgrid 5y ago

ashayh 5y ago

This monitor with a built in KVM has been working well for me https://www.gigabyte.com/Monitor/M27Q https://www.gigabyte.com/Monitor/M27Q I use two of them with Linux and Mac.

timetraveller26 5y ago

I've been using x2x https://github.com/dottedmag/x2x https://github.com/dottedmag/x2x It's really old and has it's perks but it works for my setup.

marcodiego 5y ago

How does it compare to synergy?

ballenf 5y ago

Anyone else ever wanted multiple cursors and multiple mice on one computer? Sometimes I'd rather move my hand to a different mouse than drag the cursor across all that screen real estate. Also the different pointers would stay put when not in use.

peeters 5y ago
I've done that for paired programming, it was a decade ago, but IIRC Xorg made it pretty easy to set up. That said...do not recommend :). It's too jarring.
zamadatix 5y ago
I'm not sure about multiple cursors but for the large screen real estate problem some mice have a "precision" button that changes the DPI which can be leveraged. The intent is to make the DPI much lower while pressed (or toggled depending) but many allow you to set what DPI value you want it to use directly. This allows you to specify that the mouse will move say 4x as fast while you hold the precision button which is a lot less hand movement and coordination than switching over to another mouse. Basically manual static acceleration for those that hate automatic smooth acceleration but want to occasional move fast easily. Alternatively if you're lucky enough to have reasonably steady hands you'd be surprised what you can get used to as a default static speed. My multi-monitor setup is over 70 inches horizontally but I can get across it in a flick or still move pixel by pixel if I want.
deleted 5y ago
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Mindless2112 5y ago
EitherMouse[1] can do multiple pointers on Windows. [1] https://eithermouse.com/ https://eithermouse.com/

rob_c 5y ago

Didn't synergy get there ages ago? Not saying it's not impressive, but what is the advantage?

moffkalast 5y ago
It's free vs. $30-$40 I suppose, but you pay in hours spend trying to configure an open source project.
- rob_c 5y ago
  synergy was free too, the paid client never amounted to anything and had lots of promise of cloud inclusion-y nonsense that didn't pan out. (I know I was gifted a subscription through a friend)

greatgib 5y ago

Thanks for sharing, so awesome that someone did the fork of synergy to stay oss and free. I was a big user of synergy 1 and was quite disappointed by the takeover that led to the current partially proprietary Synergy. It was a slide, first "let's have a binary builds for paying users to fund the project" then "let's have important features only for paid users with a license code needed", then the guys goal was to create and develop a company, hiring dev and assistants... The original spirit was lost. This annoyed me a lot based on the fact that it was not the original developer of Synergy. So, for long time I was thinking of doing a fork. And so, I'm very grateful that some people did it and had the courage to continue it.

nly 5y ago
Don't worry. Synergy 3 will be out soon to continue the slide

icelancer 5y ago

Got this working on the 2.3.4 release branch. The 2.4.0 release has a critical error that hasn't been fixed in months (years?) so definitely look into the issues page on that one.

Beached 5y ago

I use barrier daily between my two laptops it take everywhere. it's great, except I have two issues. you can it copy /paste images between the two. and you cannot select which monitor the mouse moves off of. I find myself wanting to copy screenshots between the two constantly, and if you have two monitors stacked vertically, I can pick the bottom monitor to be the edge monitor to go to my other computer. I wish barrier devs were more active devs but it still works great