No GUI for you!

Pardon the overused quote from Seinfeld . . .

I hope to start a discussion relating to the alternatives to manage a VPS remotely. 

1. The most efficient, and minimalistic way of administering your VPS will always be CLI.  For a persistent environment research tmux and/or screen.  When I found these I was like an ape holding up a bone in 2001 A Space Odyssey.
   
2. ncurses - ncurses is a very small step up from CLI into a GUI.  It is such a small step, it is actually referred to as a TUI (Text User Interface).  This can provide a colorful, mouse aware environment.  A quick search also turned up a video player that represents pixels as ASCII art . . .
   
3. Another option available that is tunnelling X through SSH.  Whether your preference is GNOME, KDE, or others, it will likely all depend on a X server as the display engine.  Unlike VNC and other remote desktop software, a tunneled X connection will only display the application necessary on the client computer.  If you find yourself having and entre desktop installed on your VPS, but only use 1-3 applications, this may be a way to slim down those resources.
   
4. A full blown VNC, NX (fill in app here) remote desktop management software.  This will be what most GUI folk use, and works well for remotely accessing a full desktop environment.  This solution does not marry well with the minimization of resources on your VPS though.
   

All of these are wonderful tools you can use on a Linux variant VPS.  Are you using a Windows VPS? Switch.  

Personally I extensively use xterm, ssh, tmux and vim for all my administering . . . but different strokes for different folks.

Let me know if I missed anything, I'm always on the hunt for something new =)