OT: Remote Access to your PC

[TurinTurambar]

I don't think you should have to pay (i.e. GoToMyPC Service) to access your home computer remotely from your laptop in the field. That being said /*

"Wait, wait... 'out in the field?' Why is your laptop in a field? Do you live in farm country?"

No, shut up, that's a term we technician-type people use for working at a remote location (not in the office).

*\ ... what are the options for getting it done? Just 'PC-Anywhere' from Norton? Anyone know of a place with Tutorials for such a thing?

Regards,
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[Ed Kolis]

Doesn't Windows XP have a built-in "Remote Desktop" feature?

[TurinTurambar]

Hmmm.... well, I have XP on the laptop, but ME (shhhhh... I know, shut up....) on the office machine. I don't think I could just "go to it" in the middle of the day without a static IP.

~T

[Ed Kolis]

Dynamic DNS?
www.dyndns.org (http://www.dyndns.org)
That's how I host my website http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[Fyron]

VNC is the solution to your problems. Most VNC clients are free. I don't remember off-hand what the best one currently is. Tight VNC (http://www.tightvnc.com/), I think...

Technically, the Windows Remote Desktop application is freely available for Non-XP users, but I wouldn't recommend it...

[Will]

Yes, TightVNC would pretty much solve your problems. You can't do file transfers (directly) with it, but you can basically make your remote KVM operate with your home computer (a la dumb terminal). You can get around file transfers by doing something like setting up two AIM accounts, and have one send files to the other.

All you'll need is the VNC server running at home with a static IP. There is an option to accept HTTP requests as well, so you can use a browser to do http://ip.add.re.ss:portnum/ or use a standard VNC viewer.

[Fyron]

You do not need a costly static IP. Dynamic DNS is all you need. Does dyndns.org provide a program to automatically keep the IP associated with the domain current? I went with no-ip.com a while ago because they provided such a program and dyndns.org did not... But either service, or a host of others, will solve any dynamic IP woes.

[Will]

Hmm, I guess I should have clarified a bit. By static, I meant "IP does not change in the time you're away from your computer". As far as I've seen, even if you have a "dynamic IP address", it stays the same as long as the computer is up and running. When it's time to renew the lease, you just get the same one again.

So, static, as in it's the same one that the computer had when you left the house five hours ago.

[Fyron]

Ah, yes. But what if there is a connection glitch and your IP changes in the down time? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Suicide Junkie]

Then you're down for a day, and you fix it when you get home?

[Fyron]

If it is a momentary glitch and the connection restores properly, I like having the domain update automatically and having no down time. For a couple KB of system resources, it is worth it to me.

[Thermodyne]

Imperator Fyron said:
Ah, yes. But what if there is a connection glitch and your IP changes in the down time? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif



All you need to do is run a little script the checks the WAN address and emails the results to your web mail account. Then all you need to do is enter the new addy into VNC.

[Thermodyne]

I use TightVNC almost every day at work. And it is not all that. It beats driving 100's of miles, but it can be a pain. And this is arcoss a private WAN. Across the internet it is not as good, and very exploitable. Also, VPN will not support VNC, so everything you access is out in the open and subject to interception. Also, you must leave the system up, if it goes to sleep, VPN will not wake it unless wake on LAN is on, but this allows anyone to wake it. You also need to open the firewall for VNC, which gives any ole person the same access. They sniff your VPN password, and they are in your system.

IMHO, you should set up IIS and put the things yuo need into a private web site. Then use https: and password authentication. Better yet, you uni peeps should pick up a copy of Small Business Server on the cheap uni price. Put it on an old box and use the MS Share Point Site that comes pre-installed. Also, you can log into SBS remotely with the VPN and a cert, and drive it from a true remote desk top.

[Fyron]

So use a complex password. Good luck trying to sniff 16 random characters. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[TurinTurambar]

Thanks all, for the advice (and the warnings). I am looking thru the documentation on TightVNC right now, and it looks pretty well supported. I think I'll give it a go tomorrow from the field and see how it works.

As for file transfer: can't I just remote the server side into a web browser and email it to myself?

Thx,
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[Will]

Emailing it works too. I'm just used to file size limits on email (10MB at university), and I happen to already have two AIM accounts, so that's why it came to mind first.

[TurinTurambar]

I've just been thinking to myself about my invoicing program sitting on my office PC. Microsoft Fax (for any doc on the machine) sitting on my office PC. Universal Remote config files, account files, Access reports....

All stuff I could really use to maximize my efforts when I'm out and about, and some ways to get paid faster.

I've installed the server and client functions on my machines and am looking cautiously forward to tomorrow.

~T

[Thermodyne]

Imperator Fyron said:
So use a complex password. Good luck trying to sniff 16 random characters. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif



VNC password is plain text across the wire. All I need to do is capture packets to and scan till I find it.

[Fyron]

http://www.tightvnc.com/faq.html#howsecure:
Although TightVNC encrypts VNC passwords sent over the net, the rest of the traffic is sent as is, unencrypted (for password encryption, VNC uses a DES-encrypted challenge-response scheme, where the password is limited by 8 characters, and the effective DES key length is 56 bits). So using TightVNC over the Internet can be a security risk. To solve this problem, we plan to work on built-in encryption in future versions of TightVNC.

In the mean time, if you need real security, we recommend installing OpenSSH, and using SSH tunneling for all TightVNC connections from untrusted networks.


With TightVNC, the password is encrypted, but the data is not. SSH tunneling will create a rather secure connection, and you can do that for free.

http://sshwindows.sourceforge.net/