<div dir="ltr">I use TeamViewer at work at home, on both Linux and Windows clients. I also have it on my Android phone. It works very well!<div><br></div><div>Until recently, I was using x11RDP for connecting to my Ubuntu clients, however this is broken in 14.04. I have not yet heard of a fix. But when it was working, you could get full GUI desktops, and in my opinion it ran faster than TeamViewer. If they do post a fix for 14.04 I will echo to the group.</div>
<div><br></div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On 24 August 2014 06:05, Paul Nijjar <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:paul_nijjar@yahoo.ca" target="_blank">paul_nijjar@yahoo.ca</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><br>
We are doing a refresh of our installation mechanisms at Computer<br>
Recycling. One thing I would like to support is being able to securely<br>
help people with their Linux installs remotely. The best solution I<br>
know of is proprietary: TeamViewer, which has the following<br>
advantages:<br>
<br>
- Once TeamViewer is installed on the client, it is easy for customers<br>
to share their desktops. They just run the program and tell us the<br>
access code.<br>
- The program is only running when people need support.<br>
- From what I understand, communications are encrypted.<br>
- The users do not need to forward ports or expose anything on the<br>
Internet.<br>
- The technician is not bound to using any particular machine for<br>
seeing the remote desktop connection -- anything which supports the<br>
TeamViewer client will work.<br>
- If necessary the technician can take control of the customer<br>
desktop.<br>
<br>
I would like to find something FLOSSy that comes close to this<br>
functionality. I know some of you have this issue as well, so maybe<br>
some of you have solutions I can steal. But the problem seems more<br>
difficult than it looks.<br>
<br>
For example, in a previous KWLUG presentation Gordon Dey said that he<br>
opens up SSH on the computers he takes care of, and uses some kind of<br>
dynamic DNS thing to connect into those computers when he needs to<br>
connect in. That is not a terrible solution, but it does not work for<br>
us: it essentially makes a backdoor that could be exploited, and we<br>
are not doing full-time systems administration for every machine.<br>
<br>
Here are some of the things I have been thinking of:<br>
<br>
- There is a program called pigterm (<a href="http://pigterm.sf.net" target="_blank">http://pigterm.sf.net</a>) which uses<br>
XMPP to establish terminal connections between two computers. This<br>
might work if we establish a Jabber server someplace (which I guess<br>
we could, since we have a Linode).<br>
<br>
- Similarly, GNOME supposedly supports desktop screen sharing via its<br>
Empathy client, but that does not work for us because we typically<br>
are not installing GNOME on client machines.<br>
<br>
- There is some Chrome extension called "Chrome Remote Desktop" which<br>
would require installing Chromium and the extension on these<br>
computers. This might be the best alternative, but Google creeps me<br>
out.<br>
<br>
- There is some concept called "Reverse VNC" which allows the<br>
customer's computer to make an outgoing connection to the technician<br>
machine, and then the technician machine can see the customer<br>
computer. There is a program called x11vnc which supposedly makes<br>
this easier. But this requires us to open up some port on our<br>
network, which is suboptimal for us.<br>
<br>
- I keep thinking vague fuzzy thoughts about SSH tunnels. I could<br>
potentially install a public key for some server on each client<br>
machine, and then when people want support they could click a<br>
shortcut that would make an SSH connection to a server. Either this<br>
means opening up a port on our network again, or we have to use an<br>
external server like our Linode to serve as a broker (after which it<br>
would hopefully make a direct connection between us, which is even<br>
vaguer and fuzzier to me).<br>
<br>
- Drawing on another KWLUG presentation, maybe we set up a<br>
BigBlueButton server, which supports desktop sharing. But<br>
BigBlueButton has very high bandwidth requirements, which we cannot<br>
provide. Also the client sharing the desktop needs Java installed.<br>
<br>
I really ought to be writing out this email AFTER I have come up with<br>
a well-tested solution, but I am hoping that somebody else has solved<br>
this problem for me already.<br>
<span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br>
- Paul<br>
<br>
<br>
--<br>
<a href="http://pnijjar.freeshell.org" target="_blank">http://pnijjar.freeshell.org</a><br>
<br>
<br>
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