DeskWatcher

True – In applications, I hadn’t considered that

I was thinking more of the keys defined for purposes in the Style Guide, rather than “keys that are used”. That’s F1 to F5, F8, F9 and F12.

F6 has some Style Guide definition, IIRC — it might be Sort.

It turns out that it doesn’t.

It turns out that it doesn’t.

Perhaps you’d picked up on the functionality in Select. There’s quite a bit in shortcuts, but the allocation doesn’t make sense to me in a lot of cases.

Perhaps just use Avalanche and VNCserver then?

Or have I missed something fundamental?

Perhaps you’d not read the bit in the online manual that talks about multiple clients. i.e. if you were so minded you could run a network based class with many pupils. Obviously with hackers being what they are and no encryption you wouldn’t want it directly exposed to the internet until Thomas builds in passwords and encryption for the links.

Stupid question: that it works on the Pi4?

Stupid question: that it works on the Pi4?

There’s a demo download you could test with

Works with Pi4 and Pi400…

Perhaps you’d not read the bit in the online manual that talks about multiple clients. i.e. if you were so minded you could run a network based class with many pupils.

!VNCserver and !Avalanche clients can be daisy-chained, so that multiple clients all have desktop read/write access to the system at the end of the chain. It is very usable with 4 links in the chain, although a whole classroom sounds optimistic.

I have even had the base RISC OS system connected to a Windows PC via !RDPclient (although only the base RISC OS system could type.) Mouse movements and clicks were OK right down the chain at very usable speeds.

This was posted using !Netsurf on the 3rd Pi 4 link in the chain.

There’s a demo download you could test with.

I have been unable to find that.

Perhaps you’d not read the bit in the online manual that talks about multiple clients.

I have try “all I have” ;-) Server was Titanium, clients are various Pi, MX6, Pandora, a9home at the same time.
The clients are connected with different rights.

Regarding demo version:
There is no download but send me an e-mail and I shall send you a testversion which is valid for 14 days free of charge.

Regarding test on machines:
I have testet the program on all the RISC OS machines I am owning except the RiscPC as this will take me a bit longer to reactivate it and I think it is not the major target machine for DeskWatcher.

Regarding VNC/Avalanche vs. DeskWatcher:
There are several tasks which can be done by both programs. VNC can be used on nearly every operting system which is an advantage. In intranets it isn’t playing a role whether some bytes more or less are transferred. But this changes when using internet connections. In a lot of cases the amount of data which has to be transferred is much smaller if DeskWatcher is used. Also the possibility that several clients can connect against the same server in parallel worked fine for me. I connected myself over the internet from one of my company RPis 3B+ over ADSL to my private main machine a BBxM. Parallel to this I connected my selfbuild BiKo (also an BBxM) and my Iyonix to the BBxM over the intranet.

I am regarding DeskWatcher more as a tool for “remote support” or to discuss problems/ideas with a small number of people across the internet. Of course I think it could be used in general for teaching purposes even I think that in such a case I would have
to add one additional feature to reduce the network traffic in a drastical way in case that known pictures are displayed. But the number of machines which can be connected to another is depending heavily on the network capacity and what is displayed. Neither VNC nor DeskWatcher will make fun if displaying high resolution movies.

Thomas – for remote support, does it solve the “router issue” (opening ports) that prevents VNC being a sensible remote support tool for RISC OS users?

As it stands, I have quite a few customers I would love to help via remote support, but there’s no way I can talk them through opening ports on their router and mapping them through to their RISC OS machines. On Windows/Mac, I can use a variety of remote support programs which require no user setup which can be super-helpful. It would be very nice if DeskWatcher could do the same for RISC OS.

Has anyone ported any UPnP software? This ghastly stuff can tell the router to open up gawd knows what ports to the outside world – which is why I always make sure its disabled in the router – but for people who would never be able to configure a router manually, this would be the answer. Either than or you could host a RISC OS version of LogMeIn on your servers;

Unfortunately DeskWatcher is not solving the Firewall problem in the moment even I have plans to solve this
(“Proxies”). However depending on the router/firewall
there is sometimes the situation that they are blocking incoming and outgoing activities. So even when I would implement my proxy concept in worst case only port 80 as communication port would work or one
of the e-mail ports but I am not feeling quite well with this thought even it would work.

but there’s no way I can talk them through opening ports on their router and mapping them through to their RISC OS machines most cases

And in most cases, it is even more complicated than that.

BT Internet, for example, does not provide the static IP address needed for open ports. Much the same problem as trying to run a puplic web server.

Has anyone ported any UPnP software?

Can I kill the first person that tries?

This ghastly stuff can tell the router to open up gawd knows what ports to the outside world

Turned off at home and at work – my network, my rules…

BT Internet, for example, does not provide the static IP address needed for open ports. Much the same problem as trying to run a puplic web server.

That’s why DDNS services exist.

Mind you, no one in their right mind wants to open port 80 inbound.

What is really needed is for someone to port something like OpenVPN (I believe that was the basis for the Cisco AnyConnect product)
Of course that may need a better TCP/IP stack than RO currently has.

A proxy is simpler. And that’s a good idea of commercial service :) Get an account on a website that will make the link between you and your clients (of course with a free client software).

A proxy is simpler. And that’s a good idea of commercial service :)

Most of the commercial services are either not cheap or not secure.¹

Get an account on a website that will make the link between you and your clients (of course with a free client software).

PC only so not much use to the RO fraternity.

¹ I have quite a number of years of dealing with the sloppy practice employed by various setups.

No I speak of a proxy service around DeskWatcher. A la TeamViewer.
Windows doesn’t interest me.

A la TeamViewer.

Dear God no.
Default Teamviewer install, constantly talking home to the mothership asking to be connected to, or would if someone hadn’t specifically blocked the application and the traffic after we found a French supplier¹ twiddling with the install of their software on a PC without the knowledge of the users.

¹ Which part of the GDPR did he not read?

constantly talking home to the mothership asking to be connected to

No. You can launch it on demand. And even propose a special runtime dedicated to support tasks.

No. You can launch it on demand. And even propose a special runtime dedicated to support tasks.

That’s the task you’re talking about. It installs a service too, and that gets set to automatically start at boot.

Steve – there’s a version of TV called “Quick Support” which is a standalone .exe and doesn’t install. It is conceivable that it temporarily installs a service without the user knowing in order to do same-session remote-reboots/reconnects, but once closed, AFAIK there’s nothing left behind.

It’s the only version I’d use, because it is the only version where the user is in control and chooses when to run it, and when to exit it. ie. there should be nothing left behind.

Andrew – that’s just the one that I get folks to use whenever I’m called on to do remote support too. Never had a problem.

Steve – there’s a version of TV called “Quick Support” which is a standalone .exe

Worth being aware of, thanks. The other stuff is blocked software on the domain PC’s as well as the Firewall (L7 aware)

Yes, talktalk are also notorious for mass-blocking Teamviewer (and others) at DNS level with their router/broadband services. Thank goodness for 1.1.1.1!