Work From Home part 4. Screen Sharing
Screen Sharing is another fun topic! Here’s the setup, when someone at work is getting a funny error message, has a problem in excel that they can’t solve or in the case of my life has take controll of a client’s machine to get something done and is up against a wall; I walk over and take a look at what’s going on. Sure we could talk about the issue in my office or over IM or some other system, but, it’s way more efficient for me to just see what they have in front of them. Also there is a ton of different information on a screen that you would have to explicitly ask about unless you saw their screen. Of course if you would have to walk 500 miles to see someones desktop in person, you need another option.
Ultra VNC
The first option is probably my favorite because it lends itself to creating lists and directories of links that allow you to take over people’s screens instantly. The caviat of this one is that you either have to know how to configure your firewall or be on the same network. Of course if you are on a VPN or using Hamachi much of this is already taken care of for you. ( this is why I mentioned those tools ). Youtube has a host of videos about setting up VNC. This one seems ok.
Ammy Admin was covered a while back (Fix a friend’s computer), but it is a good tool for this application aswell. It won’t really allow you to take over people’s computer with one click, but it is really pretty easy to use and doesn’t require any crazy software or firewall configurations. This is a good solution for people who really find themselves requireing this functionality seldomly rather than all day.
Both of these systems work well with multiple monitors and have ways to modify the settings for optimizing internet speed. Both will get the job done and save you from having to walk 500 miles to see what’s going on on people’s screen.
