The Old Joel on Software Forum - Remote Control Trhough Firewalls using TightVNC

Remote Control Trhough Firewalls using TightVNC

Hi folks.

At our company we decided to adopt the same solution Joel used at FogCreek, for tech support with remote control: TightVNC in listen mode.

I want to know if is possible to use distribute the listening mode through several computers, because our customer support department have 5 persons able to acept incoming questions.

If anybody can help me please...

Thanks in advance.
Ricardo Antunes da Costa

Ricardo Antunes da Costa
Thursday, August 29, 2002

Note that there are still firewalls which will prevent even this kind of connection (ie. some people's companies only allow port 80 and other common port connections).

Michael H. Pryor
Thursday, August 29, 2002

As long as you have unique internet addresses for all 5 computers and they are reachable externally (e.g. no NAT) it should work fine.

I also test-drove Netopia Ecare http://www.netopia.com/en-us/ebusiness/products/ecare.html which is hands-down the best commercial product. It starts at about $180/month and gets through every imaginable form of firewall. Very very slick, very easy to use and figure out, etc. When we get bigger we may switch to this.

Joel Spolsky
Friday, August 30, 2002