[dba-Tech] Wippien - was Re: Remote take over programs

Tue Jan 5 17:58:16 CST 2016

Hi John:

I am still unset with what happened to Hamachi. 

Aside: Got my first copy of Hamachi, at a trade fair, in Vancouver, where a couple of local boys had put it together and were giving away free copies...with a donation...I think I paid twenty dollars. At the time I could have actually got a copy of the source code but why should I as the guys insisted it would always be free. In the end I do not think the two guys that created it got anything for it. These were days before GNU GPL licensing and a lot of people were ripped off and never received any credit, let alone money. Today there is the Linux Foundation which received funds from hundreds of individuals and companies and then distributes that money based on importance and need. 

Having everything running many miles away definitely limits how adventuresome you can become. I think all new versions of windows comes with SSH pre-installed. The beauty of that is unless your hardware has completely failed it can be always be securely accessed remotely. I definitely like a good GUI but have learned how to do most things from the command prompt. Microsoft's new command language is very impressive. I used to modify some comprehensive scripts (didn't build them as that would have evolved into a career path) that could fully test all the hardware. the OS, the communications, the new POS software and then install and download it from a remote site (...of course I was on the host site). There is also some great web based software for managing databases like PHPAdmin for MySQL and I have even heard that there is some good packages for MS SQL...used one for MS SQL about ten years ago but can't remember what it is...it was a little flaky but it ran off the client's IIS/Apache. I believe there are some excellent packages available now.

Apparently you have a good solution now so what extra do you need? :-)

PS I have been testing the following software on one of my servers to see how it works. If properly configured it may be a great remote solution for managing local resources: http://osjsv2.0o.no/ It is all web-bases and uses html5/css3 and lots and lots of javascript so it can be completely modified to any client's needs. The pages will modify for any device (have not tested it on a cell phone yet) but it runs on a tablet and even has swipe controls. It would of course need two level authentication being exposed to the web but there is all sorts of code on the github site. It can be a prefect one stop control for any client...if the client does not have IIS then they can have Apache installed on any computer, with any OS. If I was still in business I might look very seriously at this as a platform for a universal support solution.

Jim 

----- Original Message -----
From: "John Colby" <jwcolby at gmail.com>
To: "Discussion of Hardware and Software issues" <dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 5, 2016 2:59:07 AM
Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] Wippien - was Re: Remote take over programs

I am trying to remote into virtual machines all running on a VM server 
colocated in a company a thousand miles away from my desktop.  So I do 
not have physical access to any of the physical or virtual machines I 
need access to.  Further my home office now uses my phone for it's wifi.

The world is indeed changing, and there is no single solution which just 
works.  I can double hop RD through the physical server to any of the 
VMs but it is slow.  I was just trying to get direct access to the VMs, 
using a VPN to host the RD.  Wippien is working just fine for that (once 
set up).

I had used Hamachi for years but LogMeIn bought it and turned it into a 
proprietary pay app.  It has very real, very annoying issues with only 
getting a relay connection in many cases which reduces the bandwidth 
down into the kilo BIT range if that happens.  They don't appear to 
know, nor care how or why that occurs and will not help when it 
happens.  So I moved on.

Remote desktop is rock solid.  It is extremely low bandwidth.  All of my 
machines, from my desktop, to my servers, to my VMs run Windows.  All 
this Windows infrastructure (VM Server / VMs) was developed over many 
years and has been running rock solid for many years.

X2Go may work well for you but it is just not even close to applicable 
in my specific situation, AND it requires my learning and injecting 
Linux into an otherwise entirely Windows setup AND it requires doing so 
in a physical environment a thousand miles away from me.

On 1/4/2016 11:21 PM, Jim Lawrence wrote:
> I like the way Microsoft is finally going. No longer are they a company fighting off all challengers but a company who wants to play on the team.
>
> http://bit.ly/1OIHvpL
>
> I couldn't be happier but it also means that no longer are there pure Window's end to end solutions for every situation. In fact the latest and greatest advances have been in Microsoft's adoption of other technologies like hyper-v, nodejs, containers, ubuntu, redhat, juju, hadoop, zfs and on and on...in otherwards MS has fully embraced the world of the open-source and Linux in particular.
>
> I may seem to be beating around the bush but I am trying to say is you are wasting to much time to craft some kind of solution built in pure MS when a hybrid most likely will be a better solution. I just ran up a $35.00 Raspberry PI 2, that can be accessed from anywhere in the world. I can control my entire network which is a mix of Windows and Linux servers and stations. (You will need to have a video cable, mouse and keyboard to set it all up but then put the PI in a small box, connected via a network cable and powered by a handy USB plug...Oh yes, I am using X2Go...the package is still in beta mode but at least it is under active development.)
>
> Jim
>      
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "John Colby" <jwcolby at gmail.com>
> To: "Discussion of Hardware and Software issues" <dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com>
> Sent: Sunday, January 3, 2016 8:38:13 PM
> Subject: [dba-Tech] Wippien - was Re:  Remote take over programs
>
> I use it on Windows 10 on my desktop.  I use it on Windows 11
> (entertainment server, which is really 2008) on my VMs.
>
> It does not look to be under development any more.  The problem is
> common with every "public domain" or free program ever written. Sooner
> or later the author loses interest.
>
> In this case there still seems to be a community of servers to establish
> that initial connection.  Beyond that it works.
>
> I use it solely to get RD over a vpn.  Wippien is the VPN, nothing more
> (for me).
>
> Nowadays most of the vpn users are kids trying to establish game groups,
> chat on the side etc.  I just need a vpn for RD.
>
> It was easy enough to get set up, and can have a "network" of many
> machines, though you do have to register a distinct user (name) for each
> and every machine to be on the network.  Having done that you can see
> every user (machine), and given the IP (5.x.x.x) and permission, can RD
> in over the VPN.
>
> The biggest issue I have for it is that it doesn't seem to start as a
> service as the machine starts up, i.e. it starts up when logged in.
> Which is just fine for connecting desktops with real live users.  In my
> case I am trying to connect VMs.  Which means I have to use RD to log in
> to get wippien running to use RD.  Kind of a catch 22.
>
> Except that I can get at my VM server using RD to a direct IP out on the
> web, then from the desktop there I can RD into the VMs, get wippien
> running and then back out of the RD on the machine from the server and
> go in direct over RD through wippien.  Which is simply much faster than
> the double RD (desktop to server to vm).
>
> So it does work for my purposes, but is clumsy getting all set up.
>
> The VMs run 24/7/365 so once up Wippien stays up and works just fine.
>
> On 1/3/2016 5:21 PM, Jim Lawrence wrote:
>> Hi Gustav:
>>
>> Have you used the product? If so does it work on Windows 7,8 and 10?
>>
>> Jim
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Gustav Brock" <gustav at cactus.dk>
>> To: "Discussion of Hardware and Software issues" <dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com>
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 16, 2015 2:40:57 AM
>> Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] Remote take over programs
>>
>> Hi John
>>
>> This Wippien seems not be developed further - which is OK if it works, of course.
>>
>> Are you using it to encrypt the connection are does it serve other purposes for your setup?
>>
>> /gustav
>>

-- 
John W. Colby

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