Regards,
Dream-Achiever

You can sign up at http://G.ho.st – press the giant green button on the left and when the login screen opens, click the “Register here” button.

If you want extra storage – just invite a few friends and you will get an additional 1 GB for each one you invite.

BTW, if anybody’s interested, I wrote about how it feels to work in G.ho.st at: http://antonbar.blogspot.com/2008/06/working-in-israeli-palestinian-startup.html

All you have to do is sign up normally and when it is set up you’ll get asked if anyone referred you… just put adondai@g.ho.st

Let me know how you like it!

I guess these are not true “virtual desktops”. They will not run without a operating system underneath, but I don’t really find it an issue. I don’t so much use it as a subsitute of my own desktop at home, but as a way to access all my files when I am somewhere else.

So yes, it’s quicker to simply use Google Docs by itself in a browser at home, but when I’m elsewhere I’ll log into G.ho.st instead.

ULTEO is impressive in the fact it offers up much more featured programs such as firefox and open office with the desktop, but my experience of it was as the slowest of them all. I’m not sure what kind of computer you are running, but I’m surprised we have had such a different experience.

Having read this article I thought all my problems were solved and I would be able to download my files to these services and access the files from any old PC – anywhere. I would no longer have to worry about my borrowed PC having a copy of Word, Excel or even if they had an USB drive or CD reader.

So I registered with all 3 and tried them out – how disappointing!
They all seem to consume all the resources on this PC and the response is very slow.

Now I realise that this is a fairly old PC, but I was under the impression that all I needed was something to run an IE or Firefox session. All the processing would be done on the remote computer; this is certainly how LogMeIn works. Such an Online Desktop system would give a new lease of life for all those old PCs and laptops as the processing work would be done on the “server”.
Just think how many people would use such a system!

So why do I have these problems?
Have I missed the point of these services?

The only one that does not grind my PC to a halt is ULTEO which loads up much quicker than the other 3, it also offers Open Office which should meet all my requirements – so will be testing it out further.

Come on Desktoptwo, OoDesk and G.ho.st – pull your fingers out and provide a system that can be used efficiently from any old PC or laptop.
Less bell and whistles and more good old fashioned efficient programming.

I am rather surprised that good old Google has not waded into this arena with its considerable muscle power and resources. It already has the document reading and storage sorted out, the only reason I do not use it is that most of my reference files are bigger than 500Mb.

Surely the revenues from targeted advertising to an Online Desktop system would easily pay for itself?
It would also tie up all the various Google offering – GMAIL, PICASA, CALENDAR, READER etc.

I will watch this arena with great interest, but for now back to LogMeIn and now Ulteo.

Thanks for the article!

Edit: Tried Ghost, it’s flash driven too, I vote ghost :)

Solaris, what do you think about G.ho.st vs. Jooce? Could you compare the features of both systems and tell us what you think?

Personally, and yes, I’m biased, I think it will be hard to compare because G.ho.st has many more features.

Please note that we also started opening up to the community and already open sourced our mobile client at: http://code.google.com/p/pixie-os/

The first prototype of the mobile client is available at: http://pixie.testghost.com. It requires an account on our test server at http://qa.testghost.com.

Happy G.ho.st’ing :-)