When you open the preferences in uTorrent, you will see a new DNA entry in the left menu. The preference lists a small explanation at the top:

Bittorrent DNA is a content delivery system that reduces publisher server load by using Bittorrent peer-to-peer delivery. Is is used only for content that you request.

DNA is enabled by default, at least in the latest test version of uTorrent 3.1. With DNA enabled, users may be able to download data that is powered by DNA faster. The service won’t accelerate standard torrent downloads.

It works exactly like those MMORPG downloaders that Blizzard and other companies offer. These downloaders use official servers and other users who download the data to speed up the downloading. DNA seems to be basically the same deal. Please note that you will also distribute part of the data to other users whenever you download with DNA enabled.

If you do not download data from websites or services that support DNA, you should consider disabling Bittorrent DNA in the preferences as it is of no benefit to you.

Just uncheck Enable DNA powered downloads to block Bittorrent DNA from being used by uTorrent. You may also check Alert me when DNA-powered downloads are added to uTorrent to receive notifications when downloads that make use of DNA are added to uTorrent.

Please note that DNA can also be distributed as a separate client alongside programs, games and other contents on websites. The program works in the same way but is completely independent of the Bittorrent client.

Remote is another new feature. Unlike DNA, it is disabled by default. The technology can be used to connect to the client from a web browser to manage and control the Bittorrent software remotely.

You need to supply a username and password and check the Enable uTorrent Remote Access feature. All you need to do then is to open the remote service on the uTorrent website and enter your computer name and password to remotely connect to the uTorrent client.

Hope this answers some of the questions that users may have when they encounter Bittorent DNA and uTorrent Remote for the first time.

The openfiles tool requires administrative privileges, at least under Windows 7. This means that you need to start the command prompt with elevated rights. One way to do that is to click on the start orb, select All Programs and then Accessories. Right-click the command prompt entry and select Run as administrator from the context menu.

Enter openfiles and hit enter to run the command on the system.

Windows admins who are new to the command can use openfiles /? to display a list of available parameters:

OPENFILES /parameter [arguments]

Description: Enables an administrator to list or disconnect files and folders that have been opened on a system.

Parameter List:

• /Disconnect Disconnects one or more open files.
• /Query Displays files opened locally or from shared folders.
• /Local Enables / Disables the display of local open files.
• /? Displays this help message.

As you can see from the parameters, it is not only possible to display all open files, but also to disconnect a user from your system. Lets say you need to access a file that is blocked by another user in the network. You can use the command openfiles /disconnect /ID xx to disconnect users. Just replace xx with the ID of the file that is shown in the open files listing.

It is furthermore possible to disconnect a user completely with the command openfiles /disconnect /a user where user is the name of the user that is currently accessing the files remotely.

Additional information about the commands can be accessed in the following way:

• OPENFILES /Disconnect /?
• OPENFILES /Query /?
• OPENFILES /Local /?

Disconnecting options include disconnecting all open file connections by names or modes. Wildcards are allowed to be used which means that the commands can be used to disconnect all users currently accessing files on the local system.

Pogoplug can be a bit of a drag to install. Its installer does not go as fast as those of many other programs, so those who tend to sit and watch downloads and installations may be staring blankly at their screens for a few minutes. Once finished, however, you will be able to configure Pogoplug by clicking on the new icon on your taskbar – it looks like a pink circle with a line inside of it.

The program will make you begin by creating a new account, requiring your email address and the creation of a new password. You can then choose which general folders you would like to be included in your cloud, including your documents, music, and picture folders. By unchecking the boxes, you prohibit access to the files within those folders from access by Pogoplug.

Once you have selected your folders and clicked Next the program will offer to give you a tour. If you tend to pick things up pretty quickly, don’t waste your time with it. Finally, activate your email and you should be ready to go.
To access your files remotely, simply visit my.pogoplug.com and sort through your various files from there. You can get to them from literally any Windows-based PC directly from the web, sparing you from having to download and install programs on the various machines you may want access from.

A quick look around Pogoplug’s website shows that it does much more than simply throw your files into an online folder and expect you to manage them. It actually sorts them into categories based on what it assumes they are. By selecting different tabs along the top of the screen you can find your files sorted into their various types – Music ends up in Jukebox, Images in Gallery, Videos in Cinema, and so on.

If at any point you decide you no longer want or need a folder to be made available through the Pogoplug’s cloud, simply click on the icon in your taskbar again to return to your preferences. By selecting the Remote Access tab you can change which folders are allowed access and even turn off remote access to your folders altogether.

One last reminder – your computer needs to be turned on any time you want to access your files. If you’re far from that computer and are wondering why the online interface is denying you, it’s probably just because it’s turned off. Happy sharing!

Pogoplug is not only available for Windows PCs and Apple Macintosh systems, but also as an app for Android and Apple smartphones.

Here is how it works. Weezo will run a configuration script on the first startup. The script will start the core services and perform connection checks to ensure that the server is accessible from a local network and the Internet.

weezo

A free Weezo account can be created during setup of the server. The account offers the advantage that a permanent url is associated with it which can be used to access the server. This is similar to a service that offers a permanent domain name for dynamic IPs. It is possible to use the program anonymously, but this means that users connected to the computer need the right IP address to do so.

The Weezo server interface is then started on the computer, providing the means to configure the the shared contents and users as well as core configuration options and an activity monitor that displays information about logged in users and server status changes.

All resorts around user groups and resources. Groups are used to allow or block access to resources. The administrator for instance has access to all resources by default while the public group does not.

Groups are protected with passwords and can be further protected by adding allowed IPs. Options to provide a distinct website theme, sounds and sticky notes are provided as well.

Resources are the core of the server. Here it is possible to enable file access and sharing, blog and websites, communication modules like chat or webcam, bookmarks, web TV, a web proxy routing traffic through the Weezo website and additional modules.

Some interesting resources are the following:

• Photos Album: Share photos with anyone connecting to the server.
• Music and Videos: Listen to music or watch videos remotely, great for sharing music and videos with friends.
• RSS Reader, bookmarks: Access and share RSS feeds and bookmarks easily wherever you are

music player

One click install / download options are provided for popular web scripts such as WordPress, Joomla or phpBB even though they are not always offered in the latest version. MySQL can be installed as well as it is a requirement for several of the scripts.

remote access server

Some modules were not completely translated into English, only offered in French. WordPress for instance was available in French. It was however no problem to change the configuration files on the local system to change the language to English. This is also the way to update scripts to their latest versions.

Admins have direct access to MySQL, phpMyAdmin, the Apache configuration and pretty much every other server configuration file. Helpful for instance to import a database or make modifications to the remote server.

Ports can be changed in the configuration, the default port is 80. It is furthermore possible to use a secure connection (SSL) to connect to the server.

Screenshots:

remote access server

remote desktop

remote file explorer

rss feed sharing

server login

Weezo offers a one-click installation server for web scripts, file sharing and remote file access. It provides rights management and an easy to understand admin interface that can be used to configure most, but not all, of the options of the server.

Some operations require manual configuration changes, which definitely will be a problem for inexperienced users. There is for instance no option to update WordPress to the latest version from within the admin interface.

Weezo is available for download at the developer’s website.

T-Mobile G1 users can access the Android Market to download additional applications for their cell phone. One of the interesting applications is the remote PC access software Android Remote which makes it possible to access and control music and videos on the Android phone from any computer system running the server application. To achieve this the Android Remote PC access software has to be installed on the Android cell phone and the Gmote Server application on the PC that the user wants to access remotely.

The Gmote software for remote PC access can be downloaded directly from Android Market to the cell phone. Users can perform a search to find the PC remote application which is located in the Multimedia category. The second required step is to download and install the PC remote access server application (from here) to the computer system that should be accessed by the Android phone. The remote server application is available for Windows, Macintosh and Linux operating systems.

A window will show up after execution of the server application asking for a password that is used to protect the contents from third parties. The very same password has to be entered on the Android phone on first usage.

The user can then add files and folders to the server so that they can be accessed and controlled from the Android phone.

The Gmote application can establish a connection over a wireless network or cellular network’s data connection.

Music can be streamed from the computer system to the Android phone. Everything else, e.g. playing movies, controlling PDF or PowerPoint presentations, is happening on the server system while being controlled from the Android phone. The Gmote application on cell phone can be used as a wireless touchpad and keyboard which extends its functionality further. All in all a very interesting remote PC access application that might come in handy in many different situations.

TweetMyPC turns Twitter into something else; A platform to send commands to a computer system. It provides the means to shutdown, restart or logoff PCs remotely. A client – the TweetMyPC software – has to be installed and configured on the remote computer system. This essentially means to add a Twitter username and password in the software which has to run in the background. An Internet connection is obviously needed as well as this is how the status updates are send from Twitter to the local computer system.

The user can then initiate the shutdown, restart of logoff by updating the status at Twitter. Changing the Twitter status to Logoff would for instance send the logoff command remotely to the computer system where it would then be initiated. It is advised to create a new Twitter account for this so that no one but the owner of the computer system can send the commands using Twitter.

TweetMyPC checks for status updates every minute and runs most of the time in the Windows system tray.

Xming is an X server for Windows which can be used to secure forward X11 sessions from Unix machines. Basically, using Xming, a graphical program, like Firefox or xeyes, can be run remotely from an SSH server with X11. Using X11 tunneling, many things can easily be done remotely, whether that be word processing, file-sharing or accessing an email client.

Xming requires a little configuration. In my opinion, Xming works best with the Putty and comes with it. ssh.exe can also be used.

Putty must be configured to enable X11 forwarding, which is done inside Putty by going to SSH>X11 and ticking ‘Enable X11 forwarding’. Whilst programs can be launched via remote SSH terminal, the Xlaunch program which comes with Xming is much easier to use.

In Xlaunch, the chosen view for X11 windows is chosen (one window, multiple windows or full screen), the SSH server and login details is entered as is the application which is to be run. xterm (the terminal) is a good choice!

Teamviewer is a remote desktop software that can be used to easily connect to other computers. The greatest benefits is that it is easy to setup even for users without broad technical knowledge and that it can be used for other purposes than remote desktop access such as presentations or virtual private networks. The Remote Control Software here at Ghacks took a closer look at the software and can be a good read for anyone unfamiliar with the product.

Teamviewer works by entering an unique ID and password in the software to connect to a client remotely. The Teamviewer shortcuts would basically eliminate the need of entering and remembering the ID and password before establishing a connection.

The basic idea is to create Teamviewer shortcuts in a folder on the hard drive and execute these to connect to the client computer. Lee created a folder for each client and one personal folder. So all that needs to be done is to create a shortcut of Teamviewer, right-click it and select Properties. The following parameters should be added in the target box of the shortcut: -i [tv ID number] –Password -[tv password]. (without the [] brackets)

Lee failed to list another possible shortcut: -m filetransfer would initiate file transfer mode. Other options are presentation to start a presentation session or starting the application without the -m parameter for remote support.

The issue is caused by security changed to the Terminal Service ActiveX control in Internet Explorer which is now disabled by default. Thankfully a workaround was posted already, here are the steps to fix the problem and enable Windows Home Server Remote Access again.

Open Internet Explorer and click on Tools > Manage Add-ons > Enable or Disable Add-ons to enable the Terminal Services ActiveX control again. If you see the Terminal Services control and are able to enable it you are done. If you cannot see it or cannot enable it you need to delete two keys in the Windows Registry instead which will also enable the Terminal Services ActiveX control again.

HKCU \Software \Microsoft \Windows \CurrentVersion \Ext \Settings \{7390f3d8-0439-4c05-91e3-cf5cb290c3d0}
HKCU\ Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Ext\ Settings\ {4eb89ff4-7f78-4a0f-8b8d-2bf02e94e4b2)

Once you have deleted those two keys the activeX control should be enabled again in Internet Explorer.

Luckily, the guys from uvnc.com are providing us with a third option, called PCHelpware, which is basically another remote-viewing-tool from the developers of my favorite VNC implementation. The interesting part though is, that it allows you to create a redistributable executable which can be placed on the target’s computer, on a web server for downloading or sent to the person on the other end by mail. And it gets even better. Due to the opposed direction of starting the communication, it allows you to bypass routers and firewalls on the side of the user in need, sparing you the excess of configuring the router/firewall in advance if you want to remotely connect to that computer.

Basically, it works like that: the damsel-in-distress calls, you tell her to double-click the little blue icon in the upper right corner of her desktop, which you planted there earlier in wise foresight, while you start the viewer-part of the application on your computer. She hits “start”, and you’re free to control her desktop while she can watch every step. It’s exactly what I always wanted for Christmas!

I have found a number of manuals and step-by-step-tutorials, but I decided to give some quick hints on my own, since I wasn’t that happy with all of them.

PCHelpware offers three ways of connecting to a Viewer (the side of the plagued person-to-help – that’s you). By direct connection with no router or firewall getting in the way, through a firewall that has an appropriate port opened to the Internet, or through a repeater service which should offer a zero-configuration-connection over two or more firewalls, but which didn’t work for me, with other users reporting the same problems. But since we usually have full control over our own routers and firewalls, and PCHelpware also supporting UPnP, the second one seems like the most probable and suitable setting.

Unzipping and locating the viewer executable shouldn’t be that much of a problem. After starting, just follow the steps in the picture and you should be rewarded with a distributable single-click-executable of minimal size in the /myservers/profilename directory.

After you push “Create Server”, a small popup will show up to enter your IP address. If you have a dynamic IP, you should use a dynamic dns-service like dyndns.org.

To ready the viewer for incoming connections (which should only be done when expecting one or for another very good reason), just pick the profile and click “Start” in the lower right corner. You could open the port in your UPnP-supporting firewall automatically by checking “Auto Map” or click the “Map Upnp”-button, or just leave
it alone because you already troubled yourself with it. Once your viewer is set up, the user-in-need may start his server, which will connect and voilá!

Another nice feature is the customizable server-part, which allows you to incorporate your own logos and stuff. Since the license emphatically allows use in a commercial environment, I’m going to design one for my own workplace, since we do a lot of helpdesk-stuff from time to time. I only have to figure out a way that’s just as easy for dial-up-connections…

Note. You should also download the patched dlls, which offer better compression and some bugfixes.

Any questions can be relayed to me or posted in the comments. Since this is sort of my very first article I publish, please be nice to me ;)

Finally, Hails and Cheers to Martin for giving me the opportunity of doing so.

Stay Metal! >-< \m/

You normally use a phone or voip to communicate which is the preferred way to give the Supporter the data that he needs to access the computer. Teamviewer uses RSA-encryption to ensure that all data is encrypted between both computers. The module on the client computer does not have to be installed at all, it can be run and supplies all information necessary. The software works even if Firewalls or Proxies are installed on the client machine.

Teamviewer offers two modes. The first is the normal remote desktop mode which gives the Supporter full control over the clients machine. You can even initiate file transfers between both computers if it is necessary to send files to the client.

The second mode is interesting as well. It is called the presentation mode which mirrors the Supporters desktop at the clients machine. The client is therefor viewing everything that the Supporter is demonstrating at his computer. Great for online presentations for instance.

Teamviewer is working on every Windows edition starting with Windows 98. There is currently no support for Linux or Mac.