Akira comes bundled with a server application called Latte. Installation and usage depends on the number of Dropbox accounts used. The user needs to place the Akira folder into the Dropbox folder on the local computer system. Other PCs that are linked to the Dropbox account can automatically use Akira. Other Dropbox user accounts need to be authorized first so that their users can make use of Akira.

Akira offers the following features once installed:

• 1. View contents of a drive.
• 2. View contents of a folder.
• 3. Run an application.
• 4. Open a file.
• 5. Delete a file.
• 6. Terminate a running process.
• 7. View currently running processes.
• 8. View a list of all available drives.
• 9. Generate a screenshot of the current screen of the server and receive it in your Dropbox.
• 10. Get a specific file from the server PC and receive it in your Dropbox.
• 11. Shutdown the server PC.
• 12. Open a website or any URL with the server’s default browser.

The program itself offers access to command line commands that activate the various functions of the program (not case sensitive).

• ABOUT – display details about the specified command.
• CLEAR – clears the screen.
• CAFELATTE – terminates the server (Latte)
• DELETE – delete the specified file.
• DRIVE – navigate to the specified drive letter.
• EXIT – terminate and sign out from the server.
• GET – get the specified file from the server machine.
• GO – navigate to the specified folder name.
• HELP – display help screen.
• KILL – terminate the specified process.
• LIST – list files and folders under the specified folder.
• LISTDRIVE – list all the available drives.
• LISTPROCESS – list all the running process.
• RUN – run the specified application, file, or website.
• SCREENSHOT – takes a screenshot of the current screen.
• SHUTDOWN – shutdown the server PC after 60 seconds.

The program can for instance be used to take a screenshot of the current screen, kill a specific process on the remote computer or display the files in a specific folder.

Akira can be downloaded from the developer’s website. It is a portable program. The only other requirement is at least one Dropbox account.

Many users felt that it was a great idea but lacked custom commands which would increase the functionality and usefulness of the software. The software developer has now released a major update of the software program which adds a plethora of new and exciting features to the application.

The program will now send a reply to the user over Twitter so that the user who initiated the command will now if it actually worked.

New commands include locking the PC, requesting the IP of the computer system, putting it on standby or hibernate, taking a screenshot of the desktop, getting the list of processes, killing processes, download a file from an url, getting a file list and files from the remote computer system.

Especially the option to download files and to get files from the local computer system are interesting new features. Users who are still missing commands can now create custom commands in the software.

Custom commands are made up of a name and linked to an executable file on the remote computer system. It would be really nice if the program would accept batch files as well as executables.

The additions to TweetMyPC increase the usefulness of the software program.

The information that are displayed after the network scan are – among others – computer names, IP addresses, operating systems, uptime, MAC address, domain name and user name. The collected data can be sorted in numerous ways. The free version of NEWT has a few limitations like only being able to scan and monitor 25 computers, no SNMP device detection or multithreaded IP Range discovery.

Next to the computer analysis it is possible to send a few commands to remote computers in the network. It is possible to send messages, ping computers or to turn them on or off remotely.

The network monitoring software is compatible with most Microsoft operating systems including Windows XP, Windows Vista and even the soon to be released Windows 7.

Update: The network monitoring software Newt has been discontinued by its developers. The project page simply states that NEWT Freeware is no longer available, and that its developers are dedicating all resources to the professional version of the applications.

If you are looking for a network monitoring software you may want to check out the following alternative which we have reviewed in the past:

York – A network monitor for the Windows operating system that automatically filters traffic into groups such as passwords, files or pictures. The program supports logging into files and saving of the raw network traffic into a file for further analysis.

The program is compatible with all 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system. Just follow the link above to find out more about it.

The computer will not shutdown automatically – usually – unless the software offers the means to shutdown the computer automatically once its operation completes. Enter All Off which is a small software program that can shutdown a computer automatically under certain circumstances.

It monitors mouse, keyboard and cpu activity and will initiate a shutdown if there has not been activity for over 600 seconds. All parameters can be changed in the options to suite the needs of the user.

It is for instance possible to change the no activity time to a value between 5 and 1800 seconds, the cpu load from 5 to a value between 1 and 30 or the cpu threshold to a value between 5 and 50.

The very same menu provides the options to determine the shut down type. Available are Power Off, Hibernate, Monitor, Reboot, Shutdown or Standby.

Another interesting possibility is the option to use the software on remote computers. All Off can be installed as a Slave on the remote computers so that they can be monitored over a network or the Internet.

The application is free for personal use. The developer requires a registration on his website though. The slave computer systems do not require a registration code.

Update: The latest version of All Off has been released recently. The new version comes with an automatic update checker, changes to the program parameters like the inactivity delay timer and a new system tray icon that shows the program’s status.

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/

I can then copy files from and to my dedicated server using this secure connection. I upload new websites this way or download mysql backups or other files that i want to store locally. Well, today version 4 of WinSCP was released as a beta. The main additions are ftp support (remember it supported SFTP before only) and SSH tunnel support. The later feature is not that important for me but the first is really nice.

The changelog for WinSCP 4.0 beta lists a lot of bug fixes and changes that would be to much to list here at my site. Just take a look at the changelog at the official site if this is really interesting for you.

What do you use to connect to a dedicated server ? Remember that I’m still using Windows mainly which limits the choice of programs that I could use.