Remote Access Over the Net

swinnie

swinnie

swinnie

Soldato
Joined
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Kent
Hey Guys

I have a friend who runs a website design business and works from home, however he is considering getting office space next year to allow him to focus and separate his work from home, but would like to be able to access his office network from home.

I suggested setting up a VPN with Windows Server 2003 but he asked if there are any free alternatives.

Are there any free alternatives that will allow us to set-up a VPN with a Linux Distro?

Thanks in Advance.
 
swinnie said:
Hey Guys

I have a friend who runs a website design business and works from home, however he is considering getting office space next year to allow him to focus and separate his work from home, but would like to be able to access his office network from home.

I suggested setting up a VPN with Windows Server 2003 but he asked if there are any free alternatives.

Are there any free alternatives that will allow us to set-up a VPN with a Linux Distro?

Thanks in Advance.
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VNC Free Edition tunnelled over an SSH connection; negates the need for a VPN.

Or even better, convince him to pay up a little and buy VNC Enterprise Edition:

http://www.realvnc.com
 
Thanks Dracata.

I already use Linux but will have a look at SSH. Do you recommend any particular Linux Distribution?
 
For his SSH server I'd recommend OpenSuSE personally (see sig ;) ). YaST will be able to help him configure his box nicely, not making it overly complicated for him. Second to SuSE I'd recommend a CentOS box.

The thing is, what kind of services is he going to want to access/run/use when he's connected in to the office? a VPN would be best if he's going to want to open up dreamweaver and pull files off a share without fuss as if he were sat in the office itself.

You could run something like OpenVPN on a linux machine, which I think is a server + client bundle, although I have no experience of it myself.
 
FirebarUK said:
For his SSH server I'd recommend OpenSuSE personally (see sig ;) ). YaST will be able to help him configure his box nicely, not making it overly complicated for him. Second to SuSE I'd recommend a CentOS box.
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Thanks FirebarUK. I have used OpenSuSE before and is a great Linux Distribution!

The thing is, what kind of services is he going to want to access/run/use when he's connected in to the office? a VPN would be best if he's going to want to open up dreamweaver and pull files off a share without fuss as if he were sat in the office itself.
Click to expand...

That is exactly what he wants to do! That is why I did originally say Server 2003.


You could run something like OpenVPN on a linux machine, which I think is a server + client bundle, although I have no experience of it myself.
Click to expand...

I think I will check out this OpenVPN software. Thanks for the advice.

If anyone else has any ideas they are appreciated.
 
That is exactly what he wants to do! That is why I did originally say Server 2003.
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Don't get me wrong, you can do this using VNC over SSH, but its sort of a roundabout method and you'll probably get pretty poor speed/responsiveness over a normal BB connection.

Server 2003 may be easiest for either of you to setup, in which case go for it. Yet there are the free alternatives, and with a little perseverance will offer you greater control and better security.
 
I am going to try the free option first as I am intrigued to see how it will handle in a small business environment.

Thanks for all of your help guys.
 
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