Providing Support

Once vinagre is installed. Go to the mintMenu once again and search for remote. There should now be two entries here one was address above in the Receiving Support section. The other, Remote Desktop Viewer is the one we’re concerned with here. Go ahead and launch it and click on the Connect button on the top left.

This will give you a simple options window. The Protocol should be set (if not already) to VNC. The Host should be provided by the person you will be supporting. It should be their NUMBER (their IP address) that they should have found in Receiving Support Setup & Configuration section.

Note: If they didn’t have UPnP setup on their router they will only have a local IP address that will look something like 192.168.1.nnn (There are other variations, but they are much less common). When in doubt test it out and read the previous section as they may need to verify that UPnP is configured on their router.

Below Host is a number of Connection options. You may with to enable Scaling if the supported system will have a larger or smaller screen (or just to make it easier to provide support from a window with other programs open of your own).

Also, if you or they have a slower connection enabling Use JPG Compression as well as reducing the Color Depth can help (at the cost of the quality of the remote display!).

Once all the settings are configured as required click the Connect button and once they hit the Allow button on the Another user is trying to view your desktop pop-up you should become connected!

Closing

Well there you have it. You should now either be able to receive support from a trusted party, or be able to provide it yourself (as well as have a hopefully useful link to provide to those you may be supporting!).

Variations on this setup can also be used to remote connect to your own systems be they headless or just inconvenient to physically access at times.

If you enjoyed this guide be sure to check out my other guides as well! I have been writing these guides for a little over a year now, and Ainer.org has existed for less than that. I have traditionally been writing these guides for my own technical and soft-skill development as well as for the benefit of the greater community. However, I am currently working towards doing more and more guides and hoping to spend more time on this. If you appreciate the guides and would like to see more in the future consider spreading the word in any manner you like (I use Twitter and Diaspora for social networking myself and frequent several forums).

Further, if you are able and willing, a donation of any size (no matter how small) will help me get to the point of hopefully one day doing this full time. Other than that a kind word or anything else you can think of is always appreciated (and I respond to all feedback and questions I receive!).

Anyway, enjoy your new found ability to provide or receive remote desktop sharing support and take care!