Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

Just in case some of you have to administer Windows servers remotely via the N900 these are the steps that you can do:

1. if you haven't yet done so, open up port 3389 on your company firewall and route the traffic to your server (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/u...ity/rdfaq.mspx)
(your server needs a public IP address for this. If your server has a private IP, then you'd need to VPN in to your office network first)
2. enable remote desktop access on your server (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/814590)
3. if you're behind a firewall at your home (or at a friend's house) that doesn't have all the outgoing ports open by default, allow port 3389
4. download rdesktop to your N900 via App Manager. It is in extras-devel, so use caution. (http://maemo.org/packages/view/rdesktop-cli/)
5. run it

The whole session is encrypted, so there's no need to go through VPN (unless your company policy requires it. Hopefully in the future N900 adds PPTP support)

It has excellent UI refresh speed, much better than VNC. Besides, since Windows servers have the built in RDP protocol there's no need to install a VNC server.

Works like a charm. This has increased the utility of my N900 big time. Now I don't have to get out of my bed when anything goes wrong with my servers.

Note: the same technique works with any Windows system. I tested it on Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003.

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

rofl where do i start?
nope don't want to start another pointless flame war...

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

I guess some people have unlimited access to modify their network infrastructure, ability to bypass any change request process, and use unauthorized devices, running unapproved apps on their networks...others do not?

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

I sat here for 10 minutes trying to think how you could start a flame war on something like this. :confused:

Guess I must be missing something. :D

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

Maybe you have to work in the IT dept for a "secure" location to understand?

:p

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

haha deadmalc :)

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

All my servers are in a bunker. Does that count? :)

Yeah, I must have missed something. The idea is sound though. Though I administer *nix boxes mostly and use VNC if I need a GUI. Perl scripts do a majority of my administration though. :D

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

...and if you are not willing to use the RDP default port (for sec reasons even MS recommends to change) you have to use rdesktop-cli (instead of rdesktop) because rdesktop does not support different ports then the default one. Run rdesktop-cli from the XTerminal prompt.

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

Let's start with these points...

1. Opening RDP to the world, to administer from one remote device is a bad idea.
2. Although RDP is encrypted, there is no verification of the server's identity by default - this makes it possible for man-in-the-middle attacks.
3. AFAIK rdesktop doesn't support TLS, so enabling it to reduce the risk of a man-in-the-middle attack is not an option.
4. VPN is good. Off the top of my head, OpenVPN and vpnc (Cisco compatible VPN client) are both available for Maemo, so there is no reason not to use it.

Re: Administering your Windows Servers with N900
 

You can also add openconnect (for Cisco SSL VPN solutions) to the list of VPN clients available on maemo...