Access home Mac from anywhere?

mattarino · July 9, 2004 12:30AM

Ok, I'm having a hell of a time trying to set this up. All I want to do is set up my Mac at home so that I can access the files while I'm out of the house from my laptop. I'm not a super-user, and I've had a tough time finding the info to start from scratch and/or to go step by step with the processes.

Here is my home setup: DSL internet connection, wireless Netgear router. My desktop Mac is connected via ethernet.

I have monkeyed with ssh, port forwarding, VNC, blah blah blah. I can't seem to get anything to work right. Can someone help with instructions/advice? Thanks in advance.

allinone · July 9, 2004 9:18AM

Quote:

Originally posted by mattarino

Ok, I'm having a hell of a time trying to set this up. All I want to do is set up my Mac at home so that I can access the files while I'm out of the house from my laptop. I'm not a super-user, and I've had a tough time finding the info to start from scratch and/or to go step by step with the processes.

Here is my home setup: DSL internet connection, wireless Netgear router. My desktop Mac is connected via ethernet.

I have monkeyed with ssh, port forwarding, VNC, blah blah blah. I can't seem to get anything to work right. Can someone help with instructions/advice? Thanks in advance.

To connect to your home remotely you need to know the internet address of your home. This can either be an IP address (XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX) or a domain name (foo.bar.co.uk).

If you have DSL you probably have a dynamic IP address (static IP addresses are available for an additional cost generally). If you have a dynamic IP address that means that your IP address is leased to you and changes periodically. The addresss you have now may not be the one that you have in an hour, day, week depending on the set up of your ISP.

You can seee what your currently IP address is in your router configuration screen. Or you can visit a site that displays it for you, such as this one:

http://www.lawrencegoetz.com/programs/ipinfo/

If you have a dynamic IP address you can still connect via a domain name if you get a dynamic dns client. google on "dynamic dns mac" and read up on it a bit. Basically you subscribe to service (some are free) that maps your dynamic IP address to a static name. This mapping is kept up to date by a client that runs on your desktop and connects periodically with the subscription server.

Once you have your address you still only have the address of your router, not your Mac. That is where the port forwarding comes in. Each service has a different port. So if you wanted to connect to a webserver running on your Mac you would have to forward port 80 to your Mac (tho some isps ban some ports). Here is a list of port numbers with their protocals:

http://www.iana.org/assignments/port-numbers

Hope that helps. come back with questions.

AIO

mattarino · July 9, 2004 9:54AM

So I've registered with DYNDNS.org. Setup as username@dyndns.org.

Running client on computer: "DNSUpdate" to update IP address.

So now, I'm not sure of the best format to connect remotely. Do I need to SSH or use some other method? I need to know this to know what ports to open and forward. Thanks!

allinone · July 9, 2004 10:07AM

Well done.

You said you want to access files...

Couple choices:

Filesharing, FTP, SFTP

actually there are lots and lots of choices...

TB2, VNC, Remote Desktop, etc etc

FTP is very insecure. Data and even passwords are passed unencrypted.

For simplicity, power and security I recommend just opening SSH and connecting via SFTP.

You will need an SFTP client. Transmit and Interarchy are commerical FTP clients that have SFTP support.

http://www.panic.com/transmit/

http://www.interarchy.com/main/

Fugu is a newer SFTP only client that is free.

http://rsug.itd.umich.edu/software/fugu/

SSH runs on port 22.

In your router port forwarding screen point port 22 to the LAN address of your Mac.

mattarino · July 9, 2004 10:26AM

Alright, so if I go into my router interface, then into the Port Forwarding section, here are the options I have with the numbers I supplied:

Service Type: TCP/UDP

Starting Point: 22

Ending Point: 22

Server IP Address: (the IP supplied by the router for my computer)

Do I have this correct?

I do use transmit for FTP. So, when I go to the remote computer, what will I need to enter in transmit in order to login?

allinone · July 9, 2004 12:12PM

Quote:

Originally posted by mattarino

Alright, so if I go into my router interface, then into the Port Forwarding section, here are the options I have with the numbers I supplied:

Service Type: TCP/UDP

Starting Point: 22

Ending Point: 22

Server IP Address: (the IP supplied by the router for my computer)

Do I have this correct?

I do use transmit for FTP. So, when I go to the remote computer, what will I need to enter in transmit in order to login?

Yes the router settings sound correct.

The address you will use is the one you chose when you set up your dyn-dns service. I am not familiar with the details of DYNDNS.org but they should have explained it to you either on their site or in an welcome email.

Should be something like:

mattarino.DYNDNS.org

so in transmit you would do following:

sftp://username

assword@mattarino.DYNDNS.org

Where username

assword is the username and password on your Mac.

Need to make sure you have remote login turned on in you Mac's Sharing preferences.

Once this is set up properly you will also be able to connect to your Mac remotely through the terminal.

In terminal you would type the following command in your remote machine:

ssh -l <username> mattarino.DYNDNS.org

where again, username is the user name of the Mac sitting at home.

you will then be prompted for the password.

The first time you connect you will be asked it you want to accept the key (you do).

Hope this helps.

Edit: smilies off

mattarino · July 9, 2004 12:39PM

Thank you so much for the great help!

It looks like I can access from my laptop via Transmit. Pretty cool. Still, since I'm testing it while still on the same network, I'm still not totally convinced that it fully works. I'll have to take my laptop out to test.

So, back to SSH, it looks like I was able to log in via the terminal. It went as far as asking for and accepting my password, followed by a "Welcome to Darwin". So, now what? Should I see the computer load onto my desktop, or do I have to supply code? Your further assistance with this would be great.

allinone · July 9, 2004 12:58PM

Quote:

Originally posted by mattarino

Thank you so much for the great help!

It looks like I can access from my laptop via Transmit. Pretty cool. Still, since I'm testing it while still on the same network, I'm still not totally convinced that it fully works. I'll have to take my laptop out to test.

So, back to SSH, it looks like I was able to log in via the terminal. It went as far as asking for and accepting my password, followed by a "Welcome to Darwin". So, now what? Should I see the computer load onto my desktop, or do I have to supply code? Your further assistance with this would be great.

If you have dial up account you can test if your set up works without leaving the house. Just take the laptop off of the LAN and connect to the internet through your modem....

No, terminal access is only going to give you command line... You are never going to see your desktop in terminal!

You can use it to do command line functions (reboot, softwareupdate etc etc).

If you are interested in viewing your desktop remotely you can look into Apple Remote Desktop (commerical), Timbuktu (commercial cross platform) or VNC (free cross platform). In your initial post you stated that you were intereseted in sharing files not viewing your desktop. But that is possible too.

I am a Timbuktu user, but only because of legacy. If I were going into it now I would evaluate VNC first. I don't know enough about it to help you, but to say that you will need to install a VNC server on the Desktop machine and a VNC client on the Laptop and set your router to forward the necessary port(s).

I know people like "chicken of VNC" as the client:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/cotvnc/

not sure of server component.

Best,

Peter

towel · July 10, 2004 6:52PM

You can also do old-fashioned Apple File Sharing via IP. It's not encrypted like SFTP is, but it makes your remote disk show up on the Desktop just like a local disk, so you can browse it in the Finder. To use it, you need to follow a few steps similar to what you've already done to enable SFTP:

1. On your home Mac, turn on "Personal File Sharing" in the Sharing system preference.

2. Tell your router to forward ports 427 and 548 to your home Mac.

3. On your laptop, choose "Connect to Server" under the Go menu (or cmd-k), and enter your home IP address. You'll be prompted for your home username and password, and for which disks you'd like to use.

dage007 · July 16, 2004 5:28PM

Another suggestion I might add is if you have a little extra cash, maybe spring for Netopia timbuktu. I use that program all the time for both mac and pc and it works absolutely great. Just like I was there.

I find the files that I want and thats it.

DD

fahlman · July 16, 2004 5:34PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Towel

You can also do old-fashioned Apple File Sharing via IP.

If the computer has a dynamic IP addy can this same thing be accomplished using a URL from a service such as dyndns.org?

dage007 · July 16, 2004 5:45PM

I am currently hooked up to a cable ISP. The problem is that they dont offer a static IP, so basicly what I do is go to a site maybe even the norton internet security check site and see what the long name is of your madem.

It will be fairly long, maybe 50-75 characters. MIne start with CPD....

anyways, just use that for the computer address when using timbuktu and away you go. Also, timbuktu has a free service that you set up the remote computers and it automaticaly detects your IP for you so if it ever changes it will know how to get to that computer. You just enter your name or email and the server finds your computer.

Took me a couple of days to get all teh options etc... down pack, but after that it was the greatest program for remote that I found.

DD

Access home Mac from anywhere?

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