Late last summer, ICON’s officers were discussing other ways we could help our members with their computer problems, and President Mary Phillips suggested that we had never really explored the Remote Assistance feature offered in Windows XP. Since this was an area of XP I had never taken the time to learn, I immediately agreed to prepare a review.

I knew there were several differences between the Home and Professional versions of XP. When XP Home came installed on the laptop Terry and I purchased three years ago, I was very surprised to find that IIS (Internet Information Services) was NOT a part of the Home version. Most folks don’t know or care about IIS, but it is critical to Web designers, and since it HAD been a part of Windows 98SE, it never even occurred to me that it would be omitted from XP Home. I DO remember that at the time XP was released, there was a lot of discussion about "remote" something or other, and that it required XP Professional, so in order to learn about Remote Assistance, I upgraded.

Upgrading to XP Pro from Home is not difficult. It can be loaded "on top of" XP Home if, like me, you don’t have the time to reinstall all your software, settings and files, although a"clean install" accomplished by reformatting the hard drive and reinstalling EVERYTHING would be my preference because it would allow for a cleaner registry and for getting rid of files installed three years ago that are no longer needed. (Be certain to back everything up prior to upgrading OR clean-installing!)

Remote Desktop

The first thing I learned after the upgrade is that XP offers TWO different remote services. The first, Remote Desktop, allows a user to connect to and actually work with a computer across the Internet via a single session of Terminal Services. This service is directed at a business user or a home user who is away from home. The computer being connected to is the "server" and it MUST have XP Pro installed. The computer (or Pocket PC or Smartphone) doing the connecting is the"client," and it can be running XP Home, Windows Mobile or even Windows 98. This is a very useful way to work on your work computer on an icy day while sitting in the comfort of your own home, or to access your home computer from a WiFi hot spot while on vacation. (Of course, you have to remember to leave the client computer on, and your work environment/firewall must allow such connections.) To learn more about getting started with Remote Desktop, visit Microsoft’s site for this July 2006 article, complete with helpful screenshots.

Remote Assistance

To my utter surprise (and delight), the Remote Assistance feature, which allows one user’s computer (the Expert’s) to connect to another’s (the Novice’s) computer, does NOT require XP Pro. It does require both computers to be using some version of XP (or later, Vista). Hurray! That means that an ICON member whose problem we’ve been unable to resolve on our Forum could send me an "invitation" to allow me to connect to their computer without my having to drive across town (or out of town) to their home. With their permission, I could even take over their mouse and keyboard and troubleshoot their problem while they watched. Remote Assistance works over both broadband and dial-up Internet connections. (Remote Assistance can also be configured so that Experts can offer assistance to computers in the same domain or in trusted domains. This would be especially helpful for"Help Desks" in corporate environments. However, this review assumes the Novice will initiate the request for Remote Assistance, since that is the most likely scenario for our group’s members.)

Let’s say the "look" of your desktop has changed, and despite your queries to our forums, you’ve been unable to change your computer’s settings to what they used to be. Your computer is too heavy to haul to an ICON meeting, and you (hereafter, the "Novice") really need some help. Inviting someone to help you via Remote Assistance may be your answer. Contact the person you wish to invite (hereafter, the"Expert") to help you ahead of time (preferably at an ICON meeting or via e-mail). Complete the following steps :

1. Boot your computer, and make sure you are logged in as the Administrator. (If you have only one"user" set up on your computer, then that is the Administrator account.)
2. Connect to the Internet in your usual way.
3. Click Start > Help and Support > Invite a friend to connect to your computer with Remote Assistance. Then click the"Invite someone to help you" link.
4. Enter the e-mail address of the person whom you want to invite to help you, and then click the"Invite this person" link. (There are three ways to send an invitation; for purposes of this article, I’m using the e-mail method.)
5. In the window that appears, enter your name and any message you would like to add to the person whom you are inviting to help you. Click Continue.
6. Next, enter a time for the invitation to expire. You can select a number of minutes, hours or days. For security reasons, a shorter time is better, say four hours. I would not select a time longer than a day. You can always send a second invitation if need be.
7. Require the recipient to use a password. You will need to communicate via phone or e-mail the password you set to the recipient. Click "Send Invitation." If you have a firewall installed, you will need to allow a connection to the Internet. Click OK to any warnings you get about the use of your address book.
   
   If you have problems sending an invitation, it may be because Remote Assistance has been disallowed on your system. To check, click Start > Control Panel > System (OR in some systems, the path may be Start > control Panel > Performance and Maintenance > System). Click the Remote tab, and make certain the box next to "Allow remote assistance invitations to be sent from this computer" is checked.
   
8. Make sure you are online at the appointed time.

Upon receipt of your e-mail, the Expert clicks the link and is prompted for the password you attached to the invitation. Your computer verifies the invitation and password are valid, and you receive a notice (popup window) that the Expert wants to open the session. If you agree to start the session, a Novice chatdialog box will open on your computer, and an Expert Console will open on the Expert’s computer. The Expert can now see everything on your computer, just as you can.

The Expert can request to take control of your mouse and keyboard by clicking the"Take Control" button on his console. If you choose to allow the Expert to take control, you can terminate that control at any time by 1) pressing the escape key, 2) pressing the Control and C keys at the same time, or 3) pressing Stop Control in the Novice chat window. You can then watch the Expert as they troubleshoot your problem. Needless to say, you would not want to give control of your computer, even for a few minutes, to someone you do not trust!

Windows XP was released in October 2001, and you may be wondering why it is worthwhile to review a product that is five years old, especially with the release of Windows Vista being imminent. First of all, I believe that a number of our ICON members will wait to upgrade to Vista until they purchase a new computer. Microsoft will be providing Live Updates (security patches) for at least four years after Vista is released, giving our members until 2011 to upgrade. (For a good summary of Microsoft’s XP plans, see Ed Bott’s Ziff Davis blog. Secondly, Remote Assistance will be available in Vista, too, as a stand-alone application with enhanced features. Microsoft’s site says the Vista version will be compatible with the XP version in most of the ways we would be using it. ICON will be supporting both XP and Vista for a while to come, and I think use of the Remote Assistance feature may help us provide that support for our members. In the coming months, we’ll be adding more information to our Web site about Remote Assistance. Stay tuned!