remote assistance to local network computer

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chris Cowles
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C

Chris Cowles

My computer is in a Windows workgroup with another computer on a wireless
network. My computer is connected to the Linksys 802.11g router by CAT5; the
other is wireless. The other computer has both remote desktop and remote
assistance enabled. Remote desktop is limited to administrators and I can
connect from the local computer to the remote computer

If I attempt to offer help with remote assistance, the local computer cannot
discover the remote computer by name or by ip address. If I initiate the
assistance session by creating an invitation on the remote computer, RA
works fine when I open it.

BTW, I have OneCare as a firewall on both, but Remote Assistance is
configured as an exception at both ends. The fact I can connect and control
the other computer by invitation suggests to me that the firewall is not the
issue.

What's not configured correctly?

TIA
 
Chris Cowles said:
My computer is in a Windows workgroup with another computer on a wireless
network. My computer is connected to the Linksys 802.11g router by CAT5;
the other is wireless. The other computer has both remote desktop and
remote assistance enabled. Remote desktop is limited to administrators and
I can connect from the local computer to the remote computer

If I attempt to offer help with remote assistance, the local computer
cannot discover the remote computer by name or by ip address. If I
initiate the assistance session by creating an invitation on the remote
computer, RA works fine when I open it.

BTW, I have OneCare as a firewall on both, but Remote Assistance is
configured as an exception at both ends. The fact I can connect and
control the other computer by invitation suggests to me that the firewall
is not the issue.

What's not configured correctly?

TIA
Click to expand...

Chris,

With Windows XP you could only use the Remote Assistance "offer"
functionality in a domain or trusted domain environment. FWIW I am seeing
the same thing here in my small work group test environment when I tried to
offer RA support to another Vista test machine, ie. a Vista Home Basic PC,
from my Vista Ultimate desktop PC. So with that said it appears that Vista
is the same as XP was, ie. offer only works in a domain environment.

Here is a work around that may work for you in the interim...

http://theillustratednetwork.mvps.org/RemoteAssistance/RemoteAssistance.html

--

Al Jarvi (MS-MVP Windows Networking)

Please post *ALL* questions and replies to the news group for the
mutual benefit of all of us...
The MS-MVP Program - http://mvp.support.microsoft.com
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
rights...
 
Sooner Al said:
Chris,

With Windows XP you could only use the Remote Assistance "offer"
functionality in a domain or trusted domain environment. FWIW I am seeing
the same thing here in my small work group test environment when I tried
to offer RA support to another Vista test machine, ie. a Vista Home Basic
PC, from my Vista Ultimate desktop PC. So with that said it appears that
Vista is the same as XP was, ie. offer only works in a domain environment.

Here is a work around that may work for you in the interim...

http://theillustratednetwork.mvps.org/RemoteAssistance/RemoteAssistance.html

--

Al Jarvi (MS-MVP Windows Networking)

Please post *ALL* questions and replies to the news group for the
mutual benefit of all of us...
The MS-MVP Program - http://mvp.support.microsoft.com
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
rights...
Click to expand...

Have you seen this?

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/Help/2001f924-eed7-4e5a-88d7-79c29a5e154c1033.mspx

Click on "Show All" and see the "Using a Computer Name or IP Address"
section for a procedure to set this up in a work group environment. Note
that I have not tried this yet...

Please post back with your results, good or bad...:-)

Good luck...

--

Al Jarvi (MS-MVP Windows Networking)

Please post *ALL* questions and replies to the news group for the
mutual benefit of all of us...
The MS-MVP Program - http://mvp.support.microsoft.com
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
rights...
 
Sooner Al said:
Have you seen this?

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/Help/2001f924-eed7-4e5a-88d7-79c29a5e154c1033.mspx

Click on "Show All" and see the "Using a Computer Name or IP Address"
section for a procedure to set this up in a work group environment. Note
that I have not tried this yet...
Click to expand...

Offering help doesn't seem to work in home network environment, but I was
not able to follow all the instructions. There is no "Offer Remote
Assistance Helpers group" as described in the latter URL, in Computer
Manage> Local Groups. On my main workstation from which I want to offer
Click to expand...
help, there is a "HelpServicesGroup" group. That doesn't exist on the
machine I want to help. I created it as a new group on the target machine,
and created ""Offer Remote Assistance Helpers" on both. I added my account
to both groups on both computers. (Both machines have the same user
credentials on them.)

I had already excepted msra in the firewall, and added raserver to both
machines. I also created an exception for TCP 135, in and out, for local
subnet only, on both.

I still cannot find the target machine by either IP or name, when attempting
to offer help. Because the user groups were not there, and I don't know how
to grant rights (or what rights to grant) to newly created groups, I can't
say I've got it set up completely.

I'm already using the invitation file method, by saving it in
Public\Documents on the target machine. I can browse to the directory on the
network, so it's not a problem. I was just hoping to do it a more elegant
manner. I'll tweak the registry to allow a 99 day duration, rather than the
current 30 day limit.

Thanks for the help.
 
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