Working in the office, while you're out!

Most businesses run their day to day systems (e.g. Sage, Act!, CRM) and access their work files on a central server or computer within their main office. It is also common that directors or employees need to access these business applications or files from home or other locations (even abroad).

We are often asked about solutions to fulfil this requirement and although each client's requirements tend to be different we can always accommodate using one or a combination of the below technologies:

VPN (Virtual Private Network) - A VPN connection is basically like running a really long network cable from your office to your home, another office or other internet location. It allows you to connect two or more locations together privately over the internet. VPN is a fairly cheap method of providing connectivity from out of the office however it is not really suitable when trying to access large files or databases across it as this can be quite slow.

Remote Desktop - Windows XP Professional and Windows Vista Business, Enterprise and Ultimate has a facility built-in called Remote Desktop which allows you to connect to your pc across the internet as long as you have set everything up to allow this and obviously secured it properly. Combined with a Windows Small Business Server this becomes really easy to use as well as increasing security. This is a great solution if you need access to your own PC at work however isn't great if you only use a Laptop and you don't have a desktop system at work to connect to.

VNC for Mac users - This gives the same functionality as Remote Desktop in windows however it doesn't have the same integration with the Windows Small Business Server. This is still a good way of accessing your Mac from remote locations though, plus VNC is free! We recommend using Vine Server

Terminal Server - this works the same way as remote desktop in Windows XP however with a terminal server you can have multiple users connected to the one machine at any time. This is the most ideal solution if you have more than one user who needs to connect to the office and they don't have their own PC in the office. It's also great for businesses with multiple sites or to centralise the management of IT policies.