Hacker News Reader

TIL that pcAnywhere still exists. Last time I used it, 56k modem was the state of the art.

We use it extensively since we require logging and the ability for remote troubleshooting.

You know those same capabilities are included for free with every modern operating system, right?

We can't standardize on RDP because it closes the remote display when we need someone to walk our help desk through what they are experiencing, VNC was hit or miss for features and support when we were looking at products so that wasn't used. pcAnywhere also integrates with our asset management system and help desk; both from Symantec.

> We can't standardize on RDP because it closes the remote display when we need someone to walk our help desk through what they are experiencing

That means you're looking in the wrong place. You don't want Remote Desktop. On Windows XP you want Remote Assistance, and from Windows Vista you want Windows Desktop Sharing. Same underlying protocol, but different semantics -- the session stays open on both ends.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com