Last night I successfully used HamachiX to establish an audio
iChat connection, when normal attempts were being blocked.
<http://hamachix.spaceants.net/>
When my wife travels, we frequently use audio iChat connections
instead of the phone. We will stay connected for hours and after
awhile it feels like our spouse is just in the other room.
Last night we tried to establish an audio iChat, but kept failing.
We suspect the iChat ****ts used for audio connections were being
blocked by the Hotel or the Hotel's ISP.
NOTE: We have made audio iChat connections dozens
of times when my wife is traveling, so we know
it typically works between our systems without
a problem.
So I got the bright idea to try HamachiX. Hamachi easily
establishes a Virtual Private Network (VPN), with all the systems
on the same subnet.
I started HamachiX on my system, then I talked my wife through
installing HamachiX and joining my already running Hamachi
network. Installation is easy and NO reboots needed.
We then enabled Bonjour within iChat and immediately saw each
other in the iChat Bonjour buddy list.
Finally we tried an audio iChat via the Bonjour buddy list, and it
"WORKED!". We were both amazed and delighted.
I think the 2 critical things were, a) Hamachi put both systems on
the same subnet (Bonjour does not cross subnet boundaries), and b)
Apple's Bonjour will see that you are part of multiple subnets and
advertise on all of them. After that it was all down hill.
HamachiX is a Mac OS X front end to Hamachi. Hamachi was acquired
by LogMeIn.com
<https://secure.logmein.com/products/hamachi/vpn.asp>
The free option allows up to 64 nodes (enough to sup****t your
entire family). The following is some of their "Marketing Speak",
but I think it is an accurate summation of Hamachi:
"LogMeIn Hamachi is a VPN service that easily
sets up in 10 minutes, and enables secure remote
access to your business [or home] network, anywhere
there's an Internet connection.
It works with your existing firewall, and requires
no additional configuration. Hamachi is the first
networking application to deliver an unprecedented
level of direct peer-to-peer connectivity."
Hamachi works with Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux systems.
Besides enabling iChat via Bonjour, when blocked by the Hotel,
HamachiX has menu items for easily making AppleShare or SMB file
server connections via the VPN.
I've done a few other experiments, and I'm able to make a VNC
connection using Apple Remote Desktop and Chick of the VNC across
the Hamachi VPN. I had to use the Hamachi VPN IP addresses to
establish the VNC connection, but it worked. AND this is an
encrypted connection across the internet.
Since I'm still my wife and I are still on Mac OS X Tiger 10.4.11,
I don't know if Leopard's iChat screen sharing or "Back to my Mac"
features would be affected by a Hotel's ****t blocking or if
Hamachi would provide a work around in those situations. But it
is something to keep in mine. I have experimented enough with
Leopard on another system to know that HamachiX does run on
Leopard.
Bob Harris
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