Brant's community posts

Hi Pauline,

Your uninstall guide did the trick.  After following those steps, I was able to get the latest Host installed and running.  Thanks very much for that.

One thing I noticed right away, is the appearance of a security balloon in the lower right corner on the Host system (which also shows in the Viewer), indicating "Your computer has been connected in a remote session ...".  I have done some reading on this, and I understand that it was introduced as a security feature against bad actors who were abusing your software.  I fully appreciate the intent of the feature, and I have no problem with it fr om that perspective.

I did find this forum thread [click here] which talks about the issue, and it mentions a planned update (at the time) which would introduce a way of turning off that balloon, at least in the Viewer.  It goes on to say that is would only be possible on Hosts running Win10 2004 (20H1) or later.  Of course, my use case involves a Win7 SP1 host.

(By the way ... I am sorry that you bore the brunt of a lot of frustration from the user community.  I read a number of threads wh ere you were explaining the situation to people who were not happy.  What ever happened to "don't kill the messenger"? [smile])

As a result, I have a few follow-up questions ...

1) Was the feature to disable the balloon in the free version (even if only on the Viewer) ever introduced, and is it available in the latest version (7.6.2.0)?

2) Is it still true that the feature to disable the balloon will not work on Win7 in the free version?

3a) If the answer to #2 is that it is now supported on Win7, how do I go about that?

3b) If the answer to #2 is to confirm that Win7 does not support it, what about a paid license?  In other words, if I purchase a license, would I then be able to turn it off in Win7?

Many thanks for your help.

Brant

Hi Pauline,

Nice to "see" you again.  (You have helped me out a couple of times, over the years.)

Thanks for the link to the uninstall guide.  The steps are easy enough, but they will have to wait a bit until I have access to the remote machine.  (Right now, I am staying close to home, monitoring a sump pump that needs to run every 5 minutes.  We are experiencing some severe weather, with lots of power outages across Ontario.)

I will be back in touch again in a day or two.

Cheers,
Brant

Hello,

I recently tried to upgrade v6.8 to the latest 7.6 version (to take advantage of 4K monitor support and a number of other nice enhancements), and I ran into an issue when trying to update the Host.  (Updating the Viewer on my laptop went through without a hitch.)

On the Host system, it told me the existing version needed to be uninstalled and that all of the settings would be migrated to the new version.  Great; that is the nice way of handling things <kudos!>.  

The 7.6 installer looked after doing the uninstall, and then it began the process of installing the new Host.

It got about 65%-75% through (judging by the progress bar), and then a small window popped up indicating that Setup could not finish.  The window was not physically large enough to display all of the details, but luckily all of the details were contained in the Windows Application Log.  Those details are as follows:

Remote Utilities - Host -- Error 1722.There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action rms_set_balloon_alert, location: C:\Program Files (x86)\Remote Utilities - Host\rutserv.exe, command: -config -instalrt

This is on a Windows 7 Pro SP1 desktop system.  (Don't ask <smile>.  It is for helping a family member who has a vision issue called 'biplopia', and requires a chiseled/3D interface in order to be productive.  The modern flat interfaces of Win10/11 present some serious challenges.)

Do you have any suggestions as to how I can get the v7.6 Host to install?

Many thanks!

Brant

Hi Polina,

Thank you so much.  You hit on the critical item.  Yes, I always assumed that after the Save, the settings were ... well, um ... saved [smile]. So, I always went directly from the Save, to Connect.

It never occurred to me that I had to close the Configuration window after doing the Save, and then click on OK on RU's own window.  (After the fact, I can understand that logic - but it was not intuitive without your help.)

So, now I have success - it remembers the settings.  Not only that, but now the shortcut that I saved to the desktop allows me to connect - with all of my desired preferences - with a single action.  This is exactly what I was looking for.

Thank you again for all your help, and for sticking with this.

Cheers,
Brant

Hi Polina,

Thanks for your help.  Yes, it was the Save (not Save As) button that I was using in the first place.  I only started to dig deeper, and modify the ".rdp" file directly in the Roaming area, when things were not working as I expected.

I have followed your instructions carefully, and I still get the same results - my settings are only remembered for the one session.  If I close down RU, and try to connect again (using RDP), I am back to 1024x768 (not Full Screen), etc.

Here is what I do ...

In the RU Viewer, I right-click on the desired Host which I see is online.  I select Properties



Then I click on RDP, and click on Configure



I configure the desired screen settings (Full Screen, 24bit)



I go back to the General tab, and Save



When I first Connect, everything is fine. Then I finish my session, and I close down the RU Viewer.  Later, I start up the RU Viewer.  I go to Properties, RDP ... and I can already see that the settings have not "stuck" - they have reverted back to 1024x768, 32bit.

This happens even without the desktop icon.  I suspect that if we can get the Configuration issue resolved, the desktop icon will automatically work just fine.  It is the saving of the RDP Configuration parameters which is not working.

I look forward to your feedback / suggestions.

Cheers,
Brant

Hi there,

I am running version 6.10.10 of the Viewer and the Host (in this case, the host is on a Windows 7 system, required for support of a legacy program for a piece of specialty equipment).

I am connecting successfully using RDP-over-ID (which is the desired method in this case), and I have created a shortcut for this connection on the Viewer desktop.  All good so far.

What I would like to do is pre-configure the RDP connection parameters (eg., use Full Screen instead of 1024x768, use 24bit colour depth instead of 32bit, etc.).  If I go into the Viewer, right-click on the Host, and go to Properties, I can tweak the RDP settings to my like there and they do work - for that particular session.  But they seem to be lost when the session ends.

I have tried doing a Save of the RDP configuration, and I do see a corresponding ".rdp" file created in the "C:\Users\User\AppData\Roaming\Remote Utilities Files\rdp_connections" folder.  But when I open (edit) that file directly, in Windows, it does not have the same settings that I configured.  It seems to contain the defaults (1024x768, etc.).  Even if I change the settings and save it out again, they don't seem to stick.

Is there a way that I can permanently configure the desired RDP settings and have them remembered so that when I double-click on the desktop short cut, the remote connection will be established as I expect?

Many thanks,
Brant

Hi Polina,

That's great - thanks for the insight.

I have generated a new key, removed the old key from the viewer's storage, and added the new one.

Now ... how will you know know which key to block?  I would rather not disclose all of my details in an open forum.  Is there a support email address I should use, to tell you which email address is the old one?

Cheers,
Brant

Hello,

I have changed the email address in my account to reflect my new email address (a change of domain name), and all seems well in that regard.  However, when I try to use the Recover Lost Key feature, it does not recognize the new address as being valid.  It tells me I must use the same email address as when I purchased the license.  (This is a free license, to "purchase" is not really applicable - but I got the idea [smile].)

Indeed, when I supplied my old email address to the Recover Lost Key function, it dutifully sent me my license.  That is okay for now, as I still have access to my old address by way of email forwarding.  But that is a limited time arrangement - after which I will not have access to the old address.

Is there a way to adjust the email address associated with a license? I don't really think it would be proper to simply generate a new license, as I am still the same individual I always was, and doing so would violate the agreement.

I look forward to any insight you can provide.

Regards,
Brant

PS - Keep up the great work on RU!

Hi Conrad,

Thanks for the quick reply, and thanks for your suggestion - that did the trick.  I have since experimented with various settings of these parameters, and I now understand (much better) what they mean and do.

To be brutally honest, none of the combinations give me "exactly" what I was looking for.  Don't get me wrong - it is not a deal-breaker [grin], but I do have a suggestion for a product improvement ...

Would you guys consider adding another option to the Local Mouse Pointer behaviour?  One along the lines of "Hide in viewer window", (or whatever you want to call it).

It is not that the "point" option is super-bad, or anything like that ... but, it certainly is a bit distracting for some (many?) situation(s).  I know there might be some cases where it would be important to know where both the host and viewer cursors are at all times, so I "get that".  But, that "point" option does obliterate a good portion of the remote cursor sometimes - especially in cases involving a quick-n-dirty connection fr om a relatively low-res screen (on say, a laptop or netbook) to a relatively high-res device (eg. a 1920x1080 screen) ... wh ere panning would be inconvenient, so stretch/scaling mode is used instead.

Like I said, not a deal-breaker by any means - but it sure would be nice to not have a double cursor.

Cheers!

Hello,

Like many here (I assume), I am an LMI refugee :-).  I am just starting to evaluate the RUT offerings, and so far, I like what I see.  I have worked my way through a few initial little bumps, but that's okay - I expected there might be a bit of a learning curve, since the paradigm is slightly different to LMI.

One thing I have not been able to resolve, is getting the cursor appearance on the viewer to (always) reflect what the remote is doing.  Here is a specific example ...

1) I log onto a remote system as an administrator.

2) I go to Services (ie. either by running "services.mmc", or going to  Start -> Programs -> Administrator -> Services).

3) I maximize the window.

4) Up were the column headings are, I place (hover) my cursor at the dividing line between two adjacent columns (eg. the Name column and the Description column.)

What I expect to see, is the cursor change from its normal pointer, to the bold plus sign (of sorts) with the left/right arrow heads.  But, that's not what happens.  The viewer cursor stays normal/unchanged (ie. is remain as a typical pointer).  I can see that the cursor does indeed change on the remote, but that is not reflected in the viewer. (Note that I have the host and remote systems side-by-side in the lab, so that I can observe the complete environment, end-to-end, simultaneously).

Oh - perhaps I should mention that involves XP SP3 at both ends.

In the remote connection properties (ie. through the Connection Properties button, on the window shade toolbar at the top of the viewer windows), the following potentially-pertinent settings are configured as indicated:

* 'Cursor' tab - 'Local mouse pointer' is set to "Set remote cursor shape to local cursor".
* 'Cursor' tab - 'Rendering of host's cursor' is set to "View only mode active".
* 'Advanced' tab - 'Capture alpha-blending windows' is ticked (which, incidentally, solved an issue I had been having with balloon-help/tool-tips not rendering in the viewer)

Do you have any ideas for how I can get the viewer to properly reflect what the remote cursor is doing?

Cheers!

Brant