The Devolutions Blog

You may know that Devolutions is headquartered in Canada. And you may also know that we’re located about half-an-hour from the wonderful city of Montreal.

But what you may not know is that starting July 8, Montreal will be home to what some folks feel is the greatest geekfest in the world: Montreal Comiccon! The event will take place at the Palais des congrès of Montreal (click here for venue, ticket, and other information).

As you can imagine, the team here is really excited. Here’s a rundown of some of the people we hope to meet, and that you can meet as well if you’re lucky enough to attend:

William Shatner, Nichelle Nichols, Brent Spiner & Kate Mulgrew

Not one … not two … not three … but FOUR Star Trek legends at the same time! It’s a perfect way to gear up for the epic Star Trek 50th anniversary, which will take place in August. You don’t have to be a Trekkie to be excited about this, and to appreciate all the good things that Star Trek has brought into the world. SET PHASERS ON COOL!

Billy Dee Williams

The one and only Lando Calrissian in person! I’m a huge Star Wars fan, and so you know I’m looking forward to this. I wonder if he’s sick of being asked questions about the Millennium Falcon and his complex friendship with Han Solo.

John Barrowman

Any Doctor Who fans out there? Well, here’s your chance to meet Captain Jack Harkness, the star of the spin-off series Torchwood. Harkness has actually done a lot of other acting, but he’s at Montreal Comiccon because he’s ridden the Tardis!

Bob Morley

Have you ever heard of a TV show called The 100? If not, then check it out! In my humble opinion, it’s probably the best show out there. If you’re a fan like me, meeting Bob is a must.

Tom Felton

Hey Potterheads! One of the most well-known characters in the franchise, , will be making an appearance. Now, I’m sure Felton is a great guy, but in the Harry Potter series, he’s hard to like (he’s actually a jerk!). But that just means he’s a great actor.

Ernie Hudson

“If there’s something strange / in your neighborhood / who you gonna call?” Well, although screaming out “Ghostbusters!” is more catchy, to be specific you’ll be hailing (among others) one of the original Ghostbusters, Ernie Hudson. Yes, the quirky and lovable Winston has been schedule to visit us with his trusty Ecto-1. A couple of day ago the Comiccon announce that is event was postponed. We still don’t know if Ernie Hudson will be with us in Montreal but we all wish to meet him this weekend. How can meeting him not be on our bucket list

Car Lovers Rejoice!

So maybe you’re not into sci-fi, but you’re a gearhead instead. Well, there are some SWEET ICONIC RIDES at Montreal Commicon this weekend, including:

The ’67 Impala from Supernatur
The ’77 Camaro from Transformers (Bumblebee)
Ecto-1 (The Ghostbusters’ car!)
The Jeep 12 from Jurassic Park
K.I.T.T (The Trans Am from Knight Rider)
The DeLorean from Back to the Future (“Hello? Hello? Anybody home? Think McFly! Think!”)

What about you?

Have we convinced some of you to jump in your car or head to the airport and get your geek on at Montreal Commicon? If so, please comment below and tell us who you want to meet. As mentioned, I’m really into this stuff – I’m a huge Star Wars, Game of Thrones, X-Men, Iron Man and The 100 fan – and so I can’t wait!

Or if you can’t make it, let us know who you’ve always wanted to meet. Share some of your experiences in attending other Comiccon (or similar) events near you. Have they met or exceeded your expectations?

Late last year we launched Remote Desktop Manager for iOS, and so far it’s proven to be a big hit! We’d like to thank everyone who has downloaded it on their device, as well as those who have shared their feedback with us.

Speaking of feedback: as you’d expect, our talented iOS development team has been working very hard to make improvements and add new features. And so today, I’d like to give you a sneak peek of what’s coming up in the next release, which is coming out soon:

New Features

Multi-tab sessions
Dashlane credential
SSH agent forwarding
RDP now support connection to a Hyper-V instance
Shared clipboard

Key Improvements

Changed cursor size in remote sessions
Can now select a private key for SSH

Bug Fixes

Fixed RD Gateway
Fixed crashing when removing a favorite
Fixed web browser forcing https usage
Fixed infinite loading after going online
Fixed crashing with variables
Fixed private keys not working in SSH
Fixed issues with user specific settings
MariaDB/MySQL will now ask for password when ‘save password’ is unchecked

Download RDM for iOS

If you have yet to experience RDM on your iPhone or iPad, download it today, free from the App Store.

Send Us Your Feedback!

As always, please let us know what you think by posting in our Forum, commenting below, or sending me an email at jdupont@devolutions.net.

Cheers!

Since launching Remote Desktop Manager for Android late last year, it’s been downloaded tens of thousands of times by IT pros around the world. We’d like to thank everyone who has given it a spin on their device!

We’ve also received plenty of great feedback, and our great Android development team has been working hard to make improvements and add new features. Here’s a look at what’s coming up in the next version, which will be released soon:

New Features

Multi-tab sessions
Full screen mode for sessions
Sub connections (view and edit)
Auto logoff when the application goes into the background
Dashlane credential support
Two-Factor Authentication for LastPass
Clipboard of Android to RDP
Session type : ILO and iDrac

Download RDM for Android

If you have yet to experience RDM on your smartphone or tablet, download it today, free from Google Play.

Send Us Your Feedback!

As noted above, we’re ALWAYS listening to your feedback, and most of the improvements we make are based on suggestions and requests from our community. Please let us know what you think by posting in our Forum, commenting below, or sending me an email at jdupont@devolutions.net .

Cheers!

There are so many options out there when come times to find a password manager that will fit perfectly for you and your company. We buckled down and searched high and low, we put our best men (and women) on the job and after days of hard work, we finally found the perfect password manager software for everyone. The one that will make you feel safe and secure, the one that is quick and easy to use…the perfect password manager software is…drumroll…EXCEL!! Here are 5 reasons why Excel won the trophy.

1 – Excel is Easy to Share

Of course, an Excel spreadsheet is so easy to share with all your colleagues! Simply send an email to your whole team with your Excel document attached to it, hit send, and voila! Your passwords have been shared with all your colleagues…and likely others as well. By the way, you did know that anyone or any program that can access internal storage can probably also read your emails and your file attachments right? Rifling through your email is one of the most common things that malware does! Remember that email was not designed with any privacy or security in mind.

Think about it, most password management software features easy data sharing between multiple users. Such software operates efficiently and securely in a multi-user environment…not by sending your information through email, but by keeping your information on a secure server with restricted access.

2 – Cross Platform access

Because the Excel app can be easily installed on phones and tablets, and Excel documents can be open on PCs and Mac, the Excel spreadsheet is perfect for cross platform access, right? I just feel like having a Homer Simpson moment right now, slapping my forehead, and saying…DOH!

It’s vital to understand what we’re actually doing when opening an Excel document on a different platform. If we update the document on our PC, it won’t automatically update on our Mac, this isn’t the picture-perfect definition of true cross-platform access! Having access to the same software on different platforms, on the other hand, and having the most up-to-date information at the same time on your Mac or PC or Linux…well now that is true cross-platform access!

3 – Secure software

Of course Excel is secure! All you need to protect your precious file is a strong password, right folks? It’s perfect. You just have to remember that one little password and you’ll have access to your Excel spreadsheet and to all your important information. Now, you do know how easy it is to find Excel-cracking programs that use dictionary attacks to work out your hard-to-guess password in just a few hours, right? Oh yeah, you’re safe from hackers … NOT!

To counter potential hackers, how about using a program that is built to be secure and to protect your valuable information by using a strong AES-256 encryption. No hackers will get through that kind of encryption. Plus, most popular password manager software uses 2-Factor authentication to add an extra layer of security. Now, that is some top-notch security!

4 – Made by a big company we trust

Excel is the product of a huge company we love and trust — Microsoft! As we all know, Microsoft has proven its power time and again, and its reputation is undeniable. It is best known for its line of Windows operating systems, Microsoft Office Suite, and Internet Explorer. It’s the world’s largest software manufacturer and one of the world’s most valuable companies. Naturally, you should blindly trust them with your most important information … NOT!

Of course, we’re not trying to compete with Microsoft; they are the best at what they do. But Microsoft didn’t build Excel with password security in mind. Think about it, would you take your broken Mac to some random computer guy or the Apple Store? Let’s let the professionals do what they do best. The Apple Store can take care of your Mac and passwords should be protected by a sophisticated password manager and not Excel!

5 – Excel is a team oriented solution

An Excel spreadsheet is the perfect team-oriented solution. You could simply use Dropbox and share your spreadsheet across your whole organization. Now you might not have Dropbox or you might not one to share the whole document through your company! You could also just update your Excel spreadsheet and email it to your team. Oh but wait, you forgot to include one of your teammates so you have to resend it! And now some of your colleagues are calling because the password they’re using isn’t working anymore…oh wait they’re using the old Excel spreadsheet and haven’t seen the updated version yet, so let’s send it again…yeah, really, I can see how easy this is to manage!

Most password managers are team-oriented for larger enterprise or small businesses, allowing for full control over your password database and letting you easily manage who can access specific passwords with a single-click of the mouse. They also strictly enforce corporate security policies.

Conclusion

Come on guys, let’s be real here! We were so surprised by how many people still believe that Excel is the best way to keep and manage passwords that we thought it was time for us to bust some myths! Excel is definitely not a password management solution and should never be considered as such. It is a spreadsheet application and it is amazing at what it was built to do. Excel is not designed from the ground up to handle passwords, and it should never be used for password management.

We just want to emphasize that password security should be taken seriously. Some of you might think that it would be too time-consuming to replace your Excel sheet with proper password management software, but a security breach could be a substantially greater loss in both man-hours and money. Taking the time to implement a proper, well-though-out solution will serve your company better in the long run. Should you need any help choosing the right password management software for your organization, please take a look at our blog post, “Most Popular Password Managers Compared”. After all, we are always looking out for our geek society!

As always, please let us know your thoughts by using the comment feature of the blog. You can also visit our forums to get help and submit feature requests, you can find them here.

We love hearing from our global community of RDMers. After all, we exist to meet your needs.

But we also know that you’re very busy — which means the sooner you get the information you need, the happier you are. And that’s why we’re reminding you today about our two video tutorial series: Getting Started and Spotlight On .

The Getting Started videos are perfect if you’re new to RDM and want to get rolling right away. They’re also great if you’re an experienced user and want to ensure you’re getting the MOST out of your RDM experience.

The Spotlight On videos are ideal if you want to learn how to setup and use a specific RDM feature.

Below is a snapshot of what’s currently available in each video tutorial series, along with links to individual videos:

Getting Started

Step 1: Register Your Data Source (launch video)
Step 2: Modify Your Options (launch video)
Step 3: Default Settings (launch video)
Step 4: Getting Set Up (launch video)
Step 5: Create Entries (launch video)
Getting Started with Remote Desktop Manager Jump: (launch video)
How to Integrate LastPass into Remote Desktop Manager: (launch video)
How to Securely Store and Share Your Passwords using KeePass: (launch video)

Spotlight On

Spotlight On User Interface: (launch video)
Spotlight On Security Group: (launch video)
Spotlight On Offline Mode: (launch video)
Spotlight On Batch Edit: (launch video)
Spotlight On Host and Templates: (launch video)
Spotlight On Execute and Export Reports: (launch video)

We hope these video tutorials help you quickly and easily get the answers you need. Of course, if you need additional support, don’t hesitate to contact our support team at support@devolutions.net.

Please also note that we’re adding more videos to both series all the time and will keep you informed here in our blog when we make an addition. If you have a suggestion on a topic or feature you’d like us to cover, contact me or comment below and I’ll make sure to pass it along to our training and development team.

Cheers!

Are you a self-professed gadget addict? If so, then you’re going to love this!

The folks over at Gadget HERO have unveiled their list of the top 5 cool gadgets that are on the horizon – all of which would make a perfect gift for that special geek on your list … or for yourself! Here’s a rundown of the gadget glory that will soon be on the market.

A High Tech Jellyfish Aquarium

It goes without saying that one of your biggest worries in life is how you’ll cope if someone in the not-too-distant future gives you a jellyfish. I mean, you’re an IT Pro, and you can’t just buy an ordinary, conventional aquarium. Fear not my friends! Reef Aquaria Design has created the perfect solution: the jellyfish cylinder! It automatically keeps water conditions just right, and the multi-colored LED lighting turns the aquarium into a futuristic work of art. It’s everything that you and your beloved jellyfish need to be happy.

A Robotic Finger

How often have you wondered how much better your life would be if you had a robotic finger to do all your button-pushing? Well, now you can realize that dream with the awesome MicroBot Push. This gadget attaches to buttons that operate things like your blender, TV, lights, coffee machine, and so on. After that, you can turn your electronics on/off (or whatever else pushing a button on them does) through your smartphone or computer. What a time to be alive!

Multi-Room Audio System

How cool would it be if you and up to 9 other people in the same house or office could wirelessly enjoy the same music or other audio – like some WoW, perhaps? Well, that’s the question that Ekko Audio is poised to answer when the company’s amazing high-fidelity WiFi audio hub for headphones/speakers hits the market in 2017.

Flying Robot!

Honestly, do we need to say anything more than “flying robot”??? OK, here’s a bit more: unlike drones that can be a safety hazard, Fleye has an innovative spherical design, and has about the same weight and size as a soccer ball. You also don’t have to be a master drone pilot to avoid turning Fleye into a smoldering pile. Instead, Fleye can execute its task autonomously, leaving you to enjoy the view and capture amazing memories.

Smart Scent Dispenser

We have smartphones and smart cars and smart homes … so why not smart scent dispensers? That’s where Pura enters the picture. This plug-in device has room for two fragrances, and you can create a scheduled release cycle based on your preferences. For example, you can tell Pura to start making your home smell lovely about 10 minutes before you get home. In contrast, a standard air freshener works non-stop, even if there’s nobody around (except maybe the dog) to enjoy the scent. Or if you’re the parent of a newborn, you can have Pura go into overdrive at about 4 a.m., which is often when your bundle of joy decides it’s time to show his or her diaper who’s boss.

What’s Your Take?

We’re huge fans of all these gadgets, and we applaud the inventors and entrepreneurs who are working hard to bring their visions to life. Click any of the above links to learn more about each amazing gadget.

Also, please tell us what you think. Do you think you’ll pick up any of these inventions for yourself or that special geek in your life? Let us know by commenting below!

Recently we hosted a Password Managers Webinar on integrating the most popular Password Managers with Remote Desktop Manager, you can find the recorded video on our Youtube channel.

In this webinar, we showcased how easy it was to implement that integration.

For most password managers, integration is fast and simple. Here are the steps:

1. Create a new credential entry.

2. Select your password manager from the list.

3. Connect your password management account to Remote Desktop Manager.

4. Use that entry from other sessions, or even better for a whole folder. (Spoiler alert! Next week blog will explain everything about inherited credentials.)

And that’s it! You’re all done, and can sit back, relax, and enjoy some hilarious Sysadminotaur comics.

However, for the most popular tool in our community, namely Keepass, integration involves a few more steps. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Create a new credential entry.

2. Select KeePass.

3. You’ll notice that a plug-in is required; you can either click Install Plug-in, or you can click: Tools – Extensions Manager – Others – KeePass Plugin. (Note: a KeePass Professional Edition (AKA 2.x) is required to proceed with the integration.)

4. You’ll see that there are multiple options in the Credential Selection tab; if you choose the Default Method, you can select a specific KeePass credential from your list, which will create a hard link to the credential stored in your KeePass database.

Another option is to select Always prompt with list. With this option, once your KeePass credential is linked to a session in RDM, you’ll notice a blue link that will grant you direct access to your KeePass credential list every time you connect, thus creating a bridge between RDM and KeePass. You will then simply have to select the proper credential for your session.

And that’s it! So easy that even Peter Griffin could do it!

For more help on how to integrate other password management software into Remote Desktop Manager (like LastPass or 1Password), please take a look at our Online help!

As always, please let us know your thoughts by using the comment feature of the blog. You can also visit our forums to get help and submit feature requests, you can find them here.

Hello IT Pros! Here’s a quiz for you:

Question: What’s better than celebrating SysAdmin Day on July 29?

Answer: Celebrating SysAdmin Day ALL WEEK from July 25-29!

And that’s exactly what we’re doing here at Devolutions, because ALL THIS WEEK you’ll get a 50% discount on a Remote Desktop Manager Enterprise single license. You can enjoy this special offer for yourself, or send it to all of your IT pro pals and give them yet another reason to think you’re the greatest.

To take advantage of this special offer, simply click the link below:

*Please note that this offer only applies to Remote Desktop Manager Enterprise single license, and will not work for any other products or packages.

About SysAdmin Day

If you’re unfamiliar with this sacred date on the Geekian Calendar, SysAdmin Day is the brainchild of Ted Kekatos (check out a great interview with Ted here). Back in 2000, he came across a magazine ad for HP showing grateful office workers giving fruit baskets and flowers to their SysAdmin who had installed their new printer. Well, Ted thought that every SysAdmin deserves to be thanked and loved, and so SysAdmin Day was born. For more information, check out the official website: http://sysadminday.com/

If you have any questions or comments, please include them below or email me at jdupont@devolutions.net.

Happy SysAdmin Week everyone!

Today, I want to take a look at superheroes. Not superheroes like Superman, but IT superheroes who have changed the world by directly and indirectly shaping our lives. They changed the world by changing the way we communicate. Here in part 1, I’ll highlight 5 IT superheroes, and then in a forthcoming part 2, we’ll look at 5 more.

Elon Musk

Musk is perhaps best known as the co-founder and CEO of Tesla Motors, which makes electric cars. But before launching Tesla, the 44-year old genius co-founded Paypal, which profoundly changed how individuals and businesses could send and receive money. And now, Musk is focusing his attention on SpaceX, which is striving to reduce the cost of human spaceflight by 90%. In fact, Musk thinks that Mars can be colonized by 2040. (Can you imagine the Air Miles you’d earn for that trip?)

Devolutions-IT-Superheroes-Mark-Zuckerberg

Devolutions-IT-Superheroes-Sheryl-Sandberg

Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg

Mark Zuckerberg is the hoodie-wearing mastermind behind the social network behemoth Facebook. But he wouldn’t be where he is today – and neither would Facebook — without COO Sheryl Sandberg. Together, the dynamic duo has helped people and companies connect like never before. They both changed the world and deserve a couple of IT superhero-grade LIKEs.

Tim Cook

Yes, Steve Jobs was a genius – but Tim Cook is no slouch, either. He’s playing a key role today in steering Apple through some uncharted waters, as expectations from both consumers and stockholders are higher than ever. I know that not everyone is an Apple fan, but we can’t discount the impact the company has had on the lives of billions of people. Cook and Apple simplified how we work with all kinds of applications. Apple has also done a lot for small enterprises and individuals by giving them visibility all around the world, especially in the music domain.

Jack Dorsey

Jack Dorsey is one of the co-founder of Twitter. In the beginning, Twitter was primarily focused on individuals and communities. But in recent years, it has become a key means for companies to stay connected with customers and other companies. In other words, Twitter has morphed into a mass information sending machine. Everything goes fast on Twitter and that’s why it’s so interesting and relevant. Plus, he’s now the CEO of Square Inc. that let us transfer money from everywhere. Keep smiling Jack! You changed the world.

Larry Page

Larry Page is the co-founder of a little search engine called Google. Perhaps you’ve heard of it? In its early days, Google had a simple algorithm that ranked websites by the number of links pointing to it, which, frankly, allowed SEO experts to exploit it. But over the years, Google has poured billions (yes, billions) of dollars into their technology, and now the algorithm is so complicated that we’re not sure even Larry Page understands how it works (not that he’s likely to care). You may flip-flop between loving and hating Google, but let’s face it: Google has changed the world, and Larry Page is a big reason why. He gives us the information and the knowledge that would make previous generations jealous. In the business world, Google saves us so much time and effort that I can’t imagine what my life would look like without it.

Stay Tuned for Part 2

In the next few days, I’ll be publishing part 2 of my look at IT superheroes. In the meantime, please chime in with your two cents in the comments section below.

In Part 1 of our two-part series on IT superheroes, we featured Elon Musk, the team of Mark Zuckerberg & Sheryl Sandberg, Tim Cook, Jack Dorsey, and Larry Page. Today, I’m shining the spotlight on 5 more entrants to the Geek Hall of Fame.

Jeff Bezos

While Amazon has both fans and haters, nobody can argue that Jeff Bezos hasn’t changed the world. While there are many reasons Amazon has gone supernova and exploded into one of the biggest companies ever, it all stems from logistics. Amazon has transformed not only the way we buy things, but also how companies sell, stock and ship goods through a network of fulfillment centers around the world. And of course, IT pros know that Amazon is a MAJOR cloud player. In fact, Amazon Web Services has more than 10 times the computing capacity as the next 14 cloud companies put together !

Devolutions-IT-Superheroes-Alexis-Ohanian-Steve-Huffman

Steve Huffman, Alexis Ohanian and Yishan Wong

The next time someone tells you that achieving a goal is impossible, remind them that many people said the same thing to Huffman, Ohanian and Wong when they targeted Facebook and Twitter with their community-based platform Reddit. But that’s exactly what they did back in 2005 – and instead of being sent to the dustbin of history, Reddit is still going strong. Today, it’s the #9 ranked US site on Alexa, which isn’t far behind Twitter at #8 or Facebook at #2. If you haven’t tried Reddit yet, my advice is, “Don’t judge a book by its cover”; what it lacks in design elements and production value, it more than makes up for in usability, speed and versatility across various browsers and devices. And there’s seemingly no end to the topics of conversation, either. You’ll find all kinds of threads, from Game of Thrones to political to sports and more. It’s informative, entertaining, and yes, a great way to waste time when you need a break from being an IT pro!

Jack Ma

Jack Ma is a Chinese businessman who founded the Alibaba Group, which owns Alibaba.com and Aliexpress.com. The logistics and fulfilment system he spearheaded is arguably the best ever (sorry Bezos!), and the breadth of products and merchants (both B2B and B2C) that use it each day is staggering. You can find pretty much everything on Alibaba.com and Aliexpress.com, from low cost coffee mugs to large-scale industrial equipment.

Satya Nadella

Although Bill Gates will always be linked with Microsoft, current CEO Satya Nadella is carving out his own legacy, too. He started with Microsoft back in 1992 with a focus on business servers, online services, Cloud services, the Azure project, and so on. Although lots of people aren’t Microsoft fans (bugging people to upgrade to Windows 10 hasn’t generated much love!), Nadella can be credited with focusing on simpler products, particularly when it comes to online services.

Devolutions-IT-Superheroes-Robert-B-Carter

Rob Carter

Last but not least on our list of superheroes is Rob Carter, an IT superhero who is relatively unknown among the general population. He’s the CIO of FedEx and the driving force behind the implementation of a technology-led logistics, communication and tracking system that has made FedEx one of the world’s biggest and most recognizable companies. So the next time you get a real-time text on your smartphone telling you precisely what’s going on with your package – whether it’s in the same city or on the other side of the world – you can thank Carter for helping make that happen. The same goes for businesses, which no longer have to field endless streams of inquiries that start with, “Where’s my order!”

Your Turn

Obviously, there are MANY more IT superheroes that I could have focused on here – there are literally thousands of them, although some are better-known than others and their contributions have been serious game-changers.

What do you think of my list? Please share your comments and opinions below. Who are the IT superheroes in your life?

Ah, inheritance: some people inherit blue eyes, and others get a huge fortune from some distant relative they’ve never heard of! Life just isn’t fair sometimes. For me, well, people have always asked me if I’ve inherited my very curly hair from my mom or dad, and the running joke is that since neither of them actually have curly hair, mine must have come from the mailman! But all jokes aside, there’s another kind of inheritance that is a lot more sensible, reliable and doesn’t involve the mailman or bad family jokes: inheriting credentials in RDM!

As you probably know, credentials in RDM can be set using many schemes, in a session, or in a group/folder. But what you may not know is that you can set the same credentials for other entries to inherit.

Here’s a simple scenario: let’s call the folder where the main credential is to be set the Parent folder. Now, in that folder, let’s create a couple of sessions and call them the Child entries and set their credentials to Inherited. Automatically, the credential resolver will go up a level and use the credentials set by the parent folder for all child entries to inherit.

It’s also possible to set a folder to use inherited credentials. In this case, the credential resolver simply climbs the ladder until it finds a Parent folder (or entry, group, etc.) and pulls in the credentials.

The end result is that if you have multiple entries with a common set of shared credentials, you only have to keep ONE set of credentials up-to-date, instead of updating all credentials for every single session. This will save you a tremendous amount of time!

Individual User Credentials

Now, let’s take a look at another scenario. Let’s say that every user on your team must use their own credentials for each entry. Start by setting all entries and intermediate groups/folders to Inherit. Then, at the top level folder, select User Specific Settings to fill in your credentials. This will allow everyone to use their own set of credentials for all child entries!

Inheriting VPN Settings

Here’s another great trick to simplify your life: in addition to using the Inherited setting for credentials, you can also use it for VPN! All you need to do is create a new VPN entry, and then set all your other sessions’ VPN to Inherited. Note that the VPN definition must have a VPN Group defined to ensure that only the LAST session that closes will close the VPN. Personally, I just type the parent folder name as it prevents clashes. So there you go, you are now all set up to use the same settings in the wink of an eye!

As always, please let us know your thoughts by using the comment feature of the blog. You can also visit our forums to get help and submit feature requests, you can find them here.

You may know that Devolutions is headquartered in Canada. And you may also know that we’re located about half-an-hour from the wonderful city of Montreal.

As you can imagine, the team here is really excited. Here’s a rundown of some of the people we hope to meet, and that you can meet as well if you’re lucky enough to attend:

William Shatner, Nichelle Nichols, Brent Spiner & Kate Mulgrew

Billy Dee Williams

John Barrowman

Bob Morley

Have you ever heard of a TV show called The 100? If not, then check it out! In my humble opinion, it’s probably the best show out there. If you’re a fan like me, meeting Bob is a must.

Tom Felton

Ernie Hudson

Car Lovers Rejoice!

So maybe you’re not into sci-fi, but you’re a gearhead instead. Well, there are some SWEET ICONIC RIDES at Montreal Commicon this weekend, including:

The ’67 Impala from Supernatur
The ’77 Camaro from Transformers (Bumblebee)
Ecto-1 (The Ghostbusters’ car!)
The Jeep 12 from Jurassic Park
K.I.T.T (The Trans Am from Knight Rider)
The DeLorean from Back to the Future (“Hello? Hello? Anybody home? Think McFly! Think!”)

What about you?

As you may remember, last month we asked you to share your list of the top 3 tools you think every IT pro should use.

We received plenty of responses on our blog and through social media, and I’d like to start by thanking everyone who participated (and for those who didn’t – no worries, there’s always the August poll!).

We also appreciate how many of you listed RDM among your top 3. Thank you so much for making us a part of your world!

As for the results, here’s a partial list of the IT tools that some of you can’t imagine working without, along with some of your comments:

Remote Desktop Manager (“I live here!” — Frank McCourry)
KeePass
SecureCRT
PowerShell
Chocolatey (“Freed me from the need to manually update each application.” — Sotiris Filippidis)
Snagit
GreenShot
Notepad++ (“It gets better and better. Very nice text editor.” — Tommy Boucher)
Cmd.exe
Sublime Text (.app / .exe)
Total Commander (“Best file manager” — Alex Flora)
Visual Studio
PuTTY
Keeper Desktop
UltraEdit (“My #1 editing tool” — Jack)
WinSCP
GNU Screen
Windows Snipping Tool

Perhaps you’ll be inspired to check some of these out and discover which ones make your work easier and more efficient.

And the winners are…

As you know, each month we randomly select poll participants to receive a $25 gift certificate. And for the July poll…drum roll, please…the winners are Vladimir Gisbrecht and Kent Chen!

To claim your prize, please email me at jdupont@devolutions.net and I’ll send them your way!

Thanks again for participating, and I’ll be posting the August poll tomorrow — so stay tuned!

Wow – is it August already!? Summer is flying by. I hope that you’re all enjoying this time of year and getting a chance to hang out on the patio or head to the beach. Enjoy it while it lasts, though, because fall is just around the corner!

But before that happens, of course we need to run the August poll. Here’s what we’d like to know this month: Which software review/discussion websites do you trust?

We don’t mean doing Google searches for stuff (everyone uses Google!). We mean the software review and tech websites that you check out when searching for a new software solution. Here are some possibilities that might be on your shortlist:

TrustRadius
CNET
Top Ten Reviews
PCMag
G2 Crowd
Software Advice
Capterra
AlternativeTo

…naturally, there are hundreds of others out there, including some that might not be very popular (at least not yet!), but that you personally find valuable and trustworthy.

Bonus Question

For this month’s poll, we’re also running a special “bonus question”! In addition to telling us your favorite software review/discussion websites, please tell us (if you can remember!) where and how you found out about Remote Desktop Manager.

Share Your Expertise & Win

There are 2 great reasons to participate in the poll. The first is that other IT pros around the world can benefit from your experience and recommendations. The second is that you could WIN a $25 Amazon gift certificate. We’ll randomly select 2 participants and announce the winners next month when we share the results. Thanks for participating and good luck!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted here, but I thought it was a good time to publish a new blog. I’ve recently been working on two issues — smart resizing and high DPI in Remote Desktop Manager (RDM is our product that centralizes all your connections and passwords). I thought it would be a good idea to share with you not only the problems we’ve encountered, but also the solutions we’ve implemented.

#1. Smart Resize bug in RDP 8.1

Starting with Windows 10, we began experiencing issues with the smart sizing. Sometimes the RDP control wouldn’t properly refresh and then it wouldn’t be possible to click anywhere in it. It happened every time the parent form was maximized. This issue was often reported on our forum by our users.

https://forum.devolutions.net/topic24395-embedded-rdp-scaling-issues-on-windows-.aspx

This became one of the most annoying bugs in Remote Desktop Manager. I was able to reproduce the same issue in RDCMan (Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection Manager) and knew it had something to do with the ActiveX. I’ve tried many workarounds, such as: forcing a refresh of the window; resizing the window; and switching the Smart Sizing on and off. None of these attempts have succeeded.

Yesterday, however, while testing some new features in the ActiveX, I finally found a way to eliminate the problem. The solution was actually pretty simple and all I needed to do was enable the zoom functionality in the ActiveX. You don’t need to change the zoom level though.

Just call this method before the Connect and it works like magic!

private void SetExtendedProperty(string propertyName, bool value)
{
    IMsRdpExtendedSettings extendedSettings =
        (IMsRdpExtendedSettings)this.Client.GetOcx();

    object boolValue = value;

    try
    {
        extendedSettings.set_Property(propertyName, ref boolValue);
    }
    catch (Exception ex)
    {
        LogManager.LogDebugError(ex);
    }
}

Be aware that you will need the RDP 8.1 ActiveX client (AxMsRdpClient9NotSafeForScripting) to fix this issue. This won’t work if you don’t use the latest version of the interop library.

#2. High DPI with RDP

A few months ago we did a major upgrade of our GUI to support High DPI. It was really challenging to add support to a WinForm application. The only missing piece of the puzzle was for the RDP connection itself. At that time, we were unable to scale the connection.

This meant that the display was too small: https://forum.devolutions.net/topic26129-k-screens-and-high-dpi.aspx?lastpage=1#post95709So last week I started looking for a solution. I’ve found an API (https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/mt703457(v=vs.85).aspx) in the ActiveX which looked very promising:

IMsRdpClient9::UpdateSessionDisplaySettings

HRESULT UpdateSessionDisplaySettings(
    [in] ULONG ulDesktopWidth,
    [in] ULONG ulDesktopHeight,
    [in] ULONG ulPhysicalWidth,
    [in] ULONG ulPhysicalHeight,
    [in] ULONG ulOrientation,
    [in] ULONG ulDesktopScaleFactor,
    [in] ULONG ulDeviceScaleFactor
);

Next, I checked the RDP protocol specifications to get more details and it was exactly what we wanted. We needed to specify the desktop scale factor and the device scale factor:

protected uint GetDesktopScaleFactor()
{
    switch (DpiManager.ScalePercent)
    {
        case 125:
            return 125;
        case 150:
        case 175:
            return 150;
        case 200:
            return 200;
    }

    if (DpiManager.ScalePercent > 200)
    {
        return 200;
    }

    return 100;
}

protected uint GetDeviceScaleFactor()
{
    switch (DpiManager.ScalePercent)
    {
        case 125:
        case 150:
        case 175:
            return 140;
        case 200:
            return 180;
    }

    if (DpiManager.ScalePercent > 200)
    {
        return 180;
    }

    return 100;
}

Unfortunately, it failed. It wasn’t possible to call it before the Connect; as a stack overflow thread mentioned, we needed to call it a few seconds after the Connect. How many seconds? Well, that was nearly impossible to find out. Sometimes 1 second, sometimes 2, and other times the login would be longer too!

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/34496466/auto-apply-local-scale-to-non-fullscreen-desktop-connections-rdp-version-8-1-an

So despite trying to find an event to execute the call at the right time, I couldn’t find anything. By inspecting the ActiveX, I’ve found that it is possible to specify the DesktopScaleFactor and the DeviceScaleFactor before the connection with this code by using the IMsRdpExtendedSettings:

this.SetExtendedProperty("DesktopScaleFactor", this.GetDesktopScaleFactor());
this.SetExtendedProperty("DeviceScaleFactor", this.GetDeviceScaleFactor());

This fix works perfectly for Windows 10 and Windows 2012R2.

In Closing

I truly hope these solutions will be useful for those of you integrating the RDP ActiveX. If you are already using Remote Desktop Manager, you can download the update to fix the issue. Note that this is even included in our free edition.

If you’re not using our application, the good news is that I’m pretty sure that soon this fix will be among your favorite tools, like mRemote, RDCMan or maybe your own custom application. You may even refer others to this blog to help speed things up.

Please let me know if you find anything else to improve my code or any other workarounds that relate to the RDP ActiveX.

As always, please let us know your thoughts by using the comment feature of the blog. You can also visit our forums to get help and submit feature requests, you can find them here.

As an IT pro, you’re always searching for smarter ways to tame the IT chaos in your world. And so when you come across a solution that helps you do more with less, you quickly want to add it to your toolbox.

But sometimes, your boss may not share your enthusiasm. He or she may think you already have all the tools you need, so why invest in something new?

Well, if you’ve fallen in love with Remote Desktop Manager, but your boss is too busy to understand what the big deal is, here are 9 ways to turn “Why do we need RDM?” into “How soon can we get RDM?”

9. Loaded with Features

RDM is loaded with features that are “built by IT pros, for IT pros”; a full list of what’s inside is available here. Feel free to forward that page to your boss, and don’t forget to mention that RDM comes packaged with several additional products and services at no extra cost, including: online backup, custom installer, access to the Devolutions cloud, and built-in Password Vault Manager. And if you ever need a new feature or an add-on, contact us and we’ll try to make it happen!

8. Amazing Support

We have a full-time support team ready and eager to answer your questions, share advice, and help you get the most out of your RDM experience. While we pride ourselves on providing responsive help, if your boss wants even faster support, then simply tell him or her about our extended and premium support options. We won’t let you down!

7. Affordable Cost

One of the things we’re proudest of here at Devolutions is that, over the years, even as RDM has skyrocketed in popularity around the world, we’ve kept the cost of an RDM license low and affordable. Plus, we offer 1 year of free maintenance with every license. And when that period ends, you’ll have the opportunity to renew your maintenance at 50% off the regular price (you’ll have one month to renew at this amazing price). On the other hand, if you choose not to continue with maintenance, that’s no problem – you’ll still be able to use the latest version. For the best Remote Desktop Manager experience, however, we highly recommend renewing your maintenance.

6. Perpetual User-Based Licensing

Speaking of licensing, your boss may hate the idea of having to pay for a subscription each year for the same product. Fortunately, that’s not the case with RDM! Our licenses are perpetual, which means there’s only a one-time fee. Plus, our licenses are per user, rather than per machine. So don’t forget that our licensing lets you use Remote Desktop Manager on a variety of operating systems (Windows, Mac, Android,iOS and Amazon Fire) with the same single licence.

5. Easy Sharing

Spreadsheets and other similar tools have their purpose. But as your boss will readily agree (or she will once you explain it!), using a spreadsheet to store and share credentials and machine information is a BAD IDEA. With RDM, your team can easily and safely share information. Instead of manually updating spreadsheets or informing each team member (doesn’t that drive you crazy!?), RDM handles everything automatically and in real time. Come on guys, we’re in 2016. Stop using Excel as a password manager!

4. Centralization

Think about how much time you and your team have wasted over the years (which your boss has paid for!) because nobody could find a password or machine information. Or worse, maybe the person who had the information was on vacation, sick, or had left the company. Well, with RDM, everything is always centralized, and the advanced search functionality means that finding whatever you need is lightning fast. But if that isn’t enough to get your boss on board, share this glorious statistic: on average, our customers save 3-5 hours a week thanks to RDM!

3. Free Online Backup

Have you ever lost your smartphone and launched into a panic because all of your pictures, contact information, and apps were gone? But then it hits you: aha! You have a cloud backup. Hallelujah! Well, that’s the kind of joy you’ll feel with RDM. If you happen to lose a data source for any reason (hardware failure, data leak, human error), you can rest easy knowing that our free online backup is there to save the day.

2. Strong Security

OK, let’s say that your boss is 99% convinced that RDM is the way to go. But before you get the green light, he wants to know if RDM is secure. Your answer? YES! RDM features two-factor authentication, and all passwords stored in the application database are encrypted using an Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) algorithm. As such, even if a user accesses the data directly in the database, it will be unreadable. We know how important security is to our users and their organizations, and we make it our top priority.

1. Time and Money Savings

At the end of the day, we all know what your boss really wants to know. Will it save time and help the company’s finances? Yes, it will. Just think about it…with RDM, you could save up to 5 times your hourly wage per week. In a matter of weeks, you will have paid off the initial investment. After that, every hour saved using RDM is direct profit. So if your boss wants to save YOUR time and HIS money, Remote Desktop Manager is definitively a must!

Need More Help?

If you need more help convincing your boss that you need RDM to tame the IT chaos in your world, contact us and we’ll be glad to help. We can also provide you with a customized quote based on your specific requirements to make your – and your boss’s – life even easier.

One of our longstanding commitments here at Devolutions is to provide emerging professionals (of any age) with the opportunity to develop their knowledge and experience, while getting the support and guidance they need to be successful. That’s why our internship program is so popular and has a great reputation in both the academic and professional communities.

Today, I’m delighted to introduce you to Joey Dupont, our outstanding new Marketing Coordinator. I recently had the chance to chat with Joey to learn more about his background, goals, hobbies and more.

Can you tell me a bit about your background?

I recently graduated from university, and so my professional background is what you could call a ‘work-in-progress’! While in school, I was very active in various marketing and business competitions. I’ve worked as a sales advisor, where I learned a lot about product development and positioning. I also enjoy helping customers solve their problems.

What would you say is your biggest achievement so far?

I’ve had the opportunity to help several small businesses improve their marketing visibility, and these experiences have been really great and inspiring. I hope to add to my list of achievements here at Devolutions, so please ask me again in a few months and I’ll have a longer answer!

What was it about Devolutions that made you want to work here?

While at university, I heard really good things about Devolutions’ CEO David Hervieux, and about the company’s internship program. So I reached out and introduced myself, and after a few weeks I heard from Devolutions’ Marketing Director Max Trottier, who invited me for a chat. That led to an offer to join the team as a Marketing Coordinator, and it was an easy decision to make! The people and environment are great. Everyone is smart, fun and cool. And even though I’m the newbie here, everyone has made me feel welcome, and that I’m part of the team.

What would you say are your top three strengths at work?

First, I’d say that I’m always interested in learning new stuff! I’m a marketing guy and a technology lover, and so I’ll read, discuss and learn pretty much everything I can about these topics. Second, I’d say that I’m creative and always looking to make things better. Third, I’d say that I’m passionate and want to help Devolutions lead the way.

What tasks do you carry out in your job and what are some of the tools that you use?

As a Marketing Coordinator, I help our team get our marketing message out, as well as gather feedback from our community of users, resellers and partners. My tasks include writing on our blog and social media properties, and helping pull together our various marketing campaigns. As for tools – I use a whole bunch of them, including analytics tools. But I’d say that the most helpful tool I use is my brain!

What are your impressions about working here?

The team and place are so cool! Back in school, I’ll admit that I used to stress out sometimes, because I really wanted to find a supportive team that would allow me to make a contribution right away. Devolutions is a great fit. I really enjoy spending time with the Devolutions team, and am proud and grateful to be here.

What goals would you like to achieve at Devolutions?

As you know, Devolutions has grown enormously over the years. I want to help us keep growing by doing what we do best: making great products that help our customers!

On a personal note, what are some of your hobbies and interests?

I spend a lot of time reading about marketing and new technologies. I also read about things like social behavior, perception, influence and so on, since all of this is a part of my work. I also like watching some TV shows – right now, The 100 is my favorite. Plus, I’m into sports that aren’t really popular, like Ultimate Frisbee and Slackline. I’m also a board game lover!

Please share a few words with our community of IT pros:

Hi everyone! We’re all here to help you succeed and be more efficient. I’m looking forward to connecting with you on the web, and in our various communities. Please feel free to contact me anytime with your suggestions and feedback at jdupont@devolutions.net.

We’re not wizards here at Devolutions, but sometimes we like to pretend that we’re Gandalf — and we think you’ll find today’s tip magical!

Here’s the scoop: Remote Desktop Manager and Password Vault Manager supply usernames and passwords in many ways (auto-fill web, web extensions, automation, etc.), but even with all of these methods, we still need a simple copy/paste of credentials in some special cases.

Well, to speed things up, we’ve introduced the Copy Username & Password action (thanks to user AP_ops for the suggestion via our forum). This new feature allows you to copy both username and password in a single action, pasting first the username and then the password.

How do we make this work? Well, we achieve this using our new Paste once (secure) clipboard copy method. It’s actually more secure since your username and password are never sitting in the internal copy buffer of the clipboard waiting to be pasted. Less time in memory equals greater security. The other big security feature is that we now allow for only one paste of the value and block it from any further request.

Paste once (secure) is the new default clipboard copy method for all three of the copy credential actions. We’ve seen instances where third-party applications monitoring the system clipboard may interfere with the new method. Citrix GoToAssist, for example, has been known to cause issues. In this case, you have two options: either change the Clipboard secure copy delay or revert the Clipboard copy method to Legacy under the File – General menu.

We hope this will help you save some time — and as we all know, time is money!

As always, please let us know your thoughts by using the comment feature of the blog. You can also visit our forums to get help and submit feature requests, you can find them here.

Dear fellow IT Pros,

Here at Devolutions, we know that life as an IT pro can be stressful and hectic.

At times you may feel more like a robot than a person – especially if your boss or other executives aren’t IT pros and don’t always realize how valuable you are.

Well, on behalf of Devolutions, please allow me to remind you that you’re not just important, you’re probably the MOST important professional on your whole team!

Veins to the Rescue!

To show you how important you are, here’s a metaphor using the human body. Every successful business offers solutions, which we’ll call the heart. Without it, there’s no business at all! And we can refer to executives and leaders as the brains (yeah…I know what you’re thinking!). The different departments – finance, sales, customer service, and so on – are the integral systems of the body. They all have to be healthy and functioning for the business to work properly.

Well, guess what? IT departments and teams are the VEINS that connect everything and everyone. Without you, NOTHING WOULD GET DONE, and the body would collapse in about 3 seconds. Seriously: imagine what would happen if someone like you suddenly disappeared, even for a day. There would be chaos! Your colleagues would freak out, customers would be irate, and everything would come to a grinding halt.

No, I’m not suggesting you try this as an experiment. I’m just saying that, even if your colleagues and boss (or bosses) underestimate your value from time to time, the truth is that they need you more than they think!

Devolutions: By IT Pros, for IT Pros

One of the guiding principles here at Devolutions is that we’re “IT pros for IT pros”. Yes, we speak the language of business, and our products are 100% focused on solving problems in the real world. But we’ve never lost sight of our commitment to IT pros like you, and to doing everything we can to help you save time, solve problems, and be successful. We know the challenges you face, and we work hard every day to be part of your solution!

We Can Help Convince Your Boss!

If you want to bring RDM into your work environment but your boss isn’t giving you the thumbs up – maybe because he or she just doesn’t understand the world of IT — then check out this blog post, which you can use to build your pitch and proposal.