Remote Maintenance (1 Viewer)

[TauTau]

Hi,

is there some way to remotely maintain Moving Pictures (i.e. adding movies, approving etc)? I run MP on a dedicated HTPC with mapped drives for the movies, and I have no keyboard at it. When I do remote desktop, I get logged out and have to log in again to Windows (7), and I don't know how to do that without keyboard (and I can't do it when the HTPC is used for watching TV)

 

[ronsonol]

Try a product called VNC. It is a remote tool that will not lock out the desktop. I used a tool by Dameware, but do not think they have a freeware version.

 

[RoChess]

You can also install a little hack, by using the termsrv.dll from Windows 2008 Server, which will enable concurrent RDP.

This works on Vista and Windows 7. You can download the termsrv.dll from Microsoft.com, but as to where and how, you'll have to figure that one out yourself.

I use the same with mine, and it allows me to use the HTPC at the same time as my wife is running MediaPortal. Just be extra careful to not run any configuration programs when MediaPortal is running. For this reason I wrote many little batch files myself that automatically detect if MediaPortal is running.

For example this is the auto-start script I use.

@Echo Off
If "%SESSIONNAME%" == "RDP-Tcp#0"	GoTo RDPSession

:NoRDP
	ping 4.2.2.2 -n 1 -w 30000
	ping 192.168.1.11 -n 1 -w 30000
	C:\Windows\sent.exe /d:XPC "Battle Cruiser Operational -- By Your Command"
	start "MediaPortal" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\MediaPortal.exe"
GoTo EndBat

:RDPSession
	tasklist | find /i /c "MediaPortal.exe" &&start wscript.exe C:\Users\HTPC\sent_msg.vbs

:EndBat

The first line detects if I'm using RDP or if the script is started by the HTPC itself. When no RDP session is detected, I first run 2 ping commands to verify that enough time was given for the network connection to kick in. When it does, it sends a broadcast message to this computer via LAN (helps to remind me that the HTPC has completed startup, incase I use Wake On LAN). And then it launches MediaPortal.

When I connect via RDP, it runs the added command to verify if MediaPortal is still running, the sent_msg.vbs is as follows:

Set wshShell = CreateObject( "WScript.Shell" )
wshShell.Popup "MediaPortal *IS* Currently Running", 10, "WARNING", 64

To create a small popup warning.

And I've modified the desktop shortcuts to use a simelair batch file to verify MediaPortal isn't already running.

 

[ZealotSix]

+1 for VNC. I use UltraVNC which is free.