iPad at Work For Dummies

Chapter 14

Remotely Accessing Your Computer

In This Chapter

Making sense of VNC and RDP

Remote-controlling your computer the basic way with VNC Viewer

Accessing your computer remotely and in style with Jump Desktop

Turning your iPad into a second screen for your PC or Mac

Although an iPad can be your computer, sometimes you actually need your computer, or at least access to it. You can do that, too, from an iPad. Maybe you need a file that’s on your computer that you didn’t store in iCloud or other cloud storage service. Or, more likely these days, you have an app on your computer that has no iPad equivalent, and you need to run it but you’re at home or at a conference or meeting with just your iPad handy.

There are several ways to access your PC or Mac remotely, but they all use a technology called virtual network connection (VNC). In a nutshell, VNC transmits your computer’s screen to another computer (or iPad) and transfers back input such as clicks (or taps translated to clicks), mouse movements (or touchscreen movements translated to mouse movements), and keyboard entry so ...