30 Nov 2010

Mac OSX VPN to Windows 7

Forced home by snow and impending more snow I had to set up VPN access from my Hac to my Windows 7 workstation. Fortunately the VPN server end is already set up.

Doing the Mac setup was pretty trivial. Go to network settings in system preferences. Add a new connection using the + sign at the bottom left. Then just follow through the settings. It's really not that difficult. If you're a bit dim, there's a picture guide here: http://bit.ly/do_vpn_on_mac

Of course, you also need some sort of remote desktop app. The first one I found was CoRD (http://cord.sourceforge.net/) which seemed a bit tricky to set up, and says it doesn't use Mac VPN, but it doesn't work without a VPN connection. Anyway, it's pretty slick and FREE. The second one was Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection for Mac 2, which is included with every edition of Office for Mac 2011 (if you're fool enough to buy it or use it). Well, it's also a FREE download (http://www.microsoft.com/mac/remote-desktop-client) and, surprisingly, it works.

They both work well but, politics aside, I don't know which one I'll use. I've only had half a day to try them out.

Coldfusion

It's been a while since I wrote anything, but that doesn't mean I haven't done anything. I've been head down wrapping up a CakePHP CMS before I changed jobs. Now I'm a Coldfusion developer. WTF? I've never used it but working through the tutorials it seems really straightforward. I guess the hard part will be letting go of MVC. Of course, someone has cooked up an MVC framework for CF, but there's too much legacy in my new job to even think about it.

I'll still be doing the CakePHP stuff as well as I have one or two personal projects and, for a smalltimer, hosting Coldfusion is just too expensive.