You want to connect to a remote Mac OSX computer and you don't have Apple Remote Desktop. Mac OSX Leopard comes with a built-in screen sharing application that allows you to connect to another Mac. It is in fact a VNC client, so if you are familiar with VNC you may already have a preferred VNC client application as there are a few to choose from.
Requirements
- Two Mac OSX Leopard computers
Setup the built-in Screen Sharing
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In your remote Mac OSX Leopard turn on Screen Sharing, it can be found in System Preferences > Internet and Network >Sharing. Turn on Screen Sharing and click on the Computer Settings button and check the VNC viewers may control screen with password option and set a password. Screen Sharing is similar to logging on with remote desktop to a console session.
- At this point it’s a good time to consider network security. VNC is considered insecure, if you are connecting over the Internet to your Mac OSX Leopard computer, it is recommended you create a SSH tunnel for your VNC session or connect to your remote network via VPN.
- If your network runs a firewall you will need to create a port forward through the firewall to the Mac OSX Leopard computer.
- To connect to the remote machine click on Finder then in the menu select Go > Connect to Server and enter vnc://yourserver.com:5900, in this case the :5900 part is optional, because 5900 is the default port for screen sharing.
- Push connect and you should after a moment be presented with the remote screen of your Mac OSX Leopard.
Summary
Using Screen Sharing to connect to your remote Mac OSX is easy and best of all, you don't need to find or buy any extra software. I did find however it is still substantially slower than using Apple Remote Desktop and of course you miss out on lots of good features in Apple Remote Desktop. You can also use the same Screen Share application to connect to a 3rd party server such as Vine Server.