Screen Sharing with Back to my Mac

This little detail is different under 10.7 than 10.6, it has taken me some hours of frustration to sort out by trial and error. I haven't seen it documented anywhere.
When a Back to my Mac user connects to another Mac to share the screen, if the userid used for the sharing connection is the same as the active user on the shared system, then sharing starts immediately upon successful authentication. If the userid used for the sharing connection is different than the active user, then the active user must give permission for screen sharing to start.
One of the consequences is that a sharing only user ID can only be used to start unattended access if the unattended machine is at the login screen.
This is in contrast to 10.6, where any userid can start screen sharing without permission of the active user.

Editing original post:
I'm trying to access my home Mac Mini from outside the home using a Macbook. I'm trying to use Leopard's screen sharing using .Mac and no luck, I can't see my Mac Mini outside my network.
At home, I've got the Mac Mini:
(1) running the latest Leopard
(2) connected to .Mac with Back to My Mac running
(3) File Sharing, Web Sharing, Remote Login, and Remote Management all on
(4) Time Capsule with the latest f/w updates running PPPoE to a DSL modem
At work, I've got the Macbook running:
(1) running the latest Leopard
(2) connected to .Mac with Back to My Mac running
(3) File Sharing, Web Sharing, Remote Login, and Remote Management all on
When I'm at home, I can screen share between Macs no problem. However, at work, I can't see my home Mac Mini. I know that it is possible to get through my company firewall because I can get my Slingbox to work at the office.
Suggestions where to start? I'm kinda stuck.

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Screen sharing via Back to my Mac

I'm away from home for work.
I have my iMac at home, connected to my internet connection which I know is working. It is on the DMZ on my network so there are typically no issues with blocked ports and the firewall is turned off.
With me I have my Macbook Pro. Both machines are on 10.10.2
When I sign into BtmM on both machines the iMac shows up in finder on the MBP, however Finder says not connected and when i click share screen I get connection failed.
What can I do to troubleshoot this to try and find what part of the chain the issue lies in? I won't be home for another few weeks, but should be able to make changes remotely (the iMac is on, I'm using it to chat to my partner daily and managed to connect remotely via Team Viewer tonight)
TIA

Hey TKarbon,
Thank you for using Apple Support Communities.
Here is a good article to use to resolve connection issues with Back to My Mac.
If you have issues using Back to My Mac - Apple Support
Regards,
Jeff D.

Screen Sharing using Back to my Mac

I'm trying to use screen sharing for the first time between my 27" mid 2010 iMac and 15" MacBook Pro Retina late 2013 using both OSX 10.9.4 on a local network using Back to my Mac feature. I enabled screen sharing and made sure Remote Management is disabled and also on firewall the screen sharing has allow incoming connections enabled. I also have my Back to my Mac checked on my iCloud settings.
And so I opened Finder window on both computers and on the sidebars from each of the computers it showed the shared devices. So from my Macbook or iMac, I click on the device and then click on the share screen button and a menu popup asking me how i want to connect either as a registered user or using an Apple ID. I selected using and apple ID and it automatically provide a drop down showing my apple id and I click connect but all I get is an error message saying "Authentication failed to iMac" or vice versa.
What am I doing wrong? Is there any other option for me to do screen sharing without using a third party app? Please advise. Any help or suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Thanks for your input. At home, I use a Time Capsule, with the absolute latest firmware, so it should be suitable.
However, I might have problems with the setup? If I turn off and on Back to my Mac under iCloud settings, sometimes I get a message that I should enable NAT/UnPP. Checking the setup of the Time Capsule, the router is in Bridge mode (NAT off). If I try turning on NAT, I get an error in Airport Utility about double NAT.
Any advice on this?

Problems with Screen Share with Back to My Mac

Hi everyone, I'm at a loss right now... I had Screen sharing previously working with my fathers Macbook air (using my apple ID) so i could help him with troubleshooting from time to time. I just recently did a clean reinstall of Mountain Lion on my iMac. I am in the process of setting everything up again but it doesn't seem to be working. I have done what the directions call for but it's still not working. Not sure if it has to do with my clean install and having to redo something on my fathers computer too. another strange problem is that in the sharing section of my Macs system prefs, under screen sharing I am unable to remove any users from the Allow Access for section. the button does nothing at all. can someone do a step by step on how to make that connection to my fathers computer. and yes Back to my mac is turned on on both computers. thanks
ps. I just noticed that i have a couple of Unknown users under my
Allow Access for section, and i can't delete them either.

I see that. The problem is that the log in choice only lets me share the screen of my admin account. I want to share the screen of a standard account which is where I do all my work. So I connect to the standard account and then when I go to share the screen I get the "share screen request"
I just tried to log out of the admin account and into the standard remotely and that worked. Strange way to do it but as long as it works I'm fine with it.
Thanks for the response, it did solve my question because it helped me figure out how to do it.

Is it faster to download files from a remote server or file sharing with Back To My Mac?

I am trying to send somebody a 6GB file using Back To My Mac. I had them set up my Apple ID in iCloud in System Preferences on their Mac and check the box for Back to My Mac. Went into Sharing preferences to check the boxes for File Sharing and Screen Sharing.
From my Mac I then went to that shared computer in the Finder, copied over my file but it's showing that it will take 27hrs to transfer.
Is this normal? And if so would setting up a server for remote access be better for transferring such large files?
Any other mind blowing ideas would be most welcome for remote large file tranfer.
Jazz
Message was edited by: ShadowRa
Message was edited by: ShadowRa

Download history usually will have the link back to the original source location. Assuming that still exists, it's worth a try. When you right-click (Ctrl+click) an item, the small context menu should let you copy the URL of the original source, which you then can paste into the address bar to fetch it again. If the original download required you to be logged in to the source site, you should log in again first to increase your odds of getting the download.

Screen sharing with remote Mac

hi,
my mom got herself a used MacBook but she is new to computing. she keeps on calling me about troubleshooting issues. helping her over the phone is cumbersome.
how would i go about using screen sharing to take control of her Mac from home ? what needs to be installed on my Mac and hers ? what information is required on my Mac to access hers over the WWW ? is there a step-by-step instruction/manual out there ? do i need VNC or ARD ?
sorry if this sounds dumb - new to this part of networking ...

Please do not hijack someone else's thread, especially one that has been answered. You can not give points to helpful contributes unless you start your own thread.
Am I wrong in searching help and seeing you have to have Back to My Mac subscribed to to make this happen OUTSIDE of iChat,
No, it is possible to make connections without iChat and without a MobileMe subscription. It is just harder.
as in by pulling an alias out of CoreServices folder in the primary System folder and putting it in the dock?
You do not need to create a Screen Sharing alias, you can use Finder -> Go -> Connect to Server -> vnc://address.of.vnc.server. You can create Safari bookmarks with vnc://adddress.of.vnc.server and use them. You can drag those Safari URLs to a folder, and create double-clickable files that will also launch the Screen Sharing utility.
Otherwise, outside of using iChat it seems 10.5.8 and up have lots of built in ability to use the built in version of VNC such as ScreenSharing .app and whatnot, but seems to me most all of the remote or sharing key items require a .Mac account or be used BEHIND a LAN, not through a WAN...
Am I wrong in this?
Well, you can use TeamViewer.com, LogMeIn.com, GoToMyPC.com, and maybe a few other services. These would be easy. They all have the same thing in common with iChat and MobileMe. There is a server that both systems talk to, that handles exchanging IP addresses, and since both system make the out-bound connection, this solves the "How do I get though the home router firewall protections" question.
If you want to roll your own, then you get to figure out how to have your home router port forward the Screen Sharing port 5900 from the internet side to your Mac, and the file sharing port 548 (if you want file sharing over the internet).
Now you need to get the IP address assigned to your router, and give that to the person attempting to make a Screen Sharing connection. WhatIsMyIP.com is one such service. Or you can get a free dynamic DNS name from a serivce such as No-IP.com or DynDNS.org, and then download one of their dynamic DNS name updating utilities, which you install on your Mac and run in the background so your dynamic DNS names stays updated whenever your ISP changes your router's IP address.
Now from the Mac making the connection, you use Finder -> Go -> Connect to Server -> vnc://address.of.your.router, or for file sharing afp://address.of.your.router.
NOTE: Doing this exposes known ports to malicious "Bots" that will attempt to break into your Mac, so make sure you use a very secure password. Yet another feature for the above services, as you do not open in-bound ports.
Also NOTE: These roll your own connections may not be encrypted. I think there is an option in Screen Sharing that will make the Mac to Mac Screen Sharing connections encrypted, but that does not apply if you are talking to a Windows or Unix/Linux VNC server. I do not think the file sharing connections are encrypted. The above services do provide end-to-end encryption for screen sharing and file transfers.
If you want end-to-end encryption in a roll your own environment, you can use ssh tunnels, however, that is another layer of complexity. If you enjoy that sort of thing (and some of use do), that is another avenue you can pursue.
If you have any further questions about screen or file sharing please start a new thread where you can assign points for Helpful answers and Solutions. It isn't much, but the people that give you good answers deserve something for their efforts.

Can I use ARD to control my mac with Back to my Mac service?

Can I use ARD to control my mac with Back to my Mac service?
The with Back to my Mac service on you see your mac in the Shared column, hit Share Screen & your good - on ARD I don't see my remote Mac listed anywhere in that program.
Thanks

ARD, to the best of my knowledge, does not work via Back To My Mac. Certainly it's not an direct or obvious feature, though I can't say that there might not be a workaround I've not heard of.

How can i fix Connection issues with back to my mac since yosemite upgrade.

Ok I have been having nothing but problems with back to my mac since the upgrade. both machines are using yosemite and I have even reinstalled yosemite on both still having connection issues. anyone else know how I can fix this? I get one of 2 error messages one that says there is a problem connecting and i should make sure screen sharing is active and then another that says the server does not exist. So far to get it working it involves restarting back to my mac or both macs. This is not a good fix since once I disconnect and try to reconnect a few hours later it does it all over again. I am currently in France and needless to say my parents are starting to get really annoyed with constantly having to do things on there end so I can remote into my iMac.Before the yosemite upgrade I maybe had to do this once or twice.

What I have done is open Disk Utility, Repair Permissions, and do that more than once if it returns a lot of errors in the permissions. Then Restart the Mac.
Also, go to System Preferences > Spotlight and try turning off a couple settings such as search suggestions...these things are taking a lot of resources now.

Problem Screen Sharing with my grandma.

I am having trouble screen sharing with my grandmother's computer. I have a brand new Mac Book Pro 15-inch, 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2 GB of memory with Mac OS X 10.5.1 . I bought my computer and my grandmother's back in October right after Leopard was released. She has a brand new iMac 20-inch, 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2 GB of memory with Mac OS X Leopard 10.5 .
We have been talking over video/audio chats using AIM for quite some time now with no problems other then an occasional internet problem (audio or video skips for a second or audio/video quality is bad for a few seconds). She is used to Windows so I have had to show/explain the basics of a Mac and every time she has a problem with something I try to help her by walking her through it, but it would be really nice if I could just do it myself through Screen Sharing. We have tried to share her screen but it comes up with and error message every time.
I have looked at the things that people are saying about how to fix your problem with screen sharing and I have tried most of them but they don't seem to be working. Maybe I am just missing something.
Please help me get this to work.

As you say there is nothing Specific in the Info about Fair Usage.
However the things you can not do are not so specific and could be stretched to cover what you want to do.
However it would depend on how actively they searched the data traffic for the things that might be interpreted as P2P file sharing and the from it takes.
As you can Video to some and Not Screen Share to others it sounds more like a NAT issue with (or possibly ports for Sharing Screens at your Grandma's) between you and your Buddy. ANd I think it is unlikely to be your ISP.
The Screen sharing part of iChat does not use the listed A/V or login ports.
It is supposed to use the Apple Remote Desktop ports that it is based on. However I have used Little Snitch which has pointed to many other Ports almost at random.
Try changing the Login port at both your End and your Grandma's
(iChat > Preferences > Accounts > Server settings tab - change the port from 5190 to 443) You can only do this whilst logged out of the AIM servers.
5:25 PM Tuesday; February 12, 2008

Auto Accept with Screen Sharing with Yosemite Messages App

I take care of many of my family and friend's Macs and I'm really excited that screen sharing with 10.10 Yosemite through iMessage. I'm wondering if anyone know of a way to enrol their Macs into auto-accepting me to control the screen without the need for them to accept it. I know there was a way to do this back in the days of iChat.

Hi,
In Any Finder window use the Go Menu whilst holding down the ALT key.
Select the Library that appears and the navigate to Application Scripts/com.apple.iChat
Double click the Auto Accept item to open in in the Script Editor (formerly AppleScript Editor)
You will note the Text section at the top is commented out by being between (* and then the text and then *) the stars and parentheses.
Later a single line is also commented out with a # symbol
In iChat the section for Auto Accepting Screen Sharing used to be commentated out (originally it was not even there)
You might decide to comment out the other lines leaving just the bits you want. (or Copy the AppleScript and alter the copy).
Then you can go to Messages > Preferences > General Section and select the AppleScript as the Messages Received item.
NOTE
I have had issue myself with the AppleScripts as they stand in Yosemite.
I have tried several of those that are Included and some that I have collected from iChat and all return and error messages about timing out at present.
Others have reported the same in various Threads here at the Apple Support Communities.
At present there does not seem to be a work around.
9:07 pm Tuesday; February 24, 2015
 iMac 2.5Ghz i5 2011 (Mavericks 10.9)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

I'm having trouble with back to my MAC. I had everything working on my home wifi network but now I am at my daughter's house and trying to connect via a verizon hotspot wifi connection. I'm wondering if the Verizon hookup is a problem.

I'm having trouble with back to my MAC. I had everything working on my home wifi network but now I am at my daughter's house and trying to connect via a verizon hotspot wifi connection. I'm wondering if the Verizon hookup is a problem.

I finally figured it out. Needed to update her Airport firmware and allow guest access, and also changed Sharing preferences to Allow Access for All Users.

Remove little window "my computer" screen when screen sharing with iChat?

Anyone know if it is possible to remove or minimize the little window when screen sharing with iChat? if you try to drag it off the screen, it just pops back. It does not seem possible to close it without getting booted out of the screen sharing.

As the "little Screen" is either your Desktop or the other Desktop depending which you have as the current one you are working in it seems silly to have no access to changing back and forth.
But as you say or rather imply it does sometimes occupy the space you want someone at the other end to see and you can not access that part of the screen or if the other end is trying to show you something it can be hidden my your own desktop.
AT present Not Even Chax does what you want.
7:31 PM Monday; March 10, 2008

Lion Screen Sharing with Full Screen apps on Remote Lion

Has anyone figured out how to EASILY work with multiple desktops and full screen apps on the remote mac when Screen Sharing with one Lion mac from another? All of the standard methods of switching between desktops and full screen apps (swipe, cmd + <arrow>, etc) all take place on the the local Mac, and not the remote one.
The only real effective methods I have found so far are using the dock (not elegant with full screen apps), and removing an app from full screen. Either way, these methods are clumsy and do not compliment the new features that Lion provides.

You're not going to believe this.
Problem was on my buddy's end. The slash key "/" was stuck down on her keyboard.
Sometimes the solution is so far out of normal troubleshooting, you're luck if you ever find it...
Nothing to see here, move along...

HT3486 can I use my ipad with back to my mac?

can I use my ipad with back to my mac?

No, because you have to use AFP file protocol and it is difficult to get going, although one file app does offer it, I have not seen or heard anyone that managed it. You should look in the ipad area.. as this really has little to do with Time Capsule.

ICHAT Screen sharing with "Share My Screen"

I am able to screen share when I "Ask to share" my father's screen, and he is able to "Ask to share" my screen. Both work successfully. However, when either of us select "Share My Screen" with the other, the audio kicks in but the window that says "Starting Screen Sharing with" username just keeps spinning, never switching over to sharing the screen.
I have a MacBook Pro running 10.5.2. He has a MacBook 1gb 2ghz Intel Core 2 Duo running 10.5.2.

I am talking about this page/pane on the Airport Admin Utility info
Where it says "Share AN IP" at the bottom, in the drop down
This is where it does DHCP to your LAN (And therefore computers)
If you do mean this pane then we need to know what IP is shown where the 75 is shown.
Is it one starting 192.168.x.xxx (or 10.something or 172.something) ?
If it does list an IP in one of those Groups and the SHare an IP is ON then you have two DHCP servers.
As for accessing the DSL modem it is normally a question of using a Web browser
You need the IP from the place where the 75 is showing as the "Router" IP This would be the one to use in a web browser if it is one of those groups.
After that use this page http://portforward.com/routers.htm
If you device shows then click on it.
In the Next page click on iChat.
The Page that comes up should be used for reference only.
It should contain the default IP and the User ID and Password if it uses one.
Once you get here check all the Settings and look to see what is active in UPnP if you have it, Port Forwarding, Port Triggering and DMZ.
Lets us know what you find.
Telling us the make and model will provide a bit of a check of other issues.
11:06 AM Sunday; March 2, 2008

Screen Sharing with Back to my Mac

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