Remote Access to Hosted GDS

If you are using a hosted copy of GDS then you can connect to it from most internet-connected computers. Here are details of some common connection scenarios.

Microsoft Windows Remote Desktop

To access your GDS install from Windows, you can use Microsoft's Remote Desktop Client, which is built into Windows itself.

To access it, click the Start button:

Then type:

mstsc

... the search panel should appear, and you'll see 'Remote Desktop Connection' appear:

Click on the Remote Desktop entry and the Remote Desktop window will appear:

Click on Options to expand the options to the full view. Then type the computer name as provided to you in the computer field (not my_host_name - it'll be something else!), and the user name in the User name field:

Now click 'Save As...' at the bottom. Give the new file a name of 'GDS' and save it to your desktop. Then click the X at the top right of the remote desktop connection window to close it. On your desktop/backdrop you should now have a new icon:

Double-click on this to connect. After clicking through some warnings, you should be presented with the remote server login screen:

Apple MacOS X Remote Desktop

To access your GDS install using a Mac, you need Microsoft's Remote Desktop Client, which you can find in the Mac App store.

Locate the Mac App store icon:

... and click on it to show the app store. Click in the search box and search for 'remote desktop'. You're looking for Microsoft's Remote Desktop client, which looks like this:

If you see a 'Get' icon beside it, click it, then click the download icon. The app will download and eventually you'll see the Open button. Click this and the remote desktop client will start:

Click the + button and choose 'Add PC'. Fill in the details on this screen: use the hostname we've given you for the PC name (not my_gds_host - it'll be something else!) , and fill in GDS for the Friendly name.

For the user account, click on 'Ask when required' and select 'Add User Account...'. Fill in the username we've given you. We recommend leaving the password blank here for security - you'll be prompted for it when you connect. But if you're certain of the security of the computer you're connecting from then you can fill that in too.

Once you've filled in the user details, click Add on the user box, and then Add on the Add PC box underneath and configuration is complete. The Remote Desktop window now has an entry for GDS in it:

Double-click on the GDS entry to connect. You'll get a warning that the remote computer's identity cannot be verified, which is normal. If you don't want to see it again tick the "Don't ask me for connections to this computer".

After that you'll see the login screen:

Don't be too concerned if you can't see the text - some versions of the RDP client don't show it correctly. Click in the password field and type the password (even though you can't see it). Once you're through the login screen everything works normally.