Remote Access From Anywhere

After months hard working, we have just released the NeoRouter v2.0. The main effort we put into this build is to extend NeoRouter network into tablets, touch devices, smart phones and so on. We are also trying to integrate most useful tools into our product to make life easier for our end users. So we design and provide you with the following new products – NeoRouter Remote Access Client:

* NeoRouter Remote Access (HTML5)

This is a web-based application, that provides the similar features to the NeoRouter Network Explorer, based on HTML5 technology. No installation, no admin permission is required. All webkit-engine based browsers are supports. One can run it on any platforms, such as Chrome on your Windows, Linux; Sarafi on your iPhone, iPod, iPad or Mac OS; Opera, BB10 or Tizen.

* NeoRouter Remote Access for Android

This is Android app is designed for Android tablets and fully tested on the popular tablets in the market, such as ASUS Transformer. It works very efficiently with tablets having physical keyboard and mouse and turns your Android tablet into a laptop.

* NeoRouter Remote Access for IOS

This is IOS app is designed for iPad series products. It works great with iPad/2/3/4/mini with or without physical keyboard.

* NeoRouter Remote Access Chrome Extension

This is a Chrome Extension version of NeoRouter Remote Access Client web app. Since it’s a pure web-based application, the Chrome Extension can be installed and running on the Chrome browser running on any OS.

* NeoRouter Web Console

This is a web-based application, that provides the similar features to the NeoRouter Configuration Explorer, based on HTML5 technology. No installation, no admin permission is required. Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera browsers are supported. With this tool, our users can manage your NeoRouter server running on any platform from computer having proper browsers.
All of NeoRouter Remote Access Client applications come with the most useful tools including:

* RDP client

This is a full featured RDP client, that supports RDP servers including Windows Server 2003 / 2008 / 2008(R2) / 2012 Terminal Services (physical or virtual and Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8 as remote desktops (physical or virtual). On touch devices, it supports special keys, such as Ctrl, Alt, Tab, Esc, WinKey, Arrow keys, Page Down/Up keys and so on. It also supports drag & drop window and right mouse button.

* VNC client

This is a full featured VNC client, that supports VNC servers running on Windows, Linux, Mac OS, FreeBSD and so on. It supports all standard VNC servers and has been optimized for tightvnc server. It supports clipboard feature, with that once can copy/past text between local devices and remote computers. On touch devices, it supports special keys, such as Ctrl, Alt, Tab, Esc, WinKey, Arrow keys, Page Down/Up keys and so on. It also supports drag & drop window and right mouse button.

* Telnet / SSH Client

This is a full featured telnet/ssh client, that supports all standard telnet/ssh servers running on Mac OS, Linux, FreeBSD and Windows. It supports command history, auto-fill command features. On touch devices, it supports special keys, such as Ctrl, Alt, Tab, Esc, Arrow keys, Page Down/Up keys and so on.

* Ftp / SFtp client
This is a full featured ftp/sftp client, that supports all standard ftp/sftp servers running on Mac OS, Linux, FreeBSD and Windows. One can upload/download files between local devices and remote computers. One can also create a folder, rename file or folder, move file or folder, delete file or folder.

We also improved NeoRouter for Android to support both native VPN mode and tunnel mode.

On devices with Android 4.x and above, NeoRouter for Android operates in VPN mode. User can seamlessly access remote computers by their virtual IP addresses using any app.

On devices with Android 3.x and below, NeoRouter for Android operates in Tunnel mode. User needs to configure dynamic or static port forward tunnels. It only works with apps that use outgoing TCP connections.

For screenshots, please take a look athttp://www.neorouter.com/Screenshots.html

We will keep improving this new product line. If you have any good idea or requirements, please let us know. Feel free to post your suggestions here and we will consider about it. Your suggestion would be a new feature in the next release.

Thanks,

NeoRouter team

HTML5-Powered Web App

People have been complaining about the command line interface (CLI) of NeoRouter server, when they want to manage and setup their domains. Most of them are Linux/Unix or Mac users and some of them never use Windows system, therefore they don’t have a chance to use the Windows based Configuration Explorer tool. Though the NeoRouter client CLI tool on a non-Windows platforms seems acceptable, people wish they could have a GUI client. Not to mention the mobile users, who want to access the remote machine from their smart phones. How? It’s been a challenge for us and it also means a lot of work to port NeoRouter software to other platforms.

Here is the answer – HTML5-powered web applications. More specific, we are moving towards to the innovative development model – HTML5 + Javascript. With the latest NeoRouter Free v1.7.0 release, the web based Network Explorer and Configuration Explorer are available online. One can simply run it online (no installation and no permission required) or install the Chrome extension on your local machine. With the new interfaces, one can run it from any HTML5 based browsers, such as Chrome, Firefox, Safari and IE 10+. It’s also cross-platform.

* Configuration Explorer

The web based Configuration Explorer has the same feature as the Windows based application. It means one can easily manage the NeoRouter servers running on any platforms, no matter it’s Linux, Unix, Mac or in-a-box devices.

* Network Explorer

The web based Network Explorer has the similar features as the NeoRouter Portable application. It comes with several add-ons:

• VNC client, which supports all VNC servers running on any platform.
  

  
  
  
  
• Telnet/SSH client, which allows you to remotely connect to any computers in the NeoRouter virtual LAN. Besides the standard SSH server on Linux/Unix/Mac, it also supports FreeSSHd for Windows.
  
  
  
• SFTP client, which give you a way to exchange files between your client machine and the remote SSHd servers. You can easily upload/download files, create new folders, delete files or rename files.
  

What’s the next step? RDP Client support and mobile versions.

Stay tuned and it’s coming soon!

IPv6 Welcome

IPv4 address pool has depleted on April 15, 2011 and IPv6 is the only available long-term solution to this crisis. IPv6 adoption has been painfully slow, because the protocol is not interoperable with IPv4 and Internet providers and users are forced to make very expensive hardware and software upgrades.

In the coming years, the Internet will likely become more divided and chaotic as various ISPs and corporations ramp up the efforts to deploy IPv6. It is impossible to coordinate all ISPs around the world to make the transition at the same time. If one ISP upgrades to IPv6, stops IPv4 service or reduces to NAT’d IPv4 service, but another ISP is still providing IPv4 only, computers/devices at these two ISPs will lose direct connectivity.

Besides ISPs, businesses and users also need to take part in the transition. Most SMB and home routers in use or selling in store are not IPv6 capable. Windows XP and other legacy OSs still have a significant market share. Many popular software that we rely on daily will cease to function over IPv6. It will be costly and time consuming to fix everything. It could take years or even decades before we can reach the IPv6 utopia.

NeoRouter can connect your computers at various locations into a virtual LAN regardless of their physical connection types. Each computer is assigned a virtual IPv4 address and can connect to other computers in the VLAN. You do not need to worry when the ISPs will upgrade to IPv6, and your existing IPv4 software will continue to function. It is as if NeoRouter provides a shelter for your network and shields you from the storm brewing over the Internet.



If you are a NeoRouter Mesh user, you do not need to perform any additional configuration to enable IPv6 support.

If you are using NeoRouter Pro or Free, please install NeoRouter server on a computer with both IPv4 and IPv6 public addresses. If your ISP does not provide IPv6, you can use a Tunnel Broker like SixXS, gogo6, or Hurrican Electric. No changes are needed on NeoRouter client computers.

NeoRouter supports both IPv6 for underlying client-server connections and peer-to-peer connections. Direct P2P connection can be established between two IPv4 computers or two IPv6 computers. Connection between an IPv4 only computer and an IPv6 only computer is relayed through NeoRouter server.

References:
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv4_address_exhaustion
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6to4
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_broker

Mobilize Your Office with NeoRouter

What’s the hot technology this year? Android device! Not only Android smartphones, but also tablet/pad and netbooks will have Android OS installed. With the 3G or WiFi support, we can be on the Internet anywhere, anytime. A lot of NeoRouter users asked for the mobile version. We’ve been working hard and it’s under beta testing now!

NeoRouter for Android allows you access and manage remote computers using your Android phone. You can see the computer list, computer status, and you can connect to your desktop PC/Mac from your cell phone. Linux users can use ConnectBot to ssh to the computer over the NeoRouter virtual network; Windows uses can use any third party RDP/VNC client software to see the desktop; with some file sharing software, you can also download files to/from your cellphone.



Why NeoRouter?

Though Android gets more popular, there are a few VPN solutions on it. By default, Android comes with PPTP and L2TP client support. Needless to say, those are pretty old protocol and not secure enough. OpenVPN is a good option. However, there is no official support. To be able to use OpenVPN, users have to root the phone. Though it’s not too difficult for a technical guy, there is still risk causing your $500 phone brick. Why need to root? Because OpenVPN requires the tun/tap devices. By default, Android does not enable the drivers. So some smart guys customize the Android and add those drivers to make it work. What is I don’t want to take the risk? Try NeoRouter.

NeoRouter does not require root the device because of its unique technology. Most NeoRouter users know about the NeoRouter portable version, which using the same technology. It works as a bridge or proxy and redirect the connections from third party software to the remote computer in the NeoRouter virtual network. Almost all TCP based software can run over the NeoRouter network in this way. While running, the NeoRouter software does not require admin permission and run just like a normal application.

Advantages:

* Make your connections encrypted
* No need to remember the computer IP address and expose the port to the Internet
* Monitor computer status in a click
* Support various third party software

Feel free to download and give it a try!

Thanks,
NeoRouter team

Mac GUI for NeoRouter Ready

We’re very excited to announce that NeoRouter Free v1.1.1 is now available for download. Since the NeoRouter official build has been released two months ago, we’ve received a lot of good suggestions and feedbacks. So we work hard and try our best to meet those requirements. Now, we have the latest build of NeoRouter Free.

One of the most popular requests is the Mac GUI for NeoRouter support. We have released CLI for Mac for a while, we also have the third party GUI tool – NRClientX, but it’s still a pain for most Apple users, who want to use NeoRouter on Mac OSX just like on their Windows machine. Now we ported the NeoRouter Network Explorer to Mac OSX. Though it’s the first version, it supports the same features as the counterpart on Windows, including computer list, add-on support, add/delete computer, add/edit/delete category, add-on manager, add-on quick launch pad, connection option settings and etc.



Another pain we solved in this build is the OpenSSL lib dependency issue on some Linux distros. We received reports that NeoRouter complains about the imcompatible OpenSSL libs and our users have to either create symbol links or find out/install the proper libs. We improved the libraries in this build and there is no need for the dyanmic OpenSSL libraries anymore. It means you can install it on almost any Linux distros.

We also fixed a couple of bugs and issues, such as hair-pin issue and so on.

Next step – we are busy on the smartphone support. The Android version will be available in a couple of months. iPhone version is in our schedule as well.

Thanks for everyone’s continued support for NeoRouter! Let us know what you need and we will do it.

NeoRouter Professional 1.0 Released

We're very excited to announce that NeoRouter Professional v1.0 is now available for download. After more than 1.5 years public testing and improvement, NeoRouter product is ready to go production now.

For home users, NeoRouter can bring your digital world together and creates a network that revolves around you.

• Access home computers securely from anywhere


• Share photos and videos with friends and family


• Assist friends and family with computer problems remotely


• Protect your Internet traffic on public Wi-Fi hotspots


• Play network games

For business users, NeoRouter can mobilize your office network and enables you and your teammates to work securely from anywhere.

• Work remotely and access office applications, files, emails and printers


• Manage and maintain unattended servers


• Provide remote supports to your customers


• Backup important documets and files offsite


• Build cost-effective VPN on-demand

For more details comparing with Hamachi and OpenVPN, please check out the feature matrix

Thanks for everyone’s continued support for NeoRouter! We will make it even better.

As most Mac users expect, we have been working on the NeoRouter UI applications for Mac. Hope it will be published soon.

Thanks to our avid Beta Testers to help us discovered and fixed quite a few bugs.

Feel free to download it and tell us what you think.

NeoRouter Professional Edition coming soon

We're very excited to announce that the first NeoRouter Professional Edition is released this week. You are welcome to download it and give it a try. Any suggestion will be greatly appreciated and we will improve it ASAP, as it is designed just for YOU.

Over the past year, more and more business users are attracted by the unique features of NeoRouter solution. They gave us a lot of great suggestions, which we evaluated and have been implemented in our products as the software gets updated. Right now, it becomes a very powerful VPN solution and covers the most common requirements from both home uses and business users and gets more popular.

Obviously, we noticed the difference of requirements between the home users and the business users. Most home users would like to use NeoRouter to remotely access their computers at home or office, play games, transfer files and so on. Some of them may not have solid technical background and hope the software as simple as possible. However, most business users may require the official support from us, more advanced features related to the stability, security, management, customization and so on. Some of them may use NeoRouter in some critical environments while others may suggest it to their own customers as well.

To meet the requirements, it would be better to split NeoRouter into different editions - Free and Professional. They are sharing the same solid core code base and have the most common features. But the Professional Edition may contains more advanced features for the business users, such as access control list (ACL), branding, technical support service, later on, authentication with PAM/LDAP/Active Directory, backup/restore and so on.

So far, the Professional Edition is still under the beta-test phase, but we hope it will be released soon.

Thanks for everyone’s continued support for NeoRouter!