My issue is that many of my remote desktop apps require knowing the IP adress of the other PC. I’m looking for a VPN that auto-discovers other devices on the same network. That way I could just “ssh” into the same IP every time, because it would be IP inside of a virtual network. Ideally I am looking a solution that does not require internet connection.

Thanks.

Edit: I should probably specify my usecase. I have a portable desktop and use VNC from a laptop to connect to it. To do that I need the IP of the desktop but that’s different on a different network. This can be solved by using hostname.local as the “IP”. (hostname is the “ubuntu” in “bob@ubuntu$:~/Documents”) The solution is quite simple, I just haven’t known about it.

7 points

couldnt you use device / hostname instead?

permalink
report
reply
1 point
*

Unfortunately the router at my gf’s house does not resolve the hostname, so no. Though thanks for the suggestion, I feel kinda stupid for not trying that.

Edit: I’m a noob. Solved by adding “.local” suffix after the hostname.

permalink
report
parent
reply
4 points
*

Bit confused about what you’re looking for. If you’re just SSH/VNC ing into devices on the same local network, then you can simply use their local IP address, which you can find with a command like ip addr and will rarely change, or their hostname if your network is configured properly. There are several GUIs that can remember connection info for you, so you likely will only need it once. It’s also quite easy to scan the local network for SSH servers if you have nmap (nmap -p22 <your ip address range, e.g. 192.168.0.1/24>). If you need to connect to a device on your home network from a different network, any VPN software can achieve that. I’m not aware of any remote desktop solution that doesn’t require a network connection, but your network doesn’t necessarily need to be connected to the Internet.

Are you looking for a GUI that combines all those things?

permalink
report
reply
3 points

Not sure I understand either but when I need to tinker with devices from another network through the Internet I usually rely on Tailscale or setup my own dedicated VPN using e.g OpenVPN.

permalink
report
reply
6 points

You can configure wireguard to achieve this solution.

You can always enable mDNS/DNS-SD (aka zeroconf) protocol as well

permalink
report
reply
2 points

Thanks, I did not know about mDNS. I will use this.

permalink
report
parent
reply
8 points

DNS hostnames

permalink
report
reply
1 point

I don’t want to be mean but searching “DNS hostnames” just gives generic AI generated “DNS explained” articles. This answer is helpful only if you already know that mDNS exists.

permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points

Sorry was busy but wanted to make the comment at least earlier. I think .local is specific to mDNS, but using just the hostname (ie; mypcname) should work as well.

permalink
report
parent
reply

Linux

!linux@lemmy.ml

Create post

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word “Linux” in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

Rules

  • Posts must be relevant to operating systems running the Linux kernel. GNU/Linux or otherwise.
  • No misinformation
  • No NSFW content
  • No hate speech, bigotry, etc

Related Communities

Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0

Community stats

  • 6.4K

    Monthly active users

  • 4K

    Posts

  • 55K

    Comments