NoordRemote
Help with their computer without driving over
Send your mum or dad one link. From then on you can see their screen and take the mouse when they are stuck — but only after they say yes, every single time.
also for intel mac · linux appimage
Free. Install it on the computer you are helping — you run everything else from remote.noordwell.com, and they never need an account.
They click a link. That is the whole setup.
You sign in with Google and send an invitation. The page they land on already knows your name, works out which version their computer needs, and puts the invitation inside the download — so when the app opens it says who invited them and waits for a yes.
- No account, no password and no card on their side
- The installer remembers which invitation it belongs to
- If that misses, the link is on their clipboard ready to paste
Asked every time, in words they can answer
When you connect, a card appears on their screen with your name on it. Until they press yes, nothing is captured at all — the request simply expires after a minute if they have walked away from the machine. Saying no is the same size button as saying yes.
- Walking away denies the request; it never sits there waiting
- While you are connected a bar sits on top of everything
- Pause and stop are buttons on that bar, not menu items
A list of the computers you look after
Everyone you help, and whether they are switched on right now. Connect when they are online, and their screen opens in a window with the mouse and keyboard wired up — latency and bitrate in the corner, so a bad line looks like a bad line rather than a broken app.
- Presence is live: online means the app is actually connected
- ⌘Q, Alt+F4 and friends get their own buttons — a browser eats them
- Their video and your clicks go straight between the two machines
The answer to “is anybody looking at my computer?”
Their app opens on one sentence, and most days that sentence is “Nobody is watching.” Underneath it: which computer this is, who their helper is, and when you were last here. The two switches that decide what you may do live on their machine — you cannot reach them from yours.
- “Ask before every visit” and “let them move your mouse” are theirs
- The menu bar holds one item: stop this session now
- Removing NoordRemote wipes its keys and works with no connection
The promise, as a table
Built for someone else’s computer
Look, don’t touch
Control is a separate switch on their machine. Turned off, you see the screen and nothing you do reaches it.
Pause without ending
Pause blanks the picture and drops your input, keeping the session open — so resuming does not ask them to share their screen all over again.
Their settings, their machine
“Ask me every time” is stored in their own keychain, not in a document your side can write to.
Nobody in the middle
Both ends sign what they send with keys pinned when they were introduced. Our server passes the messages along and cannot forge them.
A bar they cannot miss
It stays above every window while you are connected, and never takes the keyboard — so the next thing they type still goes where they meant it.
Gone in one click
Remove NoordRemote wipes its keys and quits. It works with no connection at all, and getting back in needs a fresh invitation.
Be at their computer in about ten seconds
Free, on Mac and Windows. Install it once on the computer you are helping.
helpers start at remote.noordwell.com
Screenshots are from the current build.