Android Phone Question

the_Grinch

Anyone know of software that allows you to remote into an Android phone? I know there is a VNC program, but it requires root. We have a ton of customers moving to the Android platform and they aren't computer savvy enough to get email setup on the device. It would save lives to be able to remote into the device and setup the email....

RobertKaucher

Unlikely such a thing exists w/o rootage.

Bl8ckr0uter

the_Grinch wrote: »

Anyone know of software that allows you to remote into an Android phone? I know there is a VNC program, but it requires root. We have a ton of customers moving to the Android platform and they aren't computer savvy enough to get email setup on the device. It would save lives to be able to remote into the device and setup the email....

Hmmm...I don't think so.


However in the next few months I am rolling this out at work: McAfee Mobile Security - McAfee Enterprise Mobility Management

EMM by mcafee will allow management of your DROIDS (and IPHONES) similarly to the way BES works for blackberries. It was designed for people who want to carry around one phone that servers for personal and business use but want to make sure everything is nice and secure (encrypted mail, remote wiping of apps, etc). Maybe you need something like this rather than a simple VNC program.


There is a VNC app available for a rooted droid but I don't think that is an "enterprise ready" type app.

msteinhilber

I haven't found many options out there that would suite the needs in my environment. There are a wide variety of mobile device management vendors out there with Android support, unfortunately most of them have various limitations on what they can/can't do and more limitations finding one that will cover a wide variety of Android versions. Some of them offer limited feature sets that don't include requisites such as e-mail configuration. From the research I did a few months back, there really wasn't anything out there that was either within our potential budget or anything available that was affordable enough which would cover a wide enough base of devices with the needs we could benefit from.

If you're using Exchange, Froyo introduced enhanced Exchange support including remote wipe and auto discovery making the setup process easier. But even if you are running Exchange, I believe recent estimates only place maybe a slight bit over 50% of Android devices out there currently running Froyo.

Google has taken some initiative in this realm too, and if you haven't checked into it or heard about it yet - I bet you can imagine how their approach works. Google Apps, so that's probably going to disqualify a lot of IT departments as well.

Wish I had some better alternatives, it would save me from those calls from hell by the clueless new smartphone user.

the_Grinch

Thanks guys, I kind of figured there wasn't anything out there. You would think with the open source nature of the Android platform they would have something like this. Oh well, guess we'll just keep getting shelled in the trenches

Daniel333

Logmein.com has something.

demonfurbie

Go to market

Search for andriod-vnc-viewer

All related vnc/vpn stuff is there for me nonrooted and I connected to my tightvnc server with no issues over the internet and netword

SteveLord

Daniel333 wrote: »

Logmein.com has something.

Rescue? That's 1200 bones a year. Geared for help desks.

Ignition? That's for using your mobile device to connect to a computer.

RobertKaucher

demonfurbie wrote: »

Go to market

Search for andriod-vnc-viewer

All related vnc/vpn stuff is there for me nonrooted and I connected to my tightvnc server with no issues over the internet and netword

I don't think you have understood his question. He wants to remote TO the phone to perform admin on the phone. He des not want to remote to a computer from his phone. A VNC viewer for Android would be of no help.