Taking our lab services on line - chapter 6
Finally we had done all we needed to do at our end. I
contacted Brian at Silverwire and made an appointment to do the actual
installation.
With our networking protocols established, I fired up
my Dell computer and entered into a NetMeeting mode. Microsoft
NetMeeting contains technology that enables applications to be shared
between two or more computers, even if an application is installed on only
one of the computers.
That allowed Brian to take over control of my computer
from his office in Florida.
I'd expected to spend a lot of time on the phone,
executing Brian's directions and doing a lot of rework when I'd get
something wrong. Instead I sat back and watched the mouse pointer move
across the screen as he installed software, set up parameters, and generally
did all the work for me! It felt like old episodes of the Outer Limits TV
show, where the announcer says "we are in control of your
television." But it worked!
We had only two aggravations: one time Brian turned off AOL,
not realizing that turning off AOL also disconnects the DSL connection. And the frequency of pop-up "messenger" ads
was really annoying. Messenger ads are an annoying feature of Windows XP,
but you can turn them off once you realize how.
Our lab was now ready. Next we needed the consumer
software.
Our story so far:
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