brett

We continue to work RDM into our business/client support each month and found a few more things we wish it could do:

1: Improve "Contact" Data Entry Support:

There is a data entry session type, but it is missing a easy and quick mode for the one we the one we use it the most for. Each client has a folder and we have all their servers/etc, using Sessions like everyone using RDM likely does. However, as we spend so much time in RDM to connect to things, we have found it handy to have a Group/Folder with the Customer Contacts in it. We currently use the Data entry, but it has no top level "category" that is optimal for just contact info. It has Account, Alarm Code, Bank Info, Credit Card, EMail Account, Note, Other, Software/Serial, and Web, but no "Contact" category. Interestingly, every one of those and virtually all session types DO have a "Contact" tab under the "Information" tab. However, to see that one must open the data entry, go to information, then contact, which is not efficient.

My request is to either make "Contact" a category under the data entry, or make the Dashboard view show the info in the existing contact page. So simply clicking on a contact in the navigation shows the info needed to contact the person.

A follow-up to this is to expand the contact fields just a bit. It only has one phone field and one fax field, it needs at least one more for cell phone. If it could hold a photo of the person and show it in dashboard that would be handy too. Ideally check their e-mail address at gravatar.com too.

2: SSH Support for authentication via Keys

With cloud services (Azure, Amazon EC2, etc.) continuing to grow, I would like an easier way to put a SSH Key based authentication entry in as a base supported feature. Right now, I have to have a local putty session and refer to that, but that doesn't help me share it with a co-worker as they won't have that session. Maybe there is already a way to do this and I haven't found it yet. Essentially I want to put the private key in such that all my staff can dbl-click on the session and get into a EC2 instance via ssh.

3: Sort priority is great, but time consuming to use. We tend to put @ in front of names to get them at the top, but would rather not. Having to figure out what number to use is inefficient. I know you support drag/drop for moving an entry, and I think that is appropriate. I would like to see some mouse based way to just re-order items (not move) within their current hierarchical level. I can see this working WITH move by changing the icon from the Blue arrow when moving it into something, vs. a blue line between elements when re-sorting the item. However, I would be fine with holding down a key like shift/alt to re-order, or even using shift+arrows or ctrl+arrows to move items up/down in a list. This would greatly speed up ordering items in the order we want.

I am having an issue with this too.

The extension says "no logins found" when I choose "Fill Username/Password" or "Fill Password".

Can you provide an example session screenshot of how a "Web browser" session is setup to a popular site like ebay, or amazon, etc. And then show exactly what URL you use in the session, where you put the credentials (mine are in an embedded credential in the session). I would like to duplicate a working example, on a specific well know site, you have provided and see if that works with chrome for me.

Note 1:, I did follow these instructions: http://help.remotedesktopmanager.com/index.html?dataentry_autofill_chromeextension.htm . You may want to add how to install an extension via the tools->extensions, drag/drop the .CRX file on the extensions page as by default chrome only allows install from the store now.

Note 2: See attached picture to see another odd thing after linking/enabling the extension. WHen I click on the icon it puts up a text bubble, but nothing is in it.

This is an old forum post, but should anyone find it via search and have the issue...

Go to tools->extensions in chrome, and then drag/drop the CRX file from your download dir to the extensions page and chrome will prompt you to install it.

David,

Thank you, that is what I was looking for. I unzipped that version and exported my datasource from the installed version and ran the exe in the unzipped folder and imported the datasource to test, as it didn't have an installer.

I don't completely understand the "Allow show credentials" requirement. I totally understand what you are saying, but when I am using RDM, as an admin, I can view all passwords through the GUI as an embedded or shared credential, and also if its in a text fields in a session object regardless of the setting of this checkbox. Thus, shouldn't I be able to use View Password too w/o the "Allow show credential" being checked?

What if I don't want employees to see some credentials but want my senior admins to still be able to see it with that feature?

I see it if I enable that "Allow Copy Password" option, but it doesn't do what I want. It is just copy and then I have to open notepad or something to paste it.

Those features are great IF you want it in your clipboard, but if you need to SEE the username/domain/password they don't save any time. The goal of my suggestion is to make RDM also a great replacement for general purpose password managers. If you are helping somebody on the phone, or using a different device, say an iPad and I am on my PC looking up a credential, having it my clipboard is useless. I need to SEE all the components necessary for login on another device or to tell somebody the password over the phone. RDM works fantastic if I am trying to connect from the machine that RDM is running on, but when I need to get all the information to communicate to somebody else on the phone or to use on another device (another computer, ipad, phone, or remote control window using a remote control technology that doesn't have a shared clipboard) then its cumbersome compared to the password managers we used before. All it needs to be as useful as a simple password manager is for you to see all the credential information in a single click from the tree view (And w/o the need to have copy to clipboard turned on as seeing them doesn't require the clipboard.

Thanks for listening!

Is this new feature that David added in 8.1.4.0?

In the change history I see "Added a "View Password" action for session entries with the Copy password to clipboard enabled" for 8.1.2.0.

I am not seeing how to quickly view the password in 8.1.4.0. I still have to do all these steps to see a password:

• Find session in tree and click on edit (minimum of 2 clicks, can be more for finding which sub-tree, but that click count is expected and not the issue I am looking to reduce clicks on as you do have filter, etc.)

• Determine if the password is in a embedded credential, shared credential or on a per session tab/field

• If a embedded credential, click on the link in the session and then click on view. (total of at least 4 clicks, plus numerous seconds to wait on a WAN based data source for each click)

• If in the session click on the tab and then the view icon (4 clicks usually)

• If in a shared credential, then I have to remember the credential path/name, close the dialog box, go find the shared credential which can be many more clicks, click on it, and then edit, then view, and if I want info on the session that is stored in the tabs I have to go find the session again and open it again.

Preferred:

• Find session, group, etc.

• Click "View Credentials" on action menu or on right click menu.

• or

• "View Credentials (unmasked)"

• RDM figures out what to show and quickly shows the username, domain, and password info immediately regardless if its a embedded credential, shared credential or on a filed within the session dialog box.

My group is using RDM more and more, but one thing we tend to complain about internally is that its so many clicks to see a password when we need it. Many times we can use a auto-login session, so we need to simply lookup the password. We have to click on it, go to edit, drill down into the password screen (Either on a tab, or in the credential area). If it is using a separate credential entry, then we have to go find that, etc.

We would love to be able to middle click or some other shortcut that would put a hover window up with the username, domain, and password (unmasked) for the duration we hold down the middle button (or some other technique).

Alternatively, if we could click on it and in the dashboard view of it where there is edit entry, if there was just a way to see the credentials resolved there, that would be great.

Basically as a combined session/password launcher its great, but where it is just replacing a password database, its much more cumbersome then our old system ONLY because of all the steps to see the password.

Instead of complaining internally, we though we would ask for it in hopes that it could be added and make a great product even better. Thanks for being open to feature requests.

If there is some shortcut already to do this, please share.

David,

Please find access data source attached. I tested against latest 8.0.25.0 and was able to duplicate.

Try dbl-clicking on either the "CmdSubConnection" or the "RdpSubConnection" leaf objects and you'll see $NAME$ is not replaced.

Thanks,

Brett

Version: 8.0.24.0

I am not sure what the intended behavior of this setup should be, but its not the way I was hoping it would work:

"ACME" (Group, type Company, Custom Variable 1: acme.local )

> "Datacenter" (Group, type Site, Custom Variable 1: dc01)

>> "Exchange" (Session, Type: Host, Host field set to: $NAME$.$SITE_CUSTOM_FIELD1$.$COMPANY_CUSTOM_FIELD1$)

[ my understanding is $NAME$ should equal "Exchange" by definition of the session name being "Exchange" ]

>>> "RDP" (Sub-connection of "Exchange" of type RDP. Computer field set to $PARENT_HOST$)

Issue: When RDP is dbl-clicked on the "Computer" field calls $PARENT_HOST$ which should use the Hostname from the Parent session holding the sub-connection.

It does appear to do this pretty well, but I get "$NAME$.dc01.acme.local". It appears to substitute the $SITE_CUSTOM_FIELD1$ and $COMPANY_CUSTOM_FIELD1" but it doesn't touch $NAME$.

I don't know the order of operations for variable substitutions. For example does $PARENT_HOST$ A) go to the parent, and do the evaluation and substitution from the perspective of the parent, or does it B) just grab the string from the parent, and then do the evaluation and substitutions from the perspective of the sub-connection.

If it is A, I would expect $PARENT_HOST$ to evaluate to "Exchange.dc01.pivcon.local"

If it is B, I would expect $PARENT_HOST$ to grab "$NAME$.$SITE_CUSTOM_FIELD1$.$COMPANY_CUSTOM_FIELD1$" from the parent, and then evaluate it from the perspective of the sub-connection, and thus $NAME$ should equal RDP, and it would look like "RDP.dc01.pivcon.local".

However, I don't get A or B, I get "$NAME$.dc01.acme.local" indicating $Name$ is not substituted in a subconnection.

Please advise on how this should work. "A" is the preferred behavior as it allows templates w/ sub-connections to be built that require very little editing. Everything is based of the session name of the parent without having to edit a lot of additional fields (provided the session name using the template is the hostname of the system).

David,

I still have the issue in 8.0.24.0.

Some more info... If I setup the sessions, close RDM, and open RDM and use the RDP sub-connection, the $PARENT_HOST$ string within the RDP "host" field works fine and is properly substituted. However, if I edit the parent session that holds the RDP subconnection and simply "edit entry" and then press the OK button, and then dbl-click on the RDP sub-connection it no longer works, it shows "$PARENT_HOST$" as the host it's trying to connect to. If I then bounce RDM, it works again.

Instead of making a sample, I will send you a private message with a private youtube link to see this on our production RDM database.

Thanks,

Brett

Will do. If it still is an issue, I'll make a sample access datasource and see if I can duplicate, and if so, will send that.

I upgraded to 8.0.23.0 to get the company and site variables to work in HOST session sub-connection sessions, and they do now work which is great.

However, now my RDP sub-connections that just use $PARENT_HOST$ to pull from the parent host entry try connecting to "$PARENT_HOST$" literally vs. doing the substitution.

> Session A (Host type, enter "test" into the Host field)

- RDP (sub-connection of Session A, with $PARENT_HOST$ as the RDP hostname)

David,

Thank you, this is now working. Note, the change did appear to break something else which I have entered as a new bug.

Thanks,

Brett

David,

Did my post above help you reproduce the issue or am I doing something wrong?

Thanks,

Brett

David,

I am replying mostly to aide others learning to use RDM.

Is it fair to say that:

• RDM supports Credentials entries, and when possible they should always be used as the proper format for saving a username/domain/password. For example, instead of filling in a username and password field on a host entry if you see no need to reference an external credential, you should instead use an embedded credential vs. typing the username/password into the host entry. This way if sub-connections are created, they can use the "parent" credential reference.

• I think what is confusing is that the system on a lot of session types has a place for username/password but there is also an embedded credential. Since you can't use variables in password fields, the only way sub-connections could get a password from the parent is via using Credentials at the parent level.

• The $USERNAME$, $PASSWORD$, $PARENT_USERNAME$, $PARENT_PASSWORD$ variables are not intended for use in username and password fields within the various session types. They are intended for use in macros, scripts, command lines instead.

If this isn't correct, could you clarify further? I think many users would benefit from having a type of best practice recommendation, especially when just getting started with RDM. What makes RDM great is all the flexibility in configuration, but it is also what can make it confusing as there can be multiple ways to do something and it appears that each way is there for a specific use case and there is usually a right way to do various things, but it isn't clear what that is until you have many hours of use into the system. This may only be true when trying to use templates and sub-connections extensively, which is what we are doing, but it may impact simpler uses as well.

Thanks,

Brett

David,

I am not sure why its working for you. To help you find the issue I have included a youtube video of my issue on the latest 8.0.20.0 beta.

This time I did it with the Company type as I have a problem with that too. So I have a:

Company -> Site -> Host -> Command (as sub connection) tree which will not replace the custom field 1 from either Company or Site.

however

Company -> Site -> Command (as non-subconnection, just a normal session) works fine under the same Company -> Site tree.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVcntQQm5UU

I also attached a copy of a Access Data Source file I put this in. We have the same issue in a Enterprise SQL Connection too.

The parrot.cmd file the command entries reference is explained earlier in this thread.

You'll see when I run the command session as a subconnection it doesn't replace the variables.

Note, while building this sample I may have found another issue, or maybe its not supported.

1. I originally built this ACME company tree in our enterprise SQL datasource and verified the problem still existed.

2. I then exported the group as a RDM file.

3. I then made a new Access data source

4. I then imported the RDM file.

5. All the entries showed up but it wasn't a complete export/import. The "Company" and "Site" types for the groups where lost, they both came in just as a "Group" type. Further, neither the Company or Site folders kept their custom defined variables under Information > Other.

I attached the exported file too. From what I can see it doesn't appear the Type of the group or the custom variables are supported during export.

If they are not supported and its not a bug, I think you should warn the user of anything in the tree that won't be exported to the file. I can see somebody exporting a number of trees, thinking they have backups of the data and then importing and realizing they lost a lot of custom setup. It needs to be clear while using the program what is being exported vs. what is not supported. Even if its in a help file or release notes, I can see people being burned by it unless it notifies them during use as the program is pretty intuitive overall (nice work) so if it says "Export..." the assumption is it is exporting everything.

The help files says:

"Exports all session in xml format within a .rdm file that can now be imported into any RDM install. Good for backups but doesn't include credentials (username, domain & password). All data is in clear text."

It makes it clear it doesn't do credentials and the export menu even has another choice for w/ credentials so that is clear when using the program. The help says export is good for backups, but if it doesn't do all the properties then it's not good for backups.

Thanks for all your attention to these posts. The best feature of RDM is the forum and responsiveness to posts/feature requests.

David,

I didn't follow-up on your request as you answered my question with "shortcuts are not implemented for sub connection". We were trying to create a shortcut to a sub-connection. Note that on the tree view of sessions on the left hand side, you do allow right clicking on a sub connection and choosing "create shortcut". If it's not supported, perhaps that should be grayed out when right clicking on a sub connection.

David,

I tried the new feature in 8.0.18.0 and on my first try it worked like I had hoped. This definately makes templates w/ subconnections more powerful. Thank you for adding.

Question, do you record what template was used to create a session object? I ask because the follow-up feature would be to reapply a template to all objects created with that template and for RDM to find them all. This would allow users to put connections in faster with last worry that if they change their mind on how the template works that they won't have to go back and manually fix all the entries.

Thanks,

Brett

Version: 8.0.18.0 Enterprise

Background:

We are working hard on making solid templates with sub-connections for all of our common devices/nodes we support. We want to minimize data entry and have as much of the system configured through convention (naming conventions and DNS hostnames) and well defined templates.

Our structure looks like this

Customer (Group: Customer Type)

>Site1 (Group: Site Type)

>> Virtual Machines (Group: Group/Folder Type)

>>> VM1 (Session: "Host" Type) <-- We enter these using "Templates" and have all the subconnections below already setup

>>>> RDP (Subconnection Session: RDP Type)

>>>> WebGUI (Subconnection Session: Web/HTTP)

>>>> VMWare Remote Consoel (Subconnection Session: VMWare Remote Console)

We are running into trouble accessing most hierarichal variables, for examples: $SITE_CUSTOM_FIELD1$, $CUSTOMER_CUSTOM_FIELD1$ from any sub-connection entries.

We have narrowed it down to sub conneciton entries by making a simple "Command" session type that simply calls a parrot.cmd script in C:\windows\system32 that simply parrots back anything passed on the command line. We then put in the command line in RDM for the "Command" session something like:

parrot.cmd $HOST$ $SITE_CUSTOM_FIELD1$ $CUSTOMER_CUSTOM_FIELD1$

We can do this at various levels in the tree above and it behaves as expected, when anywhere (other than a sub-connection) under Customer>Site1 both the custom fields are replaced with the values we have in the Customer and Site level entries. However, if we create a Command session as a subconnection of a "Host" type, it doesn't work at all. The variable is replaced, but its always replaced with an empty string.

This feature is critical for sub-connections via templates to be truly powerful. It allows one template to work across multiple customers and sites and adapt properly to the place it is created in the tree.

This seems to be related to this post: http://forum.devolutions.net/topic2405-variables-in-subconnections.aspx and it says it will be in the next update, and there have been many updates since 12/25/2012 released. It does not seem to be fixed in 8.0.18.0.

Sample of my parrot.cmd script:

@echo off

echo "GOT: 1|%1| 2|%2| 3|%3| 4|%4| 5|%5| 6|%6| 7|%7| 8|%8| 9|%9|"

pause

We have had a number of issues with sub-connection session appearing to not do everything an equivilently defined normal session connection can do. We are unsure if these are bugs, design decisions, or applications of sub-connections not forseen. Any information that you could provide on limitations of sub-connections would help us design our templates and entire structure better.

Thanks for your quick support on all our other questions/etc. It's great that you monitor these forums so closely and implement fixes, changes, features for your customers.

Thanks.

That sounds great.

Version: 8.0.12.0 Enterprise

We have a number of templates built that have sub-connections and would like to use the Refactoring feature "Apply Template". However, it doesn't seem to apply the sub-connections to an entity. The only way we can get the sub-connections of a template to show up is on a new entity creation. If we have a node already in RDM and want to apply the template or re-apply the template because we added more sub-connections to the template, it doesn't do anything with the sub connections. Is this the intended behavior? It seems like "sub-connections" are one of the most powerful and time saving features of template definitions and this would be a key feature.

Version: 8.0.12.0 Enterprise

I am not sure if this is a bug or not but I am confused by the behavior.

We use the "Host" type in place of the folder type so we can put sub-connections under it. We prefer it to using RDP or SSH sessions as the parent as its generic and we can use it for all types of hosts. However, occasionally someone will dbl-click on it. Why does it bring up a template chooser?

Seems like since a Host type has no built in "action" it should allow you to choose a default sub-connection type as the default dbl-click action, or simply do nothing on dbl-click.

If I am misunderstanding the intended role for the Host type, please let me know.

Version: 8.0.12.0 Enterprise

This may or may not be a bug, but its not the behavior I expected.

I have an "Host" Entry that has numerous sub-connections that use $PARENT_<whatever>$ variables.

So lets say I have:

> Firewall

- SSH (Sub connection)

- WebGUI (Sub connection)

Now, if I make a Shortcut to the "SSH" sub-connection of firewall and place that shortcut somewhere and use it the $PARENT_<whatever>$ variables do NOT look at "Firewall".

I would think a shortcut would just be another launch point for the entity and that all behaviors would be the same. I am finding that the shortcut is more than just a simple alias for the entry and has its own state.

Is this a bug or by design?

Ultimately we like to put every sub-connection type under the specific host entry. However, we would like to have other folders that have a collection of shortcuts related to a specific project so everything commonly used for managing one project is also under a project named folder. It is key that the shortcuts we make work the same as if they were launched from their primary location and that all history on launching/etc, are tracked with the primary. We just want it like an alias. Is this possible?

Version: 8.0.12.0 Enterprise

I have a "Host" session type with the Advanced "Allow password in variable" set.

I then create sub-connections under this. I have a ssh (putty) and VMWare Virtual Infrastructure Client both of which can auto-login with password entries. In each sub-connection the $PARENT_HOST$, $PARENT_DOMAIN$, and $PARENT_USERNAME$ all work great. However, when I put $PARENT_PASSWORD$ in the password field and also check the "Allow password in variable" in the advanced tab of the sub-connection, and then try the sub-connections they both don't work and its clear from the VMWare Login Dialog that the number of masked characters is the same number of characters in the string "$PARENT_PASSWORD$".

If I type the password directly into the sub-connection password fields they both work as expected. It looks to me like $PARENT_PASSWORD$ is not honored. Actually it looks like the password field on the sub-connection doesn't do any variable substitutions as $PARENT_USERNAME$ or anything else in the password field also gets sent literally w/o replacement.

Note I have tried unchecking the "Allow password in variable" on both the parent and the sub-connection and there is no difference. They don't seem to do anything.