10.6: VPN connections and Back To My Mac

Feb 11, '10 07:30:00AM

Contributed by: adams4

Snow Leopard only hintI connect to my Mac at work quite frequently when I'm home, and I found something interesting. At work, I have a fixed IP address...except when I need a VPN connection to access certain servers that I administer. When I connect to the VPN, I get a different IP address that's dynamically assigned (i.e., I never know the exact address, only the subnet).

Given the snow storm on the East Coast, I worked from home and connected to my Mac at work. I had forgotten to terminate a VPN connection I had going the previous day, but I was able to connect to my Mac anyway, even though I entered my Mac's usual address when I connected, rather than the VPN-supplied address.

Even more startling was that I maintained my connection even when terminating the VPN connection. To confirm, I restarted the VPN connection on my remote Mac, yet I didn't lose my remote session. In the past, I would have to reconnect, hoping I had properly guessed my Mac's VPN-assigned address.

Just another example of thoughtfulness from Apple.

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