Have you ever wished that you could access your home computer from work? Have you forgotten a much needed file? Do your parents need help with their computer, but you’re miles away and can’t work on it? Need to print something at church?  I’ve experienced all of these situations many times and I have tried several different solutions. But I have finally found a free software solution that lets you login and work on a computer from anywhere in the world via the internet.  I’ve been using it for a few months and it works great.

LogMeIn Free is a software application that you can install on any PC or Mac computer.  Once installed, you can access that computer from any computer with an internet connection and web browser. I can even use my Window mobile phone or iPod to access and control the computers.  I have installed this on my home computer, the church computer, and my parent’s computer. Now if I need to login and check something or email a file, I can do that quickly and easily. Everything is password protected, so choose a strong password and you’ll be safe. This is much simpler to use than VNC or remote desktop connection, and it’s a lot cheaper than MobileMe’s back to my mac.

Here’s more info from their site.

LogMeIn Free gives you remote control of your PC or Mac from any other computer with an Internet connection.

Simply install LogMeIn on the computer you want to access (it takes about 2 minutes), log into your account from another computer and click the computer you want to control. You’ll see its desktop and be able to use all the applications on your remote computer as if you were sitting in front of it – even if you’re across town, across the country, or across the world.

• Works with Windows PCs and Mac OS X
• Two-minute set-up

They do offer a paid version that adds the ability to share files and print, but I can get around needing that by using the free Dropbox utility to move and sync files between computers.

For many parents, facebook is like a foreign country full of surprises. If you can’t speak the language and you don’t know where things are, it can be a frustrating experience. With the recent surge in both parents and youth jumping into facebook, I wanted to share some ideas about how we can prepare and protect our children. I’ll tackle several issues that have come up in conversation with parents I know.

How Old Should My Child Be Before They Get a Facebook Account?

Based on the terms of service for facebook, children must be at least 13 years old. I see no reason not to honor this. In fact, here are some reasons why I think it is a great idea.

• As a social network, the power of facebook is connecting with your friends who are already on the network. Most children under 13 don’t have accounts.
• What are we teaching are children about truthfulness if they have to lie about their birthdate to create an account?
• Most younger children are still innocent enough that they don’t see the danger in sharing personal information. Their pictures and status updates are available to everyone if you haven’t changed the default facebook settings.
• One word: Drama
• Children under 13 would have a tough time differentiating between legitimate people wanting to be your friend and those who are selling something. I even have a tough time. Just today, I accepted a friend request from someone who looked like a normal user and then clicked on their profile to find out that they were linking to porn. There are dangers online, and we must be willing to protect our children.

How Do I Prepare My Child For a Facebook Account

If your older child or teen already has a facebook account (and they probably do), then how can you talk with them and help prepare them and teach them proper online safety and accountability? I would suggest the following:

• Change the default privacy settings: Go to the facebook help section on privacy and learn how to set the privacy options. I would suggest changing the default settings on status updates, photos, and photo albums to make them viewable only to their friends. Also go into the privacy settings for their profile and change each option as you deem appropriate.
• Check their profile information: It is never a good idea for a child to share their address on facebook, so make sure personal information that could compromise their safety is deleted from their profile.
• Learn about Limited Profiles: You can create a friend list for those people you don’t know quite as well and assign them to a limited profile.  You can further restrict what certain people see about you by setting this up. Check the help section for more information on how to set this up.
• Discuss with your child who to accept/invite as friends: Are you just going to add people who you know in person, or will you expand it out to friends of friends? What about people who you don’t know at all? As a cautious parent, I would suggest not adding someone if you don’t know them.
• Discuss the importance of accountability: As I mentioned earlier, there are dangers with inappropriate sites on the internet. I feel that the benefits of reaching the online generation far outweigh the dangers, but let’s help our children to see the importance of accountability. Encourage them to talk with their friends about the language they use online, about the pictures they post, and about the sites they visit. As a parent, take the steps needed to protect your child. It may mean that you look through the browsing history daily, it may mean that you install filtering software or accountability software, it may mean that you only let them on facebook in the family room with others present.  Take the time to discuss and talk with your child, and come up with a plan that will protect them and teach them the proper use of the internet.
• Remind them that you can’t delete what you post: Yes you can delete a post or status update, but someone somewhere will have a copy of it. Think before you post! If you join a group with an nasty name, guess what, everyone knows. If you attend a party and pictures are posted, guess what, everyone knows. Encourage them to live a life of purity of Holiness. 1 Timothy 4:12 tells them that they should be an example to others. Teach your children that facebook is a mission field, with the entire world watching.  What kind of example will you set?

What are some other questions you have? Leave a comment and we’ll keep the conversation going.

I finally got around to setting up a good backup strategy for our church computers. Over the Christmas holiday I found a great deal on the Netgear ReadyNAS Duo file server.  I got one for the church for only $239, and it has worked flawlessly. This is a dual drive 1TB network storage device and works great for homes or small businesses. You simply plug it into your network and access it from any computer on the network. I’m using it with Apple time machine to backup my mac, and I’m also backing up our windows computers to it.  It also functions as a great media server and file server.

Let me urge you to think through your backup plan. Eventually you will have a hard drive crash, so what will happen to your data?  By having a regular plan in place, you can save yourself from all the despair of losing important files. I recommend having a network storage drive or an external hard drive as your primary backup, and also using an online backup service to protect your most important files. If something happens to your building or home, it is great to have a backup that is not at the same location.

At home, I’m using MozyPro, which is an online backup solution.  My computer uploads any changes to their offsite servers during the night. It has worked great and is only $4.95 per month.  Other good online solutions are BackBlaze and Carbonite.

Dropbox is also another great way to backup important files. It synchronizes files between different computers. It has been a great way to backup some important files and transfer files from my home computer and my laptop to the church computer.

Whatever you do, DO SOMETHING. Don’t wait until a failure, develop a plan and start backing up. You’ll thank me later.

If you’re interested in the Netgear ReadyNAS Duo, here is some more info.