What is Whitman RemoteApp?

Whitman RemoteApp is a Windows Server-based infrastructure that makes software and remote desktop sessions available to Whitman persons over the internet, using their personal computers.

To distill it extremely, it allows people to remotely run software that isn't actually on their computer.

Why do we have it?

We have RemoteApp for three reasons:

1. Because there are some software titles which, due to licensing terms and restrictions, we cannot give freely to Whitman folks for their personal computers
   
   
2. Because there are some Whitman folks who desire or need to use Apple computers for some things, but they also need access to Windows-only software.
   
   
3. It's the best way to make certain software packages available in a way that keeps the user experience smooth and positive.

Who can use it?

Whitman Students, faculty, and staff.

What software is available on Whitman RemoteApp?

The following software are available as published applications:

• Argus Enterprise
• Caseware IDEA
• JDA Pro Floor Planning
• JMP Pro
• MathWorks MatLab
• Microsoft Access
• Microsoft Excel
• Microsoft Internet Explorer
• Microsoft Powerpoint
• Microsoft PowerBI
• Microsoft Project
• Microsoft Visio
• Microsoft Word
• MiniTab
• Palisade DecisionTools Suite:
  • @Risk
  • Evolver
  • NeuralTools
  • PrecisionTree
  • StatTools
  • TopRank
• R Statistucs
• SAP
• Tableau Desktop
• XLStat

The following is available as a Remote Desktop Session environment:

• Microsoft Excel Testing Practice Environment

What should you know about RemoteApp?

The most important thing to know is that documents that are created using apps on RemoteApp can be saved to a user's personal computer, or their H Drive. Ideally they should make sure they save to their H Drive. If a person wants to access a file on their H Drive from their personal computer, they can use SURA (Or the SU VPN Tool for Mac)

The second most important thing to know about RemoteApp is that it's not something that should be used if someone is on a Whitman lab computer, because with one small exception, everything that's on RemoteApp is available in the labs.

How do you use RemoteApp?

Before we explain this - generally speaking we at Whitman assume that if you're using RemoteApp that you're using a personally-owned computer that you have Admin rights to use. If you are using a work-owned computer on which you do NOT have admin rights, RemoteApp may be more difficult.

Additionally, using SURA on a computer with a third-party firewall that prevents DNS from being redirected can lead to odd results, such as error messages when mapping the G and H Drives related to LDAP authentication failures.

Now that that's been said, you can use RemoteApp two ways:

1. If from a private computer (as in one which is a person's personal property), you can configure the computer to connect to remoteapp using either an app (macOS) or built-in tools (Windows). 
   
   
   
   
2. If from a public computer on which you can't install software, using a web browser, you can log into https://remoteapp.whitman.syr.edu/rdweb