Remote-Control Your Linux (or other) Computer With Your iPhone

Mac users have long had a plethora of apps and devices for remotely controlling their computers. A frequent use for this is controlling presentations when presenting to a group, with a laptop connected to a projector.

I wanted this functionality for my Linux (Ubuntu) laptop, while using OpenOffice.org’s Impress application, but thought that I was just out of luck. Recently inspired to search again, I found that there are a few iPhone applications that act as VNC clients.

I purchased and installed Tienshaio Ma’s ControlPad app. It’s not a full VNC client (no display), but a remote keyboard/mouse that uses the VNC protocol. I installed it, enabled VNC on my laptop, and everything just came up working as advertised. I can now very easily control Impress from my iPhone.

Congratulations and thanks to Tienshaio Ma - I highly recommend this app. It should work just as well on any OS that supports VNC.