PointDesk

Help someone, from your own desk.

A remote desktop program that will allow screen sharing and remote control (only if you allow it) and make life easier to help friends or customers.

Free · No account · Version 6.4.1 · Windows 10 and 11

PointDesk
Main window screenshot images/main-window.png Drop the file in and it appears here

What it does

Everything you need to help someone out.

Open it on two PCs. One shares its screen, the other watches. Both PCs can share at once, and up to eight people can watch the same screen.

Share your screen

Pick a monitor and start. Only what actually changed gets sent, so a still desktop costs almost nothing.

Point and draw

Your pointer shows on their screen with your name on it. Draw arrows, circles and freehand marks straight onto their desktop.

Take over when they let you

Ask for their mouse and keyboard. They decide, and if they touch their own mouse they get it back instantly.

Leave written notes

Click anywhere on their screen and type. The note sits there as a speech bubble pointing at the thing you mean.

Hear their sound

Whatever comes out of their speakers can come out of yours, so a video or an error chime is not theirs to describe.

Copy and paste across

Copy something on one PC and paste it on the other. An address, a licence key, an error message worth keeping.

Choose which screens

More than one monitor? Pick which of them the other side may switch to. The one with your email on it can stay yours.

Nothing kept anywhere

No account, no sign in, no cloud. The two PCs talk to each other and that is the whole of it.

A look around

Built to stay out of the way.

Dark, quiet and quick to read, so the screen you are actually there to look at is the thing you notice.

How to use it

Three steps, both ends.

There is no setup beyond installing it. Nobody signs up for anything.

One of you shares

Press Start sharing. A code appears. Read out the address and the code. That is the whole handover.

The other connects

Type in what they read out and press Connect. Their screen shows up, and your pointer shows up on theirs.

Point, draw, or take over

Point at things and draw on them right away. Need to do it yourself? Ask for control. They say yes, and they can take it back whenever they want.

On the same network you connect by address. Over the internet you connect by a nine digit ID through a relay server you run yourself, so neither house needs anything opened up on its router.

Docs

Run your own relay.

On one network the two PCs find each other by address. Across the internet they cannot, so both dial out to a relay instead and it puts the two together. Only the relay needs a port opened on its router. Neither of the two PCs does.

Get the two files onto a Linux server

Any small VPS will do. Put install.sh and pointdesk-relay.cpp in the same folder, side by side.

Run the installer

It fetches a compiler if there is none, builds the relay, runs it as its own account with no shell, and opens the port in ufw or firewalld.

Point PointDesk at it

Set sharing to Relay server, put in the address and port, keep the code on. Your nine digit ID appears. Read out the ID and the code; they connect By ID with the same relay.

chmod +x install.sh
sudo ./install.sh                 port 7788
sudo ./install.sh --port 9000    a different port
sudo ./install.sh --uninstall    take it off again
It routes and nothing else. The relay only ever sees the ID it is matching the two ends on. The code that says you are allowed in is checked by the PC being shared, so learning somebody's ID gets you nowhere.

Relay servers

Ones you can use.

Put one of these in as the relay on both PCs, with the same code, and you can reach each other from anywhere. Or run your own from the Docs above and it is nobody's business but yours.

The relay never sees your screen in a form it can read. It carries the bytes between the two of you and matches you on the ID. Even so, your own is your own, and setting one up is a five minute job.

Download

Get PointDesk

One installer, one program. The same download is both the sharing end and the watching end.

It puts a shortcut on the desktop and that is it. Open it on both PCs and you are ready to go.

  • Windows 10 and 11, 64-bit
  • 1.3 MB installer
  • No account needed
  • Free
PointDeskSetup.exe
Version 6.4.1
PointDesk 6.4.1, made by TheOCProductions & ShortGG