G.HO.ST

I have for many months/years been looking at various methods of making my computing mobile. I don’t mean trying to use a mobile device here, rather using a ‘mobile solution’ to hold all my various files, applications and information, so that I can grab what I need when I need it, wherever I happen to be – easily. And to make things interesting, I wanted compatibility to ’standard’ applications (if there is such a thing).  

First, a bit of background. After trying out various on-line virtual desktop sites, I pretty soon realised that this was not in fact the way to go, the technology was too slow, or the produced documents/files were incompatible with anything else I used (i.e. MS Word, Excel etc..). It was hard if not impossible to integrate anything into these desktops, and in some cases, the charge for service was way too much than I was prepared to pay for.

It was then I chanced upon the prospect of portable applications, in other words, applications that installed on a USB memory stick, and ran cleanly (in that they didn’t need installing) on any host PC. This worked extremely well I used a system provided by portableapps.com, which I still feel is an extremely clean way of running things from a stick, easy to install, and they have a host of applications being actively worked on by a whole host of people in the community. Above all else, they have ’standards’ that must be adhered to in order to be called a portable app. You can check their site out at: http://www.portableapps.com, and I would recommend anyone wanting this method of mobility to try out their product – and it’s free open source software.

This method of mobility is as I said great, there are however I had a couple of inherent issues with it:

1. Backup – If your memory stick gets lost or vaped, you have lost everything, applications, data, use of the product. So you need to back up regularly, which needs a host or base PC.
2. Cross platform compatibility – Whilst the apps can create/edit files for say Microsoft Word, using OpenOffice.Org software, there is still a need for the host PC to be windows based, so, I could not plug my USB into a Mac or indeed a Linux based PC and run the applications natively, I still needed a windows based machine.
3. Storage – I was always dependent on the storage of my memory stick (at the time of writing I use an 8Gb which is sufficient for most things, but in the words of my school teachers … could do better.

Now, fast forward a year and a half… I decided to see if the technology for remote desktops had gained any further foothold, and went back to various sites I had tried previously, who were now in the main trying to charge even more for the service, in fact, a few didn’t even want to give a free trial. Of those that did, I had various issues still, such as server busy, try later etc.. etc.. etc..

Then I found G.HO.ST.

G.HO.ST Mascot

So, what is G.HO.ST? At it’s most basic, it’s an on-line desktop or Virtual Computer (VC), that you can store your files, and access from pretty much any internet enabled PC or Mac using just a browser. OK there are a couple of caveats here, firstly, in my experience, Firefox operates better than IE6, and you do need Flash 10 installed, but these things are pretty much standard, and I fully expect this to work much better on newer versions of IE (unfortunately I haven’t tested as I have had no need to).

But, add to this, applications that you can run naively on the platform, such as Zoho Writer, Zoho Sheets etc.. and you get a fully compatible system that you can access from anywhere. They even give you an email client so you can access your mail from there also (as well as your new shiny username@g.ho.st mail address), and 15Gb of memory (yes, you may want to re-read that bit – 15Gb).

G.HO.ST Desktop

There is a lively community, and applications are constantly being added and updated. There’s also a sync application, that will synchronise files between your virtual desktop, and a folder of your choice on your PC or Mac. You can ‘Side-load’ files from other online resources, and access things such as your google docs drive etc..

In use, it’s very flexible, speed isn’t great, but better than most I have tried, and to be honest, I this hasn’t been an issue whenever I have used it. As of yet, I haven’t had a single problem logging in, and the system has always been available to me.

So what does all this cost? Well, actually, it’s free! Yep, absolutely free, don’t ask me how, I’m no financial wizard, but their model has been working for a couple of years now, and shows no sign of bending under the strain.

I should also say, that most of my work is now done through my VC, and in fact this posting is being edited on their Ghost Notes application prior to Word-pressing it later on today.

I would very much recommend G.HO.ST to any person who finds themselves in a similar situation as me, find an internet Cafe, and no need to lug the laptop, even better grab your self a net-book, no need to worry about installing any applications, use your VC.

Any downsides? … well yes, but not overwhelming, the browser included is in ‘alpha’ state at the moment, so some things go weird, I have some pages missing text on occasions, well not missing actually, but rendered in the background colour, and there’s no title of the page in the bar at the top.. as I said, no deal breakers here. I’m also trying to get a graphics package that works for me again on-line, that will save directly to my VC … but the value of community is that I’m not the only one working on it, and I fully expect this sorted soon. Other than these nigggles, there really is nothing to stop me from recommending this site.

You can read more, or sign up for your own G.HO.ST virtual computer here, but please use yellowpearl[a]g.ho.st (my username with an ‘@’ symbol instead of the ‘[a]‘ bit..gotta love spammers..) as a referrer when signing up, and those nice people at G.HO.ST will give me a bit more storage… in fact as you yourself invite more people, they’ll do the same for you – win-win! When you get there, look me up as a buddy.

~Mark~