Are You Ready to Support Remote IoT Devices

Esther

With the rise of IoT, the number of devices that need support will grow enormously.

Learn how TeamViewer enables you to meet that demand.

Most IT professionals are probably familiar with the term IoT, or Internet of Things.

It describes the inter-networking of devices such as a variety of sensors, vehicles, or even whole buildings.

The concept of linking numerous devices that collect information from their physical and/or digital environment promises, for example, increases in overall efficiency and therefore economic benefits, as well as greater comfort to the IoT’s users.

As you can imagine, IoT devices require maintenance, repair and firmware or software updates, just like a computer or smart phone.

And if John Chambers, Cisco’s ex-CEO, was right in 2013 when he said that by 2020 there would be 50 billion devices connected as part of the Internet of Things, then the management task will be huge.

Remote support, especially unattended access, will become ever more critical with so many devices running 24/7 all over the world.

But that’s not everything. There’s another problem to address and it’s called platform fragmentation.

Since IoT is still a young and highly competitive market, devices run many different operating systems. And it is still to be seen if there will ever be only a few operating systems for IoT.

Luckily, with TeamViewer you already have everything you need to remotely control and support a vast amount of IoT devices.

You might not have been aware of it, but TeamViewer is already being used to control and support numerous IoT devices as part of high-profile partnerships.

Supported Operating Systems

As mentioned above, IoT devices run a diverse spectrum of operating systems.

With TeamViewer, you’re prepared to deliver support to all of the following operating systems in many different versions:

• Windows
• Windows 10 mobile
• Windows Phone
• Mac OS
• iOS
• Linux
• Android
• Chrome OS
• BlackBerry

And that’s what makes TeamViewer the most comprehensive solution for remote control and support.

Perfect TeamViewer Features for IoT

TeamViewer’s features have always made it a powerful tool to support your friends, family and customers.

However, many of them are also a gigantic help, if you want to maintain and support IoT devices that – in most cases – don’t have an operator.

Here are some selected features and possible use cases in an IoT environment:

Unattended Access

Why is unattended access so important?

In the Internet of Things, there are many single devices that deliver data to certain knots, such as a computer or smart phone.

In reverse, that also means that each of the single devices possibly has to be maintained or repaired someday.

While parts of the devices within your managed network might be easy to access for you, other parts of them could be spread over numerous other locations.

With TeamViewer’s Host modules, that is not a problem.

They’re easy to deploy even to large numbers of devices in a few steps and let you set up unattended access for efficient work from anywhere to anywhere.

TeamViewer Policies

You can also deploy policies such as master whitelists to the devices you’re responsible for via the Management Console or the TeamViewer Policy API.

Also, you’ll instantly see whether the policy was applied to a device in the Management Console.

That way you’re in full control of the devices connections and behavior.

Computers & Contacts

Especially in conjunction with unattended access, the Computers & Contacts list is not to be underestimated.

Once you set up unattended access for the respective devices you want to connect to, it offers a comfortable way to organize and connect to them with only one click.

Remote Device Dashboard

Do you want to see all important information about a device at a glance?

The Remote Device Dashboard provides for process, performance, security, session, device and system environment information.

Therefore, the device’s status will be clearly visible and you can come up with a solution much faster.

Mobile Remote Control

Sometimes, all you have on yourself is your smart phone – be it because you’re on your way somewhere or you just think it’s more convenient than to carry your laptop.

Either way, you can simply control other TeamViewer devices with your mobile using the TeamViewer: Remote Control app from anywhere with minimum equipment.

Support that Thing!

Even though we can’t know for sure how the Internet of Things will look like in the future, it’s not too hard to imagine that it will bring changes to the IT and IT support landscape.

If nothing else, many support tasks will consist of working with large numbers of unattended devices as part of a wider network.

With TeamViewer, you’re well-prepared to take on tasks like that.

Have you already used TeamViewer to remotely work with IoT devices? Share your experience in the comment section below!

richardfoleher

When will you guys be supporting Windows IoT? I have several Raspberry Pi's running Windows IoT that I would like to monitor.

Thanks in advance

Richard

Esther

@richardfoleher Supporting Windows IoT is already added as a feature request. In the meantime: Did you already check out the new TeamViewer IoT solution? You can find more informatione here: https://community.teamviewer.com/t5/TeamViewer-IoT/ct-p/TeamViewer_IoT All the best, Esther

richardfoleher

I scrapped the Windows IoT solution in favour of leaving the Rasberry Pi's running Raspian which you guys already support. Works a charm