Windows 7 DirectAccess - the next killer enterprise feature

Posted By: Keith Combs | Mar 24th @ 8:46 PM | 19,407 Views | 4 Comments

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Remember when you jumped from dial-up to DSL or a cable modem? You know what I mean. Those technology jumps that just make you smile really wide? Well, I have news for you. There’s another one coming that is going to rock your world. It’s called DirectAccess and although I am not particularly fond of the name, the name is accurate.

What is DirectAccess?

Simply put, it’s direct access to your corporate network across an automatically established tunnel. There’s a lot that has to happen in order for that to occur, but thankfully nearly everything is transparent to the user.

See the full blog post with documentation and references at http://blogs.technet.com/keithcombs/archive/2009/03/24/windows-7-screencast-on-directaccess-the-killer-enterprise-feature.aspx.

Tags: Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2

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VpnDialer

For people who can't wait to try or start using this kind of always-connected capability, you can use a program called VPN Dialer 2009 which is widely available just by looking for it on any search engine. It is not a direct equivalent, but it does allow setting up a persistent VPN link from Windows XP/Vista to any RRAS server using a standard VPN user account over IPv4, and keeps it connected even when no user is logged on, for as long as the remote system has power and Internet access.