Teleport Virtual KVM

Teleport A better way to use multiple Mac OSX systems from one keyboard and mouse

Way back in the day, from 2000 to 2006 I worked at a company in Ames Iowa called Engineering Animation, it was purchased the 2nd week I worked there by a Unigraphics Inc, they were purchased in 2002 by EDS who had a CEO named Dick Brown who would email us from all over the world. In 2003 our division was bought by a group of investors who changed the name to PLM, they wanted to go public. The name changed to UGS in 2005. Many people were let go during those tumultuous years. It was rather stressfull watching your co-workers be escorted out by 9am some mornings. Every co-worker in a circle around my cube were let go except for one. Then finally after making it 6 years, I was let go April 21, 2006 along with 200 others. PLM was purchased by Siemens who still owns them today and they still have an office in Ames.

Anyway, long story just to relate that I learned a ton working for those 5 companies, while never changing my location. The early 2000s were the beginning of some big changes in Web design and development. One cool thing I used was VNC to control my 2 or 3 desktop devices with one mouse and keyboard. The first couple years they were all Linux based. The last years all Windows based. VNC runs on pretty much anything and it would allow me to move my mouse to the edge of the screen and it would switch the mouse to the next destop to the right or left. Now in 2021, 15 years later, I have been using 3 systems again and thought about implementing VNC again.

I searched and found a better, easier tool to do what I wanted, it allows 3 systems to use one mouse and one keyboard, plus has the cool added benefit of moving the cut and paste buffer from system to system by just dragging your mouse to the next system left or right. Wow!! Teleport for Mac. In my case I have all 3 OSX systems.

How to install Teleport on 3 OSX Mac systems

Step 1: On every system. Go to Teleport for Mac click on Latest and download the zip file you see on this page.

Step 2: Double-click the zip file which will extract Teleport.app

Step 3: Drag Teleport.app to the Applications folder

Step 4: Double-click the Teleport.app and it will open. It might complain that Accesability is not enabled. If so go to System Preferences, click on Security & Privacy, then click Accesability, click the lock to unlock if needed, type your password if needed, check the box next to Teleport, then click the lock again if you want to lock this screen.

Step 5: Double-click the Teleport.app again to open if not already. Select the checkbox next to Share this Mac, do this on all 2 or 3 systems. It will prompt you to allow access on 2 of the 3 systems. Allow that. Then drag the 2 remote systems you now see on the host system into the configuration you want one on the left and one on the right. That is it. You can also select Teleport to make a sound every time you switch screens.

Now you can use one mouse and one keyboard to control all 3 systems. Saving much time and brain power too.

Nice, Huh!!