Remote Sessions: Seeing Which Machine and User You Are On

Overview

When you open a remote session over WebRTC or VNC, Plenix shows which machine you are connected to and who is signed in at it. You see this in two places:

• The toolbar. The computer name is shown in bold, followed by the signed-in account.
• The browser tab title, for example HP10 · AzureAD\jane.smith — VNC. When you have several machines open in different tabs, you can tell them apart without switching tabs.

This needs agent 3.79.8 or newer. With an older agent, Plenix shows the last user it recorded for the device instead. Hover over the name to see which you are looking at.

How accounts are shown

Account type	Shown as
Local account	PC-NAME\user
Active Directory domain account	DOMAIN\user
Microsoft Entra ID (Azure AD) account	AzureAD\name
macOS or Linux	the user name

• A padlock next to the name means the machine is locked.
• Nobody signed in means the machine is at the sign-in screen.
• The details refresh every 30 seconds, so a sign-in, sign-out or lock during the session shows up by itself.

Ctrl+Alt+Del

Use the Ctrl+Alt+Del button in the toolbar to sign in to or unlock a Windows machine. Over VNC, the agent sends the real secure-attention sequence, the same as pressing the keys on the machine's own keyboard.

Laptops with the lid closed

You can remote into a laptop that is awake with its lid closed. This needs agent 3.79.9 or newer.

When the lid is closed, Windows turns the built-in screen off. If Plenix captured that screen you would see only black. Instead, the agent moves the desktop onto Plenix's virtual screen, so WebRTC and VNC show the machine as normal. When someone opens the lid, the built-in screen comes back and the virtual screen is switched off. If the lid is opened or closed during a session, the picture may go blank for a few seconds while the screens switch over.

• Laptop with an external monitor: the external monitor is used, as before.
• Desktop PCs: nothing changes.
• Asleep or hibernating laptops: a closed lid often puts the laptop to sleep. The agent cannot connect to a sleeping machine. If you need to reach it with the lid closed, set the power option "When I close the lid" to Do nothing.

If VNC takes a while to start

The first VNC session on a machine can take a little longer while the agent prepares the screen and starts the VNC server. The viewer shows each step, for example Preparing displays… or Starting the VNC server…, and keeps waiting while the agent is still working. It gives up only after 45 seconds with no progress.

If you close the viewer before the session opens, the agent stops the attempt and puts the machine's displays back as they were.

Related

• Remote Sessions: View Modes, Panning and Multiple Monitors
• Agent Updates and Self-Repair