How to Set Up Remote Control in MacOS to Allow Access From Another Computer at Home
Currently, I have two local MacOS computers at home. MacBook Air M1 and iMac. Both are connected to the same network. One via Wi-fi and the other one via LAN. I wanted to find a way to work on the same project from these two computers. And, the best solution I found was to remotely accessing one computer from the other to copy files for initial project set up. Once set up, I can use GitHub repository to synch the project files between the two computers.
Couldn’t I just Upload Files to GitHub and Download to the Second Computer for initial set up?
Yes, but — if the GitHub repository is set to public, I wouldn’t upload the secrete keys, large image files, virtual environment, etc. Of course, I thought about creating a private repo in GitHub and upload some of these files, but still it will require me to manually copying virtual environments and some large files in another means. There are workarounds to upload large files to GitHub. However, I was looking for a simpler and quicker solution. And, I didn’t want to confuse myself later between these two repositories.
So, setting up Remote Control is Better — Quick, and Simple.
Setting up remote control allowed me to view, copy from one computer and paste to the other computer quickly. And, it was pretty easy to set up. Here’s how.
How to Access Files via Remote Control
To help you understand easily, I am giving you an example of iMac trying to access files stored in MacBook Air. So, in this case, we will set this up in system settings of MacBook Air as below.
- In MacBook Air, allow remote access to the computer. Go to System Settings — Sharing — File Sharing. And, turn on File Sharing, Remote Login, and Remote Management.
- In iMac, access the remote computer via Finder. At the top of the screen, click Go — Network — MacBook Air. And, select a folder that contains your project directory.
3. To view hidden files in remote folder, press the Command + Shift + . keys simultaneously in Finder. This keyboard shortcut will toggle the visibility of hidden files in the Finder. So, you can copy over these hidden files as well.
4. If you want to access remote files via Terminal, type cd /Volumes and ls to view the list of remotely accessible computer names and its file directories.
Done! Hope this helped you work on the same project between the two MacOS computers of your own at home. From here, you can do whatever you wish with the entire project directory.
