Monthly column
Hit the Road, Jack - Without Your Laptop
By Klaus Majewski
I have always dragged my beloved laptop with me during business trips. I wish I didn't have to.
Travelling would be so much easier without it. No hassle at the airport security checkpoint, no
extra luggage. These days I almost automatically remove my laptop from its case before the security
check. Every time I leave my laptop at the hotel in the evening I am worried that it will be
stolen. Yes, I am too lazy to bring it to the hotel’s safety deposit box at the concierge desk.
Convenience is the word of the day. Wouldn’t it be nice to leave the laptop at the office?
Yes, it would be convenient, but how could I access my email, presentations or files without it?
I spoke about my dream of travelling without a laptop to our company IM department and they
already had an answer. The answer was SSL VPN. It is a clientless remote access method that allows
me to use a browser to access the information I need.
Let’s take an example: a one-week-long conference trip. I need to read my emails every day. I
have random free time between lectures and I can use it productively by reading and replying to my
emails. Usually conferences offer common-use laptops with which people can access the Internet. I
can go there and access our company’s SSL VPN portal using a normal browser and read my emails in a
secure way.
The problem with public terminals is that I do not trust those devices. I do not want to
leave my passwords or emails in those machines. Fortunately, this is no problem with SSL VPN,
because it features something called trace removal. Sounds like hacker language to me. Basically,
it removes all traces of my connection from the public terminal. Fantastic.
Now I can safely use those public terminals during the conference and maintain my business
productivity throughout the whole conference week.
What happens if I do not have any public terminals at my disposal? Could I use something else
to read my emails, maybe a mobile phone or PDA? I always carry one of them with me anyway. I tried
it with my smart phone and, sure enough, it worked. Smart phones support Web browser and that is
all that’s needed. However, I noticed that the connection speed varies quite a lot in smart phones.
When the connection was good the remote access was pleasant to use. So, make sure that you have a
good connection before using a SSL VPN with your smart phone.
Now I travel really light. I have a smart phone and a USB stick with me. I use the USB stick
to store presentations I need during my business trip and the smart phone for everything else. I
must admit that I had to change my business practices a bit, because now I use my customer’s laptop
when I do my presentation. They like it, because their laptop always works with their data
projector and I like it because I can leave behind my presentation for marketing purposes.
Moreover, I like it because my laptop is safe in my office and I still have access to the
information I need while travelling. It is a win-win situation.