Conor.P.M

Q: Problems using 'Back to my Mac' with Yosemite

At home I have two Macs, an iMac and a MacBook, both running Mavericks. At work I use a MacBook Pro, also running Mavericks, and when I'm out I use a MacBook Air that was running developer preview of Yosemite.

 

My home iMac has now been upgraded to Yosemite. However when at work using my Mavericks MacBook I can no longer use 'Back to my Mac' to screen share back to my iMac, I get "Connection failed to "Conor's iMac", but I can still connect to the MacBook at home running Mavericks. I've also tried connecting to both Macs at home using my Yosemite MacBook Air but I get the same error.

 

I can screen share between all Mac when they are on the local network, but as soon as I'm using iCloud to screen share the only connection I can make is between Macs running Mavericks. It's almost as if 'Back to my Mac' via iCloud is broken in Yosemite.

 

I've tried disabling and reenabling 'Back to my Mac', signing out of iCloud entirely and then logging in again, but nothing I've tried so far will allow me to use iCloud to screen share between two Yosemite Macs.

 

Has anyone else seen this issue, or have any suggestions?

Posted on Oct 21, 2014 12:54 PM

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Q: Problems using 'Back to my Mac' with Yosemite

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  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Feb 2, 2015 1:41 PM in response to simonwt1
    Level 9 (50,142 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 2, 2015 1:41 PM in response to simonwt1

    simonwt1 wrote:

     

    Adding my voice to this noise.  ...

     

    Sorry, all you're adding is noise. If you want Apple to fix it you have to tell Apple to fix it: Contact Us

  • by simonwt1,

    simonwt1 simonwt1 Feb 2, 2015 8:14 PM in response to John Galt
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 2, 2015 8:14 PM in response to John Galt

    I was tempted to call you a miserable patronizing git, but that would be beneath me so I decided to refrain from doing so.  The frustration of finding that basic advertised services for Apple products do not work is profound.  I head a company that decided to use Apple products exclusively and feel very let down that fundamental processes do not work as advertised.  I have, of course, used the "correct" channels to communicate this disappointment, and the response to date has been underwhelming.  Zero, in fact.   I have also used personal channels to communicate my disappointment, as my son happens to work for Apple in a senior capacity.  To date, that has also yet to yield a satisfactory conclusion.  Therefore, I have chosen to use every reasonable opportunity to communicate my ongoing dissatisfaction with the products that I have authorized hundreds of thousands of dollars of expenditure on.  Responses like yours are unhelpful, and very annoying.  Please use your wisdom elsewhere....

  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Feb 2, 2015 9:20 PM in response to simonwt1
    Level 9 (50,142 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 2, 2015 9:20 PM in response to simonwt1

    simonwt1 wrote:

     

    ...  I head a company that decided to use Apple products exclusively and feel very let down that fundamental processes do not work as advertised.

     

    As do I, which is the reason for informing you that your contribution of "noise" is exactly that.

     

    To me, the only "satisfactory conclusion" will be when it's fixed. "Patronizing" would be trite expressions of commiseration and sympathy. For that you've come to the wrong place.

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 2, 2015 10:22 PM in response to John Galt
    Level 1 (23 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 2, 2015 10:22 PM in response to John Galt

    Let's remember that this is a discussion forum.  If @simonwt1 wishes to voice his opinion in a measured and reasonable manner, he/she is totally within his rights to do so.  I understand @John Galt's rationale as well, but telling people that it is pointless to bring up issues on the Apple discussion forum isn't helpful either.  If that was the case, 99.9999% of the threads here wouldn't exist.  This is a place for people to come together to put their heads together to try to help each other.  In some cases we can help each other with solutions, and in cases like this, we can't.  It's great (and helpful) to remind people about the official channels for reporting problems to Apple, but it's OK for them to chime in here too.

     

    Anyways, that's my thought process regarding this matter. 

  • by robdberlin,

    robdberlin robdberlin Feb 3, 2015 2:02 PM in response to Conor.P.M
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 3, 2015 2:02 PM in response to Conor.P.M

    Adding my voice to the noise. I was really hopeful that 10.2.2  would fix BTMM and it did seem to work, for about a day, and has now defaulted back, for me at least, to its broken state. On a side note, Apple Remote Desktop, which I've been using as kind of a replacement, has been working flawlessly since the update, where before it was often flakey and didn't connect.

     

    This suggests to me that Apple are aware they've made a huge mess of their native remote connectivity applications and are working on fixing the paid for ones first. I image there was uproar from sysadmins at all the major creative agencies, graphic design studios, music production companies etc, when they suddenly discovered they couldn't remote administer any of their machines. It's really not acceptable that BTMMis has been broken for so long, Apple is failing hard on their brand promise of "it just works".

    If it's any consolation in all the other forums I've been scouring, including places like developer blogs and stack overflow, it seems the culprit is definitely this new network device discovery service "discovereyd" which replaces the old mDNSresponder. Turns out Apple decided to start again from scratch in Yosemite which is never a good idea since existing code is usually full of months of patches and updates and quirks, cobbled together to get it to run. mDNSresponder had been around since Jaguar as far as I'm aware, and worked perfectly, was open sourced by Apple and adopted by a lot of third parties who built out compatibility with it. Now we have something new which doesn't work and is causing everyone headaches. We just have to all be angry and wait.

  • by Gustakovish,

    Gustakovish Gustakovish Feb 3, 2015 2:17 PM in response to robdberlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 3, 2015 2:17 PM in response to robdberlin

    it also worked for me like a charm with 10.10.2, cross my fingers it stays that way

  • by Brian S. Campbell,

    Brian S. Campbell Brian S. Campbell Feb 3, 2015 3:57 PM in response to robdberlin
    Level 1 (82 points)
    Wireless
    Feb 3, 2015 3:57 PM in response to robdberlin

    Well, my experience has been the exact opposite of yours. For me Remote Desktop doesn't work AT ALL. Nothing. It rarely even thinks any of my computers are even online. Even computers on my LAN show as "offline". BTMM, works intermittently if I restart my machine and have folks on the other end restart the machines i'm trying to access.

  • by Boot_E,

    Boot_E Boot_E Feb 7, 2015 10:12 AM in response to Conor.P.M
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 7, 2015 10:12 AM in response to Conor.P.M

    So I have a solution to get screen sharing which worked for me! Maybe it could work for others too.

     

    Wherever I go I can see my BTMM devices but any attempt to connect results in failure, as if the network settings were wrong in some way. But I found a way to connect using Safari to manually enter a VNC address, however you need to know the shared name of the computer you want to connect to (the one that appears in the sidebar of a Finder window under sharing) and your special iCloud ID

     

    Firstly to extract your iCloud ID number using terminal. Open terminal and copy+paste or type:

     

    dns-sd -E

     

    This will produce a read out on the right hand side with the bottom line being 9 digit number that is your personal iCloud account number thing. Copy this number and go to Safari and type this in the address bar:

     

    vnc://(Insert Shared name of computer).(paste iCloud account number).members.btmm.icloud.com

     

    If you hit enter this will open screen sharing and connect to the target computer, I saved mine to the favourites bar. Hope that helps some people!

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 7, 2015 5:05 PM in response to Boot_E
    Level 1 (23 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 7, 2015 5:05 PM in response to Boot_E

    I mentioned using your BTMMid back on page three of this thread, but your detailed instructions are helpful.  However, for me, that was a short-lived and intermittent, at best, solution. 

     

    All of my Macs have been updated 10.10.2 and my remote Macs do not even show up in the Finder sidebar from outside my home anymore.  I have been out of the country 6,000 miles away for the past week and Plex and TeamViewer work flawlessly, while BTMM has not worked once. 

     

    I'm glad the BTMMid/VNC method is working for you, but I wouldn't count on it for anything important.  I would have TeamViewer or a similar third-party option installed, just in case.  I definitely learned that lesson the hard way the last time I was out of the country and needed to access my home Mac and only had BTMM set up.  Never again.

  • by Hakob G.,

    Hakob G. Hakob G. Feb 13, 2015 4:54 PM in response to Conor.P.M
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 13, 2015 4:54 PM in response to Conor.P.M

    Make sure to check the settings in the Sharing preferences. in the Remote Management section, be sure that you've added your iCloud user in the list of users who can use the Remote Management.

     

    Go to System Preferences, Sharing, then select Only These Users and click the + sign to add the username which uses the iCloud.

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 14, 2015 1:24 AM in response to Hakob G.
    Level 1 (23 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 14, 2015 1:24 AM in response to Hakob G.

    Hakob G. wrote:

     

    Make sure to check the settings in the Sharing preferences. in the Remote Management section, be sure that you've added your iCloud user in the list of users who can use the Remote Management.

     

    Go to System Preferences, Sharing, then select Only These Users and click the + sign to add the username which uses the iCloud.

     

    I thought Remote Management was only for Apple Remote Desktop, not for BTMM.  Am I mistaken?

  • by Cinemagic,

    Cinemagic Cinemagic Feb 14, 2015 6:23 AM in response to mrbofus
    Level 2 (154 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 14, 2015 6:23 AM in response to mrbofus

    The more people that send Feedback, the better chance we have of Apple actually doing something about this mess.  Every Yosemite patch I hope Back to My Mac will be fixed.  It's certainly better than when it was first released, but is still totally inconsistent and unreliable.

     

    https://www.apple.com/feedback/

  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Feb 14, 2015 10:57 AM in response to mrbofus
    Level 9 (50,142 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 14, 2015 10:57 AM in response to mrbofus

    mrbofus wrote:

     

    I thought Remote Management was only for Apple Remote Desktop, not for BTMM.  Am I mistaken?

     

    No.

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 15, 2015 1:03 AM in response to Gustakovish
    Level 1 (23 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 15, 2015 1:03 AM in response to Gustakovish

    Gustakovish wrote:

     

    it also worked for me like a charm with 10.10.2, cross my fingers it stays that way

     

    Is it still working for you?

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 15, 2015 1:05 AM in response to Boot_E
    Level 1 (23 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 15, 2015 1:05 AM in response to Boot_E

    Boot_E wrote:

     

    So I have a solution to get screen sharing which worked for me! Maybe it could work for others too.

     

    Is the BTMMid/VNC method still working for you?

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