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Kelvin Tran
2 hours ago, mzirino said:

Just was unable to use Syn2 due to a failure to connect to background service.  I've not seen that happen before.  If it's due to a dependency on the internet, that could lead to thousands of clients not being able to work.  If so, seems like a major priority to remove that dependency.

 

It is a major priority, and Symless is working very hard to remove that dependency. Unfortunately, the fruits of their labor will not be experienced for a while.

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  • 1 month later...

I have just purchased Synergy 2. If I have known it would not start to work without internet, I would have not bought it. It is a very poor engineering. PoS.

 

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I am frustrated with this as well, The lab I work in does not allow Internet connections on the machines I am using, making 2.0 a non starter.

I am frustrated as well that there is no indication of this major functionality gap on the website or a means to track or be notified when it is working again.

 

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It's not really about the refund, I'm happy to stay a supporter for the product.

Just releasing this as a 2.0 and not clearly stating anywhere that existing functionality was ripped out (temporarily) causes confusion.

The website still doesn't mention anywhere the limitation, or if and when the functionality would come back.

I would suggest the limitation declared somewhere other then doing a google search after the fact. I couldn't even find a change log between 1.X and 2.0 on the website.

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I still do honestly appreciate the removal of the "server-client" architecture and allowing keyboards/mice to be shared between all devices, but I really don't think that constitutes a complete rewrite (well, clearly the rewrite is incomplete).

I get the server-client code can't just be wrapped up into one shared system, but the automatic configuration ABSOLUTELY does not need to be rolled out into a new version. It's a very simple thing to incorporate into the existing v1 client. This is a clear cash grab.

I'm not even angry, I'm disappointed. I wanted to support the company for this great software, and now I know I should have just compiled the software myself.

Edited by qaisjp
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  • 2 weeks later...
Jereme Guenther

Ditto on this complaint.  I hate having anything dependent on the internet.  Have an option to use the internet if someone wants maybe.  But I would rather type in my ips.  Also, what if I want to install this on two separate computer systems?  Are they all going to try and sync to each other now?  Do I need two different accounts with different email addresses?

I'm leaning pretty strongly in the direction of going back to version 1 until version 2 grows up.

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I also had to question via email if it would work without a cloud, and they said "no".  I asked why that info wasn't on the website... they didn't reply.

I also just noticed here that it's not really a release, it's a BETA release.  That ALSO isn't on the website that I can find...  Or in the email invite I got.

Very, very bad marketing... sending people email saying "2.0 is released! Go for it!", and it's a BETA?  That's not released, guys... that's getting your users to test your code for you...

Sigh.   Waiting patiently (more or less) for 2.1, as I also won't run anything like this that has to "call home" to operate.

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Is there an update on when the beta will be released for download? Bought this without knowing it needed the internet. Very disappointed. Looking forward to a download link soon! 1.8 is not working well and i hope this will help solve the problem

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Jereme Guenther

I ended up rolling back to 1.8.  After a reboot of my computer 2 stopped working, wouldn't even connect to the internet, and created a phantom machine.  It doesn't even feel like a beta release, more like Alpha.

I also got it thinking it was an actual release.  Didn't see any comment in the email about it being a beta release.

For all the bugs 1.8 has, it still works better than this thing.

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Why the hell this needs any cloud relay? - the computers we are trying to control are almost always next to each other and on the same network so I don't see any reason why this should be connected somewhere to the internet unless I explicitly allow it to do so. If I omit the fact that Synergy 2 never worked for me no matter what I tried (and I tried like 4 different betas), I feel VERY uncomfortable that all my keystrokes are being transferred somewhere to the cloud for no reason. TBH I have no intention to do any changes to my firewall or network security so my keystrokes from my work correspondence can be recorded somewhere in the internet just because I want control Netflix on my second computer (yeah yeah I know they are saying its encrypted but if they used the same coding skills for implementing an encryption like they did for writing v2, I have serious doubts)...

This concept makes me feel very uncomfortable moreover when its obvious how bad is this implemented and not working.

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Internet dependency in this case is a HUGE NO for any one with engineering and security training. You must realize that the software you are providing deals in very private and security sensitive service such as clipboard, i/o inputs, and file transmission. There is no way a sane/qualified engineer would give any software that much of security clearance into their system while allowing it to make repeated internet communications to remote who-knows-what servers. A good example is ShareMouse, who clearly understands this issue and completely refrained from having any remote communication.

This is a definite deal breaker. I hate to point out but I think it is necessary that you realize how much potential this internet communication dependency can be exploited to do damages and security breaches. And it is ultimately in all of our human nature to exploit whenever possible. I'll leave it there.

Sadly I would have to require a refund of this software unless a new patch come out soon to remove the internet dependency completely. Such expectation is the only reason why i still have not done so. I like the software so far and that's why i hate to do it, but it is necessary until what need to be done is done.

Best luck

Edited by Syhr
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Kelvin Tran
15 hours ago, Syhr said:

Internet dependency in this case is a HUGE NO for any one with engineering and security training. You must realize that the software you are providing deals in very private and security sensitive service such as clipboard, i/o inputs, and file transmission. There is no way a sane/qualified engineer would give any software that much of security clearance into their system while allowing it to make repeated internet communications to remote who-knows-what servers. A good example is ShareMouse, who clearly understands this issue and completely refrained from having any remote communication.

This is a definite deal breaker. I hate to point out but I think it is necessary that you realize how much potential this internet communication dependency can be exploited to do damages and security breaches. And it is ultimately in all of our human nature to exploit whenever possible. I'll leave it there.

Sadly I would have to require a refund of this software unless a new patch come out soon to remove the internet dependency completely. Such expectation is the only reason why i still have not done so. I like the software so far and that's why i hate to do it, but it is necessary until what need to be done is done.

Best luck

You seem to misunderstand the purpose of the internet connectivity and WebSocket functionality in Synergy 2, however much more qualified you may be than me.

The only thing that Synergy 2 uses the internet for is establishing a local connection and ensuring that that local connection is still alive, hence why there is constantly traffic sent over the internet, to ensure that the connection is still alive. However, as far as I am aware, the internet traffic to establish a networked connection on a LAN between the systems is encrypted traffic ONLY used for the aforementioned purpose. Your sensitive information is safe unless someone compromises your network traffic, in which you've got SSL to delay the attacker until it is addressed.

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The only thing that Synergy 2 uses the internet for is establishing a local connection and ensuring that that local connection is still alive, hence why there is constantly traffic sent over the internet, to ensure that the connection is still alive.

This kinda of makes no sense, doesn't it... So you are saying that there is a cloud communication just to enable the local communication? If so, than any necessity for "cloud" is even more ridiculous and from the network perspective, its much more complicated to communicate to the internet and back (firewalls, NAT and all this stuff) than communication over the local network where the security rules are usually not so strict. Building an app which relays on a cloud communication unless its a purely cloud service makes it only prone to communication problems. What if the internet goes down but you need to control your 2nd computer? What if you are a company whose network is closed? What if you simply don't feel any need for sending your keystrokes (passwords, cc numbers, simply EVERYTHING you type) to some 3rd party you know nothing about...?

Really can't understand why the hell this needs some f*ckin cloud.... :-(

There are 2 possible scenarios:

1) Cloud is used to discover local machines and then they communicate directly (its as stupid as it sounds - why would you do any remote calls instead of doing any multicast requests directly on the local network?). If so, the design is stupid...

2) The whole communication (including the keyboard and mouse events) goes via the cloud relay. If so, the design is stupid and EXTREMELY dangerous no matter any SSL...

 

In any way, this feels sooooo bad...

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Jereme Guenther

As far as security goes, it does make me feel like there is a remote possibility that someone could intercept the communication and make the software connect to their instance rather than the one it is supposed to.

However, the biggest issue that I see with it is that the software is dead in the water without the Internet.  I simply rebooted my computer and when it came back up there was no internet connection for a few minutes.  Without that Internet connection my two computers could not connect back together, even though they had both already been setup when the Internet connection was active.  That was just too flaky for me, so I had to roll back.

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  • Synergy Team
Nick Bolton

This feature is planned for 2.1 which is due in about 6 months. For now, you can either wait or take a refund and use Synergy 1.

Synergy 2 uses our cloud server purely for discovery to establish the initial connection. From then on, all communication is done via the LAN.

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