Remotely access a Mac

So you want to remotely access a Mac like remote desktop in Windows. It is actually quite easy. Let's call the Mac you want to access Mac_One. First you need to turn on VNC server on Mac_One by going to System Preferences - Sharing, tick screen sharing.

This is all your need to do on Mac_One. Now you just need a VNC client on the remote machine to access Mac_One by its IP address. Note that if Mac_One is behind a NAT router, and you want to reach it from over the internet, you will need to set up port forwarding on the router to forward incoming VNC traffic on port 5900 to Mac_One.

If you are using another Mac to access Mac_One, Mac OS has a build-in VNC client named Screen Sharing. You can open it directly by going to Spotlight and type the name, or you can use Safari, and type "vnc://[Mac_One_IP_Address]" on the address bar. Safari will then open the application for you. There is one extra thing great about this VNC client - you can access Mac_One by its Apple ID instead of its IP address!

Yes, you hear me right, you can use Apple ID. Unlike using IP address, even if Mac_One is behind a NAT router, you don't need to set up port forwarding, and it will just work out of the box. But the downside is there should be someone in front of Mac_One, because there will pop up a dialog box asking to grant the access...