G.ho.st - A Free Virtual PC/WebOS

[Deozaan]

While browsing topics and following links from the 10 Things IT Won't Tell You thread, I came across a mention of this website/service which is currently in public alpha. Here's a small excerpt from the Key Features page:

•  Access your desktop, files, apps and settings from any Internet browser
•  Desktop and apps run without the need for installation or updating
•  Customize your desktop and choose from 20+ available languages
•  G.ho.st has chosen the very best available storage service for your precious data - Amazon Web Services
•  5GB professionally hosted and backed-up disk space
•  Many file types can be viewed or edited online with a simple double-click
•  Upload and sync your documents, photos and music easily using the G.ho.st Upload Download Utility, Sync program or FTP
•  Manage smart shortcuts called Tagged Things to Web resources - webmarks (URLs), files, photos, videos, music, products
•  Single sign-on to other services such as Google Docs using My Logins

You also get an e-mail address username(at)g.ho.st and you can easily access your WebOS just by typing in g.ho.st?username in your browser. It seems like a pretty neat idea to me even if it's not all that useful at this point in time. And by the way, this is being posted from the G.ho.st browser inside my G.ho.st Virtual PC.

Resized screenshot of the desktop:


FULL DISCLOSURE: If you sign up for an account and use my username (Deozaan) as the person who referred you, I get an additional 1GB of storage space. None of the links in this post automatically indicate me as a referrer, so you'd have to manually enter in my g.ho.st e-mail address for me to benefit from you signing up for an account. And I'd sure appreciate it if you did.

[gtoal]

This isn't a virtual PC or even a remote desktop, this is one of those DHTML/AJAX browser-based pseudo-desktops that can only run applications (usually web applets, sometimes remotely hosted AJAX apps) that the hosting system pre-installs.  There's actually quite a lot of these around now.  I've signed up for several at various times, but they're all so useless that I've stopped using any of them.  The most recent one I tried was Jooce but it was no better than the rest.  Here's some names to google: Jooce, Goowy, XINdesk, OODesk, Orca, craythur, desktoptwo, eyeos, glide, purefect, ssoe, YouOS, astranos, bedesk, cmyos, doxboard, glide, mygoya, oos, parakey, psych, startforce, webdesk, webdows, zimdesk, fenestela, zkdesktop.

Best solution: get yourself a 24x7 net connection and allow remote access to your home system. (ssh, VLC, or Remote Desktop)  All the comforts of home and the convenience of accessing it from anywhere on the net, and you don't need to entrust someone else with your data.


Graham

[Deozaan]

I've been using G.ho.st some more today (again posting this from within the G.ho.st browser) and I just found out that the G.ho.st browser has a built in proxy. So it might be an effective method of reaching websites that for whatever reason you are not able to access. I've come across a website or two which for some reason I could not access directly but using a proxy I had no problem.

EDIT: I was writing this as gtoal posted.

[Edvard]

For the record, YouOS has been shut down as of July 30...