Copying files from other computers

[scott092707]

Hi, I hope someone can help...

There may be a simple solution to this problem, but I am so far not aware of it.

I was in Germany for 2.5 years, and used my fiancee's computer, more actually than she did...
I had to leave rather suddenly (decision was Germany's, not fiancee's), and now am in the States again, but my files are still there.
There are lots of things (mainly photos) on there, that I would like to have here.
SOME stuff is on CD/DVD, but there is stuff that isn't.

Is there some way that I could access her computer and just copy files to mine?
(I picture two folders, one on hers, one on mine, and I just dragging an icon from one to the other - but I don't suppose anything's THAT easy...)

Naturally, her computer would have to be on, and I assume she could not be using it herself.
Naturally also, I would get her permission first...

I assume that it would take a while, but if it were as simple as the icon thing I described above, then I could just go away and come back later. I assume something would be running to make sure that the destination file and source file were identical before proceeding to the next file.

[Before you suggest: why doesn't she just copy the files to DVD's and mail them to me?
She is not all that computer saavy, I'm afraid, and trying to explain it all, including the exact folder names and such, Plus, how to use a DVD/CD burner and software... Plus translate it all into German...
If I were rich enough, I could just go there and do what I needed, but that is not in the cards for the present. ]

IS there a way to copy stuff from her computer to mine?

-Scott

[newbie-user]

I think the easiest solution would be to sign up for some cloud storage service, then tell your fiancee how to access it and upload to it.

Otherwise, you could set up our own ftp server, or transfer the files via ssh, or a number of other options.

[scorp123]

IS there a way to copy stuff from her computer to mine? Why not use Teamviewer? It's dead easy to use.

The URL:
www.teamviewer.com

Screenshot:
http://www.teamviewer.com/en/res/img/screenshots/win_mainwindow.jpg

All she needs to do is to download the program on her side from here:

http://www.teamviewer.com/en/download/index.aspx

... and then launch it. And then she needs to tell you the numbers for ID and temporary password she sees on the screen (e.g. by Skype, Jabber, Google Talk, Facebook Chat, whatever).

Once you have those numbers for ID + password you can use the same program to remotely connect to her computer (no messing with firewalls + port-forwarding etc. needed!) and do what you need to do, e.g. install something like Dropbox and have her computer upload the stuff for you (you could both use the same Dropbox ID and thus Dropbox would sync the contents of the "Dropbox" folder between your computers).

Teamviewer also has a built-in file-transfer function:

http://www.teamviewer.com/en/res/img/screenshots/win_filetransfer.jpg


Trust me, this stuff just works. It's closed source but free to use for non-commercial + private purposes (it will nag you here and there with a "buy me!" message but that's it, otherwise there are no limitations in the unpaid version). This thing is so easy that even the computer-illiterate parents of my wife (both are 70+ years old!) can use it.