One of the problems with having switched over a number of relatives to Linux is that I’m “the guy” when they have issues, and I can’t always get over to help them in a timely manner. A lot of the time most stuff is working just fine and it’s just a matter of popping into the desktop and fixing a bad link or a naughty plugin that’s slipped into Chrome etc, but it DOES require being able to see what they see.
Windows has a system where you can “request assistance” and then provide a code for access at which point it shares your desktop. There are similar systems where one can get a link in email and click it for support.
I’d like to find a system that I can host myself to allow users to queue up for support at which point I can pop into their system, without needing to open ports on their routers or using something hackish like forwarding a VNC port to an SSH server etc
Yup
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/solve-pc-problems-remotely-with-remote-assistance-and-easy-connect-cf384ff4-6269-d86e-bcfe-92d72ed55922
It even works most of the time. No self-hosted server though. AFAIK it connects via an MS host as the intermediary.