When Clouds Die: Microsoft Will Retire Live Mesh in Early 2013

Problem is you have to have a Windows Pro license for Remote Desktop.

If all you need is basic remote desktop then you can just use LogMeIn's remote desktop client at the main LogMeIn website. I've been using it for a few years and it works fine.

In the last couple of weeks, I've attempted to use two new solutions for the PC-to-PC sync functionality.

AeroFS https://www.aerofs.com/:
* Presently invitation-only.
* Looks a bit rough.
* Needs all your folders to be under their AeroFS folder in order to be able to share them.

Cubby (from LogMeIn) : https://www.cubby.com/
* Free and open to all.
* Looks polished.
* Has *almost* exactly everything you want, except that the PC-to-PC functionality only works with a single user. That was a deal breaker for me. I've submitted a feature request to enable PC-to-PC sync across users.

At this rate, I cannot trust my data with any of Microsoft's cloud solutions (Email, calendar or otherwise). They keep discontinuing useful services while propping up crappy ones. Where will Skydrive be in two years? It took a long time for Skydrive to mature to this state while competitors (Dropbox, Box, etc.) were making big inroads.

One HUGE feature missing from SkyDrive is the option to sync different selected folders in different places on my computer.

For instance, I want "My Documents", "My Pictures", and "My Music" to automatically sync, but I don't want to necessarily put all of those folders in the SkyDrive folder.

SkyDrive recently added a "selective sync" feature, but that is different than the feature I was describing above. In SkyDrive's feature, you can pick which folders WITHIN the SkyDrive folder you want synced with what devices. I want to be able to "break out" of the SkyDrive folder to sync files, which was an option that Live Mesh offered.

Without this feature, SkyDrive will never be fully complete.

I'll miss PC-to-PC sync but SkyDrive is much better than Live Mesh. I just hope Microsoft does add this feature to SkyDrive.

Favorites sync I do with Chrome.

To sync multiple folders with SkyDrive you can use the mklink command line utility to add junctions from the SkyDrive folder to the additional folders you want to sync, eg pictures. It's a bit clunky having to drop to the command line to do this, but it's simple enough one time task. There are various free GUIs available for the mklink utility : http://serverfault.com/questions/3440/some-gui-for-mklink

I still miss PC-to-PC syncing for keeping very large libraries in sync.

And I miss Remote Desktop that worked via a browser over the internet.

The new SkyDrive can't match either of those features, and those were the two features I actually used in Mesh.

First off people are missing something basic: LiveMesh works. So when Microsoft kills it in favour of SkyDrive, any defense like 'use LogMeIn' or 'use Cubby' is inherently invalid.

Unless there's some technical reason why Microsoft has to discontinue LiveMesh, it's a business decision and one that affects their customers.

Second, SkyDrive only offers a tiny subset of the functionality of LiveMesh. It is NOT a replacement. Again, unless there's some fundamental technical reason why Microsoft couldn't move the missing features from LiveMesh to SkyDrive, this is a business decision.

In the case of remote access - it's simple. Microsoft sells a remote access solution and LiveMesh makes a better solution available for free.

In the case of peer to peer sharing - it's also simple: Microsoft wants you using their cloud solution and storing your files on their cloud. Peer to peer doesn't get them this. It also provides a way to share files without any kind of monitoring (ie: there's a potential liability to Microsoft).

Neither of these are good reasons for customers to accept this.

If the only thing SkyDrive offers is essentally the exact same thing as Google's Drive solution does - then I'll go with Google simply because Microsoft is taking away something I've relied on for years and not only did not provide a good replacement - but has tried to blow smoke up my.. mm.. you know... about it. At the very least, they could be honest and admit what their intentions are.

The feature that I will miss the most is the ability to selectively share files between users. SkyDrive's share feature are quite the same. SkyDrive does let you share files with other users but once they download the file it is now disconnected and the changes are not reflected in the file unless they modify an office document directly in SkyDrive via one of the web apps. If they offered SkyDrive to SkyDrive syncing I could be happy with the transition.