I’m going to be away from home for a few weeks and would like to access my computer (LMDE) while I’m away. Remote desktop connection would be ideal, just file transfer would be acceptable.
Is a VPN necessary, or can port forwarding be good enough for a one time use?
What software/networking recommendations do you have?
Port forwarding is moderately simple but there are risks to just opening a port and not guarding it with appropriate firewall rules. This includes an SSH server if not up-to-date.
Whereas setting up something like Tailscale on your machine and on your laptop is exceedingly straightforward, avoids firewall reconfigurations, and Just Works™. You could then connect to whatever service you have running, just as if you were on your LAN. My only gripe is that you do need a Google/Microsoft/GitHub/Apple account or OIDC to set up.
In the long term, if you have misgivings about that company operating the coordination server necessary for this tunneling solution, then there’s always the open-source Headscale, which is a drop-in replacement.
If you’re gonna use an overlay network like Tailscale I would highly recommend also taking a look at netbird. Similar concept, but fully self hostable if the need arises (but not recommended unless you have a specific need).
will recommend. just use Tailscale. you may distrust any of these OIDC providers, but that doesn’t mean they can see your traffic. long term if you’re paranoid move to Wireguard or Headscale, but this is so simple it’s a no-brainer