In Short, requires a license to use an older version.

I have an old Mac OS X (OS 10.7.5 (Lion)) which I have on a shared Keyboard, Video and Monitor (KVM). I came across a software called Teamviewer, which lets a user access another computer remotely. WOW, perfect solution, as I wanted to remove the Mac from my KVM and use those resource for another device.

Down the rabbit hole…
After a few a few hours trying to find the version of Teamviewer that is compatible with the Mac, I finally found the version and downloaded the Host version, which allows the Teamviewer software to run in the background and to auto start on boot up. Great I thought to myself… that is done, now to install Teamviewer on my workstation and access the Mac. Man this is nice… Boy was I wrong!

After downloading the latest version of Teamviewer (15.18.5), installed and tried to access the Mac, I received a message that stated that the Teamviewer that I am trying to access is older that the Teamviewer I am using and to update the Teamviewer I am trying to access. Well since I would not update the Teamviewer on the Mac, as that is no longer supported, I thought, Hmmm… I will just downgrade the Teamviewer I installed. So uninstalled Teamviewer on my Ubuntu 20.04 workstation and installed the same version as the Mac, which is Teamviewer 11. I had compatibility issues with some modules missing, which I resolved after following this post: https://nezhar.com/blog/install-team-viewer-12-or-older-on-ubuntu-18-04/

Just as the article stated, I opened a command line, typed in ./teamviewer and Teamviewer launched as expected! GREAT I thought, that is until I tried to connect and only received the same message. So I searched why having the same versions I would still receive the same message… Came to licensing. With the “free” version, the software becomes obsolete, while if a license was purchased for that version, the software might continue to work. I say might, as I did my research on why Teamviewer was not working, some licensed users where posting in the Teamviewer forum why their licensed software is now no longer compatible. I came to the conclusion that Teamviewer uses something in the backend that prevents older unlicensed version from working.

I ended up uninstalling Teamviewer on both workstations, enabled sharing on the Mac and using TightVNC (https://www.groovypost.com/howto/remote-access-mac-osx-windows-7/). Which works for what I wanted.

Teamviwer would have save me hours of frustration if they provided a notification that older versions will not work unless a license was purchased. But then again, the knowledge and experience that I gained would not have happened. There is always a positive side, just have to look! 😉