>>Alex,
>>
>>>1) I want to use MSN Messenger programmatically for customer support, both through chat and especially by offering the option to give us limited control of their machine, similar to what you do with NetMeeting. All with minimal complication to customer, but naturally with good security.
>>
>>The Remote Assistance feature already built in to Windows and MSN Messenger works fairly well. I've used it quite a bit to fix up stuff gone wrong with my daughter's computer which is 800 miles away from here.
>
>Thank you David. Sounds close to what we need.
>
>We don't want customers to have access to us by messenger at all times. Ideally the process would go like this: customer calls in with a problem and if we can't help over the phone we offer a remote session, with a passcode. At that moment we set up to receive with that passcode and user goes to Help > Remote Assistance in our app's menu, enters the code and our app sets everything up. User provides approval to Windows when asked.
>
>Besides controlling the app remotely it would be useful to have some form of chat, again without setting a permanent chat channel with that user, perhaps through some bot session similar to the translator demonstrated in the Channel 9 session Ken referenced. The bot session, under control by a program we write, receives the requests and passcodes from both sides and passes the appropriate messages.
>
>Thanks for the help.
>
>Alex

We have such a program that we wrote for our own tech support.
There is more to it than you might think :)

Your user can launch the program from his menu.
It gives him a list of all your tech support people who are available and logged in.
If you are not logged in, the list would be empty.

The program requires no ports open or special firewall configuration on the customer's machine or yours.
It has Remote Desktop, File Transfer, Chat, and the latest version even has voice.

Because of the "no open ports" design, it must run through our connection server.

I was considering offering low cost subscriptions to the service with no per client charges.
Let me know if you are interested in trying it out.

Best,
Michael Cummings
Brick Software Inc.