Common paths to VDI?
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@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
Probably could have been better asked "How does one move from desktop/laptops to thin client environments?"
Install RDS, done.
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@scottalanmiller said in Common paths to VDI?:
@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
I wasn't particularly interested in a comparison between VDI to RDP, but more interested on how one gets to a "thin-client" environment in general. "VDI" is just a term that I have known it as a general technology/topology (such as similar to the 1980's client-server session based technologies) and not in a particular vendor/protocol/specific product instance.
Probably could have been better asked "How does one move from desktop/laptops to thin client environments?"
VDI is VERY specific, it is one to one virtualization of desktops without the sharing of resources and is not something that existing in the 1980s. You are thinking of terminal services, which is called RDS in the Windows world. So using VDI explicitely gave you something different.
Duly noted.
When I worked at the Dept of Energy, they were deploying thin clients and specifically called it "VDI" with VMware Horizon. In the environment, everybody shared a "golden image" of the OS and each user had their particular profile loaded on top of their copy of the golden image, with the apps that they needed. This is the particular environment that I am trying to refer to.
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@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
@scottalanmiller said in Common paths to VDI?:
@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
I wasn't particularly interested in a comparison between VDI to RDP, but more interested on how one gets to a "thin-client" environment in general. "VDI" is just a term that I have known it as a general technology/topology (such as similar to the 1980's client-server session based technologies) and not in a particular vendor/protocol/specific product instance.
Probably could have been better asked "How does one move from desktop/laptops to thin client environments?"
VDI is VERY specific, it is one to one virtualization of desktops without the sharing of resources and is not something that existing in the 1980s. You are thinking of terminal services, which is called RDS in the Windows world. So using VDI explicitely gave you something different.
Duly noted.
When I worked at the Dept of Energy, they were deploying thin clients and specifically called it "VDI" with VMware Horizon. In the environment, everybody shared a "golden image" of the OS and each user had their particular profile loaded on top of their copy of the golden image, with the apps that they needed. This is the particular environment that I am trying to refer to.
Then you are back to VDI. You are flip flopping. Do you want shared computing like in the 1980s, or do you want one ot one virtualization where each user gets their own instance and they don't share, that's VDI. VDI is the expensive one that you never want unless you've proven that the other options don't work/ You never "want" VDI. If the phrase "I want VDI" comes up, something is wrong. It is always "I have no choice but VDI".
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VDI odes not actually mandate thin clients. VDI could actually be done with a mass of KVM cables. The thing that makes it VDI is not the thin client nature of it, but the sprawl of VMs.
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@scottalanmiller said in Common paths to VDI?:
@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
@scottalanmiller said in Common paths to VDI?:
@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
I wasn't particularly interested in a comparison between VDI to RDP, but more interested on how one gets to a "thin-client" environment in general. "VDI" is just a term that I have known it as a general technology/topology (such as similar to the 1980's client-server session based technologies) and not in a particular vendor/protocol/specific product instance.
Probably could have been better asked "How does one move from desktop/laptops to thin client environments?"
VDI is VERY specific, it is one to one virtualization of desktops without the sharing of resources and is not something that existing in the 1980s. You are thinking of terminal services, which is called RDS in the Windows world. So using VDI explicitely gave you something different.
Duly noted.
When I worked at the Dept of Energy, they were deploying thin clients and specifically called it "VDI" with VMware Horizon. In the environment, everybody shared a "golden image" of the OS and each user had their particular profile loaded on top of their copy of the golden image, with the apps that they needed. This is the particular environment that I am trying to refer to.
Then you are back to VDI. You are flip flopping. Do you want shared computing like in the 1980s, or do you want one ot one virtualization where each user gets their own instance and they don't share, that's VDI. VDI is the expensive one that you never want unless you've proven that the other options don't work/ You never "want" VDI. If the phrase "I want VDI" comes up, something is wrong. It is always "I have no choice but VDI".
Sorry about the flip-flopping. I assumed that VDI and RDS was the same type of technologies (similar to terminal back in the 80's) but different takes from different companies.
RDS sounds more like the technology that I would be needing instead of VDI. I can always redirect users drives as necessary to the file server, along with printers, applications, etc.
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@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
@scottalanmiller said in Common paths to VDI?:
@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
@scottalanmiller said in Common paths to VDI?:
@nerdydad said in Common paths to VDI?:
I wasn't particularly interested in a comparison between VDI to RDP, but more interested on how one gets to a "thin-client" environment in general. "VDI" is just a term that I have known it as a general technology/topology (such as similar to the 1980's client-server session based technologies) and not in a particular vendor/protocol/specific product instance.
Probably could have been better asked "How does one move from desktop/laptops to thin client environments?"
VDI is VERY specific, it is one to one virtualization of desktops without the sharing of resources and is not something that existing in the 1980s. You are thinking of terminal services, which is called RDS in the Windows world. So using VDI explicitely gave you something different.
Duly noted.
When I worked at the Dept of Energy, they were deploying thin clients and specifically called it "VDI" with VMware Horizon. In the environment, everybody shared a "golden image" of the OS and each user had their particular profile loaded on top of their copy of the golden image, with the apps that they needed. This is the particular environment that I am trying to refer to.
Then you are back to VDI. You are flip flopping. Do you want shared computing like in the 1980s, or do you want one ot one virtualization where each user gets their own instance and they don't share, that's VDI. VDI is the expensive one that you never want unless you've proven that the other options don't work/ You never "want" VDI. If the phrase "I want VDI" comes up, something is wrong. It is always "I have no choice but VDI".
Sorry about the flip-flopping. I assumed that VDI and RDS was the same type of technologies (similar to terminal back in the 80's) but different takes from different companies.
RDS sounds more like the technology that I would be needing instead of VDI. I can always redirect users drives as necessary to the file server, along with printers, applications, etc.
Right, RDS (or TS as it used to be) is the stnadard approach. VDI is the hipster buzzword of the day that has only become practical as of late and people jump on the bandwagon because it is new and interesting, but rarely evaluate it and then are trapped with all kinds of cost and complexity. As long as RDS works for you, it is generally far better. Easier, simpler, cheaper.
VDI comes into play only when you are running apps that cannot be deployed to a server (whether by bad tech or a crippling license) or you are doing someting where people need to be administrators on their own individual boxes (eek!!) So VDI is common in classrooms for system admin classes so that people can destroy their own instances and not mess with other people But for normal users who are kept with user accounts, you normally use RDS since they can't mess with each other as they are not admins.
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RDS enables the licensing to allow a Windows server to act like a UNIX server. UNIX was multi-user from the beginning. Windows restricts that by license without RDS.
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The simplest VDI implementations is just throwing up a Windows 10 VM on a hypervisor. It means nothing more than that. Lots of SMBs just do that when they need VDI. VDI is licensed "per VM" so scale plays little to no role. The cost is the same per user whether you need one or one million of them (well, at some point MS will make a deal with you.)
So I actually see VDI making the most sense for tiny shops that need one or two special case VMs and are unwilling to run a dedicated little box for them (which is generally cheaper) so that they don't have to license an RDS server which generally is overly expensive till you have at least five users (to get into your CAL packs.)
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To avoid VDI at the bank, they did racks of workstations in the datacenter.
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We (at Scale) have done a lot of work with Workspot for easy VDI solutions on Scale HC3. We have also done a lot of testing and validation around more traditional terminal services approaches like XenApp and Microsoft RDS. Both approaches have merit and vary in their value proposition, management, and approaches. Of course, a lot of Scale customers use the "simple" VDI approach of simply running Windows 8 or Windows 10 desktop VMs on top of their cluster and using the stock RDP options to connect to them, no special VDI products needed if you want to go that route. There are free front ends for this approach as well, we know that someone here in MangoLassi has used Guacamole, instead of RDS, as a front end connection aggregator for exactly that purpose.
