VMware recently announced their integrated Desktop Virtualisation solution “Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)”, which includes the new Virtual Desktop Manager. What is VDI and why is it the way of the future?
In this article we cover:
Traditional desktop computing uses thick clients, each client having a local operating system and locally installed applications. This environment is difficult to manage and represents one of most underutilised asset in companies today.
Managing a distributed PC environment including patching, deploying applications, providing support and provisioning PCs to new users (whether it is 1 new user or a group of new users, through an office move, outsourcing, acquisition or merger) is extremely time consuming and inefficient. IT staff need to be on site to support users, taking time away from working on other projects that can lead to either increasing company revenue or saving the company money.
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This complex environment has become extremely expensive to support and maintain. More than 70% of the total cost of ownership of a desktop is spent on operational activities associated with managing the PC: managing end-users, hardware maintenance and repairs, provisioning and upgrading PCs, and software installations. With large numbers of PCs dispersed across an organisation, IT struggles to track, patch, update and troubleshoot connectivity issues. In addition to the high cost, the PC is underutilised. Typically, a user is only logged on for 8 hours per day, the PC sitting idle whilst users are in meetings, travelling, or performing other duties.
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Service levels for end users can be low with unplanned downtime from OS/hard drive failures or virus and malware infections high. End users tend to be tied to device in order to access their desktop. In most cases, a user must sit at the same physical PC to access the applications and data required for their job. This can complicate organisational changes such as MACS (Moves, Adds and Changes) and limit the user’s flexibility. Many organisations are looking for ways to improve employee productivity by making users’ personalised corporate desktop available anywhere, anytime and from multiple devices.
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Maintaining control over data and information that resides on individual PCs is almost impossible. When data resides locally, the threat of intellectual property or sensitive information walking out the door or being lost is always a major concern. Lost or stolen laptops can end up costing organisations millions of dollars and expose the organisation to litigation. Government and industry regulations such as HIPPA, SOX and Basel II have steadily increased the need for organisations to protect and safeguard private information, tightly control access to this information and provide a more trustworthy business environment
All of these factors contribute to the high operating cost of the desktops.
VMware decouples software from hardware, inserting a virtualisation layer or hypervisor that allows you to run multiple “virtual machines” on a single server. This significantly increases the utilisation of the server and creates virtual machines that are isolated from each other. The virtual machines share the benefit of powerful server and the isolation ensures that the applications behave well. If one machine becomes corrupted it will not affect the group.
Virtualisation has transformed the data centre, by partitioning physical servers, into multiple virtual machines. Each virtual machine represents a complete system, with processors, memory, networking, storage. Multiple virtual machines can share physical resources and run side by side on the same server.
Operating systems and applications can run unmodified in virtual machines and can be managed as a group increasing utilisation and optimising your infrastructure.
Just as virtualisation decouples software from hardware, desktop virtualisation separates the OS, applications and data from a local device, and encapsulates the image in a file run on a centralised server or servers in the data centre. 
Multiple desktop VMs are isolated on fully utilised, powerful servers and managed as a group in the data centre where they can be protected, backed up and resources can be dynamically allocated as needed.
This transforms a static desktop device into a portable stateless desktop environment that is highly available and accessible using almost any device over any network connection.
Since the complete desktop image is captured, the user has the full feature rich experience as if the OS and apps where installed locally. The user interfaces are all the same and everything just works. There is no need to retrain users.
The emergence of the transformed “stateless virtual desktop” has lead to the creation of a complete end-to- end integrated solution from VMware – called Virtual Desktop Infrastructure or “VDI”.
VDI is an end to end solution with no single point of failure; designed with both the IT administrator and end user in mind. VMware VDI is built on virtual desktops running on the VMware VI3 platform, VMware’s mature and proven virtualisation infrastructure.
VMware Virtual Desktop Manager is a component of VMware VDI, which is installed on servers (or virtual servers) in the data centre. VMware VDM securely connects clients to the virtual desktops. This process is generically known as connection brokering. The logic, controlling which virtual desktop a client should connect to, is handled by VMware VDM. This makes the process of connecting to VMware VDI simple for the end user and tightly controlled for the IT administrator.
VMware VDI includes VMware VDM 2, VMware VI3 and VMware Virtual Centre. This end to end integrated solution elegantly and simply solves the problems plaguing the traditional desktop model.
Management is simplified and streamlined. Upgrades, patches and backups are done from a single location, increasing the success rates while reducing desktop IT maintenance and support costs. No longer is IT required to be on site to handle PC help desk issues, these can be centrally managed. IT resources can be reallocated to other projects helping to reduce the maintenance costs of PCs.
Desktops are deployed and provisioned rapidly in minutes, rather than days, by deploying hardware independent virtual machines from templates.
End users benefit from improved end user Service Level Agreements (SLAs): unplanned downtime is minimised and recovery of OS failures is accelerated. The user is no longer tied to a device, their desktop is now tied to their identity and their personalised stateless virtual desktop is available using a wide variety of devices. It can be accessed securely over the public internet using a browser. This ensures continuous availability of service for end users in the event they cannot physically make it into the office.
Data and information is removed from local devices, where it may be susceptible to theft of loss, and is stored in secured and protected data centres. Protecting intellectual property and enabling companies to remain compliant with regulations like HIPPA, Basel II and SOXs.
In Windows Terminal Services (or Citrix environments), multiple users share a single instance of an operating system and applications, which are running on a server in the data centre. With VDI, each user gets their own desktop environment, which is running on a server in the data centre.
Application compatibility: organisations who can’t run their applications successfully with Citrix terminal services or other shared services solutions, will love VDI.
Extension of the full desktop: VDI users have their own complete desktop experience but it’s hosted in a secure location where it can be completely backed up and supported.
Full user isolation: customers requiring stronger user isolation for regulatory and security reasons may also prefer to run VDI.
Flexibility: users can utilise USB connections, such as memory sticks.
Typically we have found that customers deploy VDI for 3 reasons:
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Centralise their environment or replace their desktop,
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Disaster Recovery or business Continuity, and
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Ease the management of transactional workers.
Organisations are using VMware VDI to replace traditional PCs with virtual desktops that run on servers in the data centre, making them easier to control and manage. Administrators can provision new virtual desktops in minutes, giving end-users their own complete, unmodified desktop environments, eliminating the need for retraining. Unlike a shared services model, where a single OS is used for multiple applications such as Windows Terminal Services, VMware VDI creates isolated Virtual Desktops so VDI has none of the application compatibility problems.
VMware VDI extends the proven power of VMware Infrastructure 3 to the desktop, and VMware VDI customers enjoy the reliability, data protection and disaster recovery capabilities that have traditionally been available only for server applications. Features such as automated failover ensure high availability for virtual desktops, leveraging shared storage to back up your desktops, just as you would server data. Site-wide disaster recovery mechanisms ensure rapid restoration of service after an unplanned outage—without the need for duplicate hardware.
VMware VDI is ideal for delivering cost-effective desktop services to fixed-function workers at branch offices, call centres and other locations. Controlling access to confidential data is easier because all virtual desktops and their data can be stored inside the firewall.
Improved manageability
VMware VirtualCentre makes it possible to centralise and streamline provisioning, configuration, resource management, and workload management for desktop environments.
Streamlined desktop deployment: Desktop administrators can deploy new standardised, hardware-independent desktop virtual machines from templates in minutes and can automate more of the deployment process.
Increased flexibility
Users can access multiple desktop environments from a single client. They can also access their desktop environment from any connected client. Administrators can instantly archive or discard inactive desktop environments to reclaim resources for immediate reuse.
Improved security & data protection
Ensuring data security is simplified because all data resides in the data centre. Administrators can use the same backup processes they use in their data centre today, to ensure reliable desktop backups. Desktop recovery is dramatically simplified by the hardware independence of virtual machines.
Better resource utilisation
Running multiple desktop environments on a single server allows customers to pool hardware resources effectively. It also provides the flexibility to easily reuse and dynamically reallocate computing resources to desktop environments.
If you have hardware update scheduled, consider moving to VDI and thin clients. Thin clients normally have a 7 – 9 year lifecycle and minimal moving parts. This makes them ideal for rugged environments such as Healthcare or MFG. Thin clients can further reduce Opex costs by using about 1/10 the power of a typical fully loaded PC.
Many organisations are planning to migrate to Vista over the next year, often requiring desktop HW upgrades. This is an ideal time to move to a virtual desktop environment. You can deploy VISTA as a Virtual Desktop and repurpose and extend the life of your desktop HW and break the upgrade cycle.
If you need to ensure the integrity of the company data by establishing proper access to critical information, then a centralised VDI model can help you meet requirements, subject to government-imposed standards such as SOX or HIPAA. And if you have software developers in house, you can keep your IP safe and secure in the data centre by providing developers with a virtual desktop.
During a Merger and Acquisition, you need to provide groups of people immediate access to key business applications such as accounting or CRM. With a VDI, you can deploy a virtual desktop in minutes.
People today are very mobile and need to access their desktops and applications from home, on road or remotely. VDI is ideal to provide these remote or mobile workers secure access to their workspace when and where they want.
Use Case |
Problem |
Solution |
Outsourcing / Offshoring |
Need to protect confidential information and intellectual property in offsite, outsourced or offshore environments. |
Centrally host all desktop environments within the data centre
Provide secure network access for external users and control over desktop environments |
Disaster Recovery
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Complex DR plans typically do not include desktop systems because of the difficulty of supporting distributed desktop environments |
VDI makes desktop recovery possible because complete desktop environments are maintained on the backend
Extend existing disaster recovery solution to the desktop |
Alternative Workspaces
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Need to provide more flexibility for employees including mobile employees who often work from home or other locations |
Centrally host all desktop environments regardless of remote location
Users gain anytime access to complete desktop resources from anywhere |
Compliance
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Need to more easily comply with regulations such as Sarbanes Oxley, Gramm-Leach-Bliley, HIPAA, etc… |
VDI enables organisations to bring confidential information back to the host country data centre as well as apply more controls over the use of personal information |
Developer Desktop Consolidation
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Developers spend over 30% of their time setting up dev/test environments, an unproductive use of their time.
Dev and test scenarios often involve multiple systems per employee and unnecessary extra costs |
Centrally host all desktop environments a library of pre-configured dev/ test environments for easy access and replication to any test system
Share infrastructure among users and sites in a secure manner |
Branch-office Consolidation
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Escalating costs of supporting desktop infrastructure particularly legacy applications
Lack of IT and support at remote branches |
Centrally manage and support all desktop environments in the corporate data centre |
Get VMware Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Now | For more information or to purchase VMware products, contact Thomas Duryea Consulting on 1300 724 745.
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