Archive for August, 2009

Desktop Virtualization, VDI and Client-Hosted

Friday, August 21st, 2009

Another acronym – just what the IT world needs, but VDI is with us now. VDI – Virtual Desktop Infrastructure is one type of desktop virtualization. It refers to hosting client virtual machines on a central server and deploying that virtual machine to any appropriate device –a PC, a thin client, a netbook on the road, etc. The other category of desktop virtualization is client-hosted. That model involves having two or more separate environments –as separate virtual machines on one client machine.
VDI is the more generally applicable model for business computing needs. This approach offers at first blush a lot of advantages. Your friendly, all setup as you like it office computing environment can be accessible to you anywhere from a lot of different devices.
Setting up a new desktop would take potentially minutes. Management, maintenance, updating of all of a business’s “desktops” is done centrally and probably more quickly than for separate desktop machine. The whole concept of a desktop PC goes away to some degree.

Cost, time and security advantages make the technology certainly intriguing. One disadvantage is the effort to get setup –without ending up with double the hardware investment. That is you could end up with bigger, more powerful servers and more of them plus be using desktops. A from scratch implementation with thin clients in place of desktops would make more sense.
The big players seems to be VWware and Microsoft. We will be deploying a pilot environment here at EBS and I will report back on our experiences.

Posted in Desktop Issues, Desktop OS, Security, Virtual Servers -VMware | 4 Comments »

Windows 7 – Looking Good!

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009

Microsoft is getting close to release of Windows 7 – the plan is in October of this year. After the many concerns and issues with Vista there is some hesitancy to jump on the bandwagon for Windows 7, but it looks good! It apparently builds on the best parts of Vista and adds speed and reduces memory usage. It reduces laptop power consumption. It has improved internal search, faster online access, touch screen options and new “jump screens” that seem to add functionality. One of our techs has used it for several weeks now and his comments are very postive:
“My initial impressions of Windows 7 have been overwhelmingly positive. It is amazingly stable and intuitive. The user interface has not changed drastically from Vista, but it resolves all of the complaints I had with its predecessor. After a clean installation, it went out and downloaded every single driver I needed, even drivers only available from third party websites, and automatically notifies me when new drivers become available from the manufacturer. I attempted to install two products that were never functional in Vista x64 for me, and when they failed in Win7, I received prompts recommending that I run them in WinXP compatibility mode. A quick click of accept and both are running flawlessly.

Windows 7 also includes a utility called Windows XP Mode, based off of Microsoft’s Virtual PC, that allows you to run an XP virtual machine from within Win7 in the event of a software compatibility issue, which I have not found to be necessary due to the compatibility adjustments. I was skeptical that the Virtual PC offering could be as useful as its VMWare opposite number, but was pleasantly surprised again. It’s as smooth as I’ve ever seen a virtual machine, and all of the host’s hardware, including anything attached by USB or Bluetooth, is automatically available in the virtual environment.

In short, Win7 provides multiple, redundant solutions to the major issues raised in Vista. I can perform most actions faster, with less clicks, than I ever could with Vista Ultimate. With several weeks of business and personal use and not a single crash or lock up, I am very optimistic about the newest version of Windows.”

Other reviews that I have read also have been very positive such as, “…upgrade without trepidation, people. With excitement even.”[1] and “essentially a faster Vista, the Vista that should have been”.[2]

Windows 7 is looking good!

[1]Windows 7 Review: You Can Quit Complaining Now
By Matt Buchanan,
http://gizmodo.com/5330609/windows-7-review-you-can-quit-complaining-now

[2]Business Insider, Eric Krangel, http://www.businessinsider.com/2009/1/windows-7-review-consensus-its-a-faster-vista-msft
“Windows 7 Review Consensus: It’s A Faster Vista”

Posted in Desktop Issues, Desktop OS | No Comments »

Instant On PCs, Laptops, Notebooks

Tuesday, August 11th, 2009

It takes what, 2-3 minutes to boot your PC? Drives us all crazy when we have to boot up so we tend to leave PCs on all the time – burning electricity, heating components, not clearing out the machine RAM, etc.
Microsoft has said that load times of less than 30 seconds is the near term goal, but there is a lot of activity in this area and alternatives are springing up.

Probably the most market advanced option to get a fast boot is offered by DeviceVM. They make a product called Splashtop (http://www.splashtop.com) that gives a really fast start -in seconds. This product and others like it, use a Linux kernel to quickly bring up email and Internet access. These fast boots are being offered as supplements to Windows. You hit the F4 etc. and boot quickly while Windows is loading, or just to browse or check email and you do not start Windows. This operating system for now comes built-in to new machines -mainly laptops/notebooks -from Lenovo, Asus and Acer and others.

Google Chrome -the new operating system Google is working on (to be, or not to be confused with the Google Chrome browser already released!) has a fast/instant boot as a promised major feature.

Dell has announced an “instant on” offering – they call it ‘Latitude ON”. Right now they seem to have little to say about when its coming, but they have an oar in the water.

Of course Microsoft is not sitting by idly -they are also promising faster boot times to come – as mentioned.

Less power use, instant access to information – it sounds great.

Posted in Desktop Issues | 2 Comments »

Virtual Servers

Tuesday, August 4th, 2009

OK, I resisted virtual servers a bit even early last year. It seemed as though technicians wanted to virtualize every client’s server no matter how small the operation or what the issue to be addressed! I am suspicious of hype and of those who get carried away with technology just because it is new or dubbed “hot”. I have to admit now that virtual servers do have many and deep applications in the small and mid-sized business space.
Simply put a “virtual server” is just a sort of sub-server which is run on a very real plain old standard hardware server box. The magic is that the virtual server -meaning it’s very real standard old operating system software and what ever applications and data that server has, is run by a special piece of software on the real hardware server -the host. The special software that does this becomes the operating system for the real hardware server -the core or host server if you will. This special software is relatively simple and yet complex. It is simple in that this special software takes care of few basic functions -just the operation of the virtual servers and ways to backup, and troubleshoot, etc. those virtual machines. It does not have active directory or print drivers, or all the myriad functions of a regular operating system.

Now one of the beauties of this system is that this “special software” can run more than one “virtual” machine. Most simply you could have two virtual servers on the one hardware box. One could be an Exchange server and the other a domain /file server for example. these “servers” would be completely separate each with their own operating system and applications and data in regular old windows file folders, etc.
What is the magic “special software” that runs the virtual servers on a host server box? VMware and Microsoft’s Hyper-V are the two most well known applications that do this job, although there are others.

How can you suddenly run more servers on one box when it seems the technical folks have been constantly nagging to get bigger and bigger boxes – how many time shave we heard, “to do that you need more RAM, more processor capacity, etc.” ? Now that is a good question and one that you need to watch for good answers to. Sometimes the technical folks in smaller deployments do not take into account the full demands on the box that is suddenly running 2 or more servers. However, there are real technical reasons for some of this new found power. One reason is the processors we now have -Dual core, Quad core etc. -the processors of today have some serious power and have moved beyond the needs of average computing requirements. This excess power can be put to good use with virtual servers. Virtualization is way into mainstream and provides serious benefits. No need to resist the force.

Posted in Hyper V, Virtual Servers -VMware | No Comments »

Social Networking and Security

Monday, August 3rd, 2009

A recent Houston Chronicle [7/29/08] article pointed out that social networks are increasingly popular with “geezers” like me -and that “60% of Americans 43 to 63 are hanging out on social networking Web sites”. Of course your younger workers are also big players in this area, but the “older” user statistic helps show how pervasive such use is. This has strong implications for marketing, brand awareness, product reputations and of interest here – network security.

One security risk is social networks being a platform for “the thoughtless disclosure of confidential business information” per the June, 2009 Insiders Guide to SMB ["Cybercrime Countermeasures, Rich Freeman]. Especially if your employees are using social media -Facebook, Twtter, etc. while at work it would seem they could easily blab on about matters they should not be publishing to the world. At the least, you should caution employees about the need for discretion and confidentiality especially when online.

With layoffs up, the possibility of client or prospect lists, proposals or other confidential data being stolen by laid off or threatened employees is higher as well. A termination policy that includes a checklist for locking down systems and locking out ex-employees is a key for data and systems security.

Posted in Security, Web and Browsers | 2 Comments »