Over the past year I have worked to establish a proof-of-concept and now pilot implementation for virtual desktops in an effort to create a host of new functionality for our users. The guiding principles of the implementation have been to expand user access to computers, provide any-time, any-where, any-device access to the resources they need and to do so in an easily accomplished fashion. To that end, an evaluation was setup to look at major players in the VDI space at the time, namely Citrix, VMware, and Quest. VMware View’s client requirements lacked the overall diversity to satisfy our needs, so they were quickly eliminated. Quest vWorkspace left a lot to be desired in terms of application management and execution. After testing, Citrix products were selected for our pilot implementation with a goal of providing 100 concurrent users access. Over in the coming posts, I will discuss the discoveries I’ve made and where we are today as a new school year begins.
