Dynamic Virtual Client

Managed IT with netBoot/i from Double-Take software

priya.m.abani@intel.com — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 21:26:32 GMT

Intel has been working with multiple ISVs to implement Dynamic Virtual Clients. Implementing netBoot/i™ solutions from Double-Take software simplifies desktop management, and provides IT providers and end-users with the right mix of management capabilities (centralized storage, recoverability) without compromising user-experience even for the most demanding applications. Central management of operating system and applications reduces management complexity of patching multiple desktops and offers cost reduction and security by eliminating hard drives from desktops.

Building and maintaining computer systems is no easy task and information technology managers are constantly looking for better tools to reduce the total cost of managing their data centers and infrastructure. Storing both operating system state and data within the computer can cause management challenges such as storage over provisioning, data duplication as well as expensive and ineffective backup solutions. Shifting data storage to Storage Area Networks (SAN) provided numerous advantages in both hard and soft dollar cost savings. The final evolution of storage management is to separate the boot disks from systems and turn them into stateless compute devices. The netBoot/i™ technology separates state from compute devices and allows them to run from iSCSI SAN.

Check this technology out in the attached case study.

Case Study - Scientific Application Streaming at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

priya.m.abani@intel.com — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:44:18 GMT

Hi all,

Intel has been working with various companies on implementing the concept of Dynamic Virtual Clients. As innovators among Harvard University’s IT community, the School of Engineering and Applies Sciences (SEAS) is an ideal environment for implementation of Application Streaming technology. Within SEAS, the office of Computing and Information Technology’s (CIT) CyberInfrastructure Labs (CI Labs) supports faculty, researchers, students, and staff by deploying and maintaining up-to-date, effective computing technologies.

With application streaming, applications are streamed on demand from the data center to the client, where they are executed locally. The goal of the scientific application streaming project, as outlined in the attached white paper, is to simplify the deployment of large, complex engineering and scientific applications to a highly diverse user population of around 1,000 students and faculty.

Initial results show install times decreasing from hours to minutes, as well as fewer problems caused by human error during complex installation and licensing procedures. As innovators among Harvard’s IT community, the CI Labs anticipates wider implementation of application streaming, both within its user base and across Harvard.

Check out the details in the attached case study.

Citrix Software with Intel vPro Technology

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 21:21:28 GMT

Citrix and Intel have been working together to deliver a solution that builds on both companies expertise. The end-to-end solutions, application delivery, and virtualization software that Citrix provides combined with the manageability, performance, and security from vPro deliver a novel solution. The solution allow the IT OS build to go through a secure or trusted boot, where the hardware and software used to launch the OS is measured for integrity before the program executes. The OS can be streamed off a remote server, and the end-user gets the rich client side local execution experience.

In this video, Citrix Software's Paul Hahn, Director of Business Development / Virtualization & Management Division, and Matt Edwards, Product Manager, talk about how Citrix Systems is developing products for OS/App Streaming on top of Intel vPro technology. You will see that the virtualized, measured, and streamed OS is able to still render and rotate a rich CAD drawing.

Demo of SCCM R2 w/App-V from Microsoft World Partner Conference

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:23:18 GMT

The 2008 Microsoft World Partner Conference (WPC) was hosted in Houston, TX on July7-10, 2008, with global participation. The WPC provides an online and in-person forum to learn more about business growth opportunities and product innovation from Microsoft executives.

This year the ECMF team participated at the event and provide a showcase that incorporated the manageability of Intel vPro in a real world scenario that utilized application virtualization and steaming. For the showcase the team used SCCM SP1 R2 beta as an enterprise management console with Microsoft's App-V (Soft grid 4.5 beta) to stream and manage applications to the vPro clients.

This provides the ability to:

Dynamically deliver application on the world's most manageable clients
Enable greater business agility with an enhanced end-user experience
Achieve IT "Green Computing" and reduced TCO objectives via fine-grained update controls.

After the event, I sat down with Craig Pierce to record the demonstration. I think it is a very compelling 4 minutes of video. In the demo he shows both the server console and the client experience, and launches 2 versions of Microsoft Word (2007 & 2003), which share drivers and normally wouldn't be able to run on the same machine. This concept can be extended to many other applications.

Application Virtualization and streaming allows you to no longer go through the entire install process, but simply stream and execute the applications you need when you need them - and the licenses for these applications can then be reclaimed when your not using them. This should become a defacto standard over time, as it works well in all compute models (from the rich client models to thin clients).

Questions? Comments? Funny remarks?

-Jason A. Davidson

p.s. Thank you to Chris Kaneshiro, Sophia Stalliviere, Nicole Trent, and Gunitika Dandona for your help in filming & editing this video.

St. Agnes Prep School use Emerging Compute Models with Video

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 23:43:26 GMT

A recent trip I took, I had the opportunity to visit the St. Agnes academy in Houston Texas. They have been using a product by Symantec called SVS Pro to deliver a online portal to the students which integrates into the classes and seemlessly offers the books and applications needed for the students to learn in a whole new way! I was able to get the perspective of sevearl students, a math teacher (whom I hear is one of the students favorites), as well as a great technical talk from Jason Hymes the director of Technology.

Here is the video it runs approximatly 5 minutes.

The url for the school is: http://www.st-agnes.org/ (if you have kids and live in that area, it looks like a great place to send your children).

Emerging Compute Models on vPro Radio - LISTEN HERE!

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Wed, 21 May 2008 03:23:05 GMT

Today Mike Ferron-Jones and I participated on the vPro Radio show. We covered the spectrum of emerging compute models and recommendations for when to consider each model. See this ppt for additional info:

Slide Deck

and click play below to hear our radio show from this afternoon!

Application & Desktop Virtualization Forum - Atlanta Video Demo with Brian Duckering from AppStream

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 19:59:50 GMT

While in Atlanta, I was able to get a few minutes with Brian Duckering from AppStream to have him show us his latest.

Here is the video. (I also learned that I need to do lighting different in this video...novice mistake on my part about having the window in the background - beyond the window is the Atlanta Braves stadium, which would have been a nice backdrop).

Podcast on Compute Models with Mike Ferron-Jones

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:52:33 GMT

Recently, Mike Ferron-Jones did an interview with Scott Smith from Intel's feed room. Mike did a great job at explaining the views he expressed in his blog.

Video Interview - Ketan Sampat, Marianne Jackson, and Arjun Batra

jason.a.davidson@intel.com — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:31:09 GMT

On February 12, I was at a Intel team event in Hillsboro, Oregon. I was able to snag a few minutes with Ketan Sampat, Marianne Jackson, and Arjun Batra to do video interviews about the Intel streamed computing initiative.

Here is my video interview with Ketan Sampat. He gives an overview of the recent events in the industry that have been contributing to Intel forming the streamed computing initiative, and in turn form the Emerging Compute Model Forum community. It runs just over 1 minute.

Next, I was able get Arjun Batra behind the camera to invite you to attend one of our upcoming application & desktop virtualization forums. Follow this link if you would like to register for one of these events. It runs around 3 minutes.

Also, I was able to sit down with Marianne Jackson, who talked about some of the various events, activities, and products that Intel has planned for 2008. It runs around a minute and a half.