Virtualized Client Computing: Are We Forgetting the Human Element?

By Peter Rawlinson
published: Wednesday, August 06 2008

The past two decades have been dominated by two principal methods of delivering users their desktop environment.  The first, personal computers, where a one-to-one relationship exists between user and machine, provides a highly-flexible and personal experience for the user.  PCs, however, are a relatively high cost asset - both in terms of initial outlay and ongoing maintenance costs.

The alternative method of desktop delivery came about with the advent of Microsoft Terminal Server and Citrix Winframe.  This is a server-based computing approach, where a one-to-many relationship exists between machine and user.  With multiple users sharing the same hardware resources, total cost of ownership is significantly reduced.  This method, however, can suffer from low user acceptance, application conflict and performance issues and consequently adoption is limited to those users who do not require a highly flexible, complex and personal working experience - an increasingly small proportion of the user base.

Operating System Virtualization

These two methods of desktop delivery remained the status quo for several years, until technological advances enabled the operating system to be abstracted from the hardware base.  This was called Operating System Virtualization and was pioneered at the server level by VMware in the late 90s.  This allows multiple servers to be supported on one physical box - enabling optimal use of hardware and increased business agility, since servers can now be ‘swapped out' almost instantly.

When applied to client computing, multiple desktops can be centrally hosted on a server and the accessing device swapped out for a low cost presentation (thin) client.  The difference between this and the traditional Terminal Server solution is that full desktops, including operating system and application set, can be hosted independently and be dedicated to one particular user.  There is no sharing of OS or applications and the application conflict issues exhibited previously by that model are no longer valid.  This effectively provides a one-to-one, user-to-PC model, with the cost and management benefits of the one-to-many server-based computing model.  This is called virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and has gained increased momentum in recent times.

Application Virtualization 

The next logical stage in the journey to virtualized client computing was the virtualization of the application layer.  Removing the dependency of the applications on the base OS means that hardware, OS and applications can now be managed independently and brought together when needed by a user.  This model has been referred to as the ‘on-demand' desktop, since it only actually exists when a user needs it.  Since the operating system and applications are now independently maintained, there is only a need to keep a single ‘image' of each and use a copy of this base image to construct the desktop when needed.  Now the management of operating systems and applications is significantly reduced, since each of these items is no longer unique to the user (as they were when installed on a local PC).  Hardware now literally becomes a commoditized resource, where operating systems are ‘plugged in' to this resource as required.

So it would seem the journey is complete - from a fully integrated PC, to a virtualized operating system, to completely separate OS and application assets - the on-demand desktop.  IT departments experience cost and management reduction and the business is able to provide a working environment to each user that is in line with their needs - but is it?

The Missing Element

Something is missing here.  Something that was not only present, but always intimately entwined in the PC.  Something that was essential to user acceptance of the PC.  We are talking here of the user, the human being, what can be referred to in technological terms as the ‘user personality'.  This is all the personal preferences that each user has that make their working environment their own.  Desktop wallpaper, resolution settings, keyboard, language and mouse settings, spell-checker, desktop icon location, personal applications etc. are all optional changes that a user can, and is fully expecting to, be able to make to the baseline configuration of their desktop. 

The Third Layer of Virtualization

It seems clear that a third step is required on the road to a fully realized virtual, on-demand desktop solution.  A step that takes into account the most important component of the desktop as a business tool - the human being that interacts with it.  This third layer involves the abstraction and independent management of the embedded user data from the desktop environment.  User environment management requires all aspects of the user personality to be abstracted, stored and managed independent of the desktop and applied on-demand when needed - in exactly the same way that OS and applications are assembled in the on-demand desktop.  In this way, the efficiency of the assembled desktop model can be realized with no impact to the users working experience.  All personal changes made to the desktop by the user are also centrally stored, independent of the desktop, to be applied the next time the user requests a ‘fresh' working environment.

Policy and Personalization

In business terms, it is not only essential that the user is able to personalize their environment.  It is also vital that the business is able to enforce corporate policy within these fresh, clean, leveraged desktops.  An important realization in the move from the PC to the virtual desktop is that of ownership.  A PC, by its very definition, is typically managed by the user (who is frequently the least qualified person to manage such an asset).  However, when this environment is virtualized and centrally hosted in the data center, the perceived ownership transfers to the business (specifically the IT department).  This means implementation and enforcement of company policy becomes more important (and also more realistic) in virtualized environments.  Policy may not be the same for everyone and can be subject to change as business agility dictates.  So enabling the user to personalize their environment is only one aspect of representing the human being in the on-demand desktop.  Tailored policy is the other.  Policy, since this represents what the company dictates (e.g. what network drives to map, what printers can be used, what applications can be accessed etc.) and tailored, since policy varies depending on role (e.g. CEO versus administrative assistant) and therefore forms part of the users' virtual personality.

So What Does This Mean?

There are several business benefits that emerge as a direct result of enabling a true on-demand, virtual desktop environment across an enterprise landscape.  Beside the obvious opportunities for reduced management overhead through minimized OS and application images, as well as removal of the high cost localized endpoint device, user environment management enables other benefits to come into play.  Migration of physical to virtual environments or between operating system boundaries can be accelerated by automatically abstracting the local personality and storing it centrally - to be called upon from a virtual desktop or alternate operating system post migration.  The central management of policy enables business rules to be easily and instantly implemented across large numbers of users, increasing business agility and further reducing management costs.  Application of this ‘on-demand' personality enables virtual desktop pooling, effectively delivering a homogeneous solution to a heterogeneous environment and reducing ‘canned' image maintenance.  Perhaps the most important result from the addition of user environment management to the virtualized desktop estate is the delivery of a consistent, predictable, seamless, personal and optimal working environment to all users, across all roles, accessing devices and contexts.  High user productivity and reduced support costs, as well as an efficient and harmonious relationship between the IT department and business units are also consequences of effective user environment management.

User Environment Management

Virtualization technology has evolved to enable optimal use of available resources, increased business agility and reduced management overhead.  Attempting a virtualized desktop roll-out without embracing the management of user-specific aspects of the environment serves to omit an essential component of the desktop itself, providing only a sterile, unfamiliar experience.  Similarly, approaching the user aspect with partial solutions such as profile management or roaming profiles will increase the management overhead which virtualization serves to decrease, as well as compromise the user experience since these piecemeal solutions are typically not enterprise-aware and do not combine the policy and preference aspects of the holistic user personality.

There are several technology vendors providing user environment management solutions today and it is expected that the major virtualization technology vendors such as Citrix, VMware and Microsoft will integrate some aspect of user environment management into their platforms (e.g. the recent inclusion of profile management capability, User Profile Manager, in Citrix XenDesktop).  There is a growing recognition that accommodating the user's needs in a desktop environment is increasingly important, as users become more demanding and the IT department is held to business Service Level Agreements (SLA).  User environment management is a key component in any move to a client-based virtual environment.  It is the third layer of virtualization and completes the vision of the on-demand desktop.

Related Links:

AppSense , XenDesktop , iMany , Intelisys