What Is It Called When All Users Connect to a Clone of a Master Image Machine
Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) is a desktop virtualization technology wherein a desktop operating organisation, typically Microsoft Windows, runs and is managed in a data eye. The virtual desktop image is delivered over a network to an endpoint device, which allows the user to interact with the operating system and its applications as if they were running locally. The endpoint may be a traditional PC, thin client device or a mobile device.
The concept of presenting virtualized applications and desktops to users falls under the umbrella of end-user computing (EUC). The term VDI was originally coined by VMware and has since become a de facto applied science acronym. While Windows-based VDI is the virtually common workload, Linux virtual desktops are also an selection.
How the user accesses VDI depends on the organization's configuration, ranging from automatic presentation of the virtual desktop at logon to requiring the user to select the virtual desktop and then launching it. Once the user accesses the virtual desktop, information technology takes primary focus, and the expect and feel are that of a local workstation. The user selects the advisable applications and tin perform their work.
Operating system
VDI may be based on a server or workstation operating system. Traditionally, the term VDI has near usually referred to a virtualized workstation operating organisation allocated to a single user, merely that definition is changing.
Each virtual desktop presented to users may be based on a i:1 alignment or a 1:many ratio, which is often referenced as multi-user. For example, a single virtual desktop allocated to a single user is considered 1:i, but numerous virtual desktops shared under a unmarried operating system is a hosted shared model, or i:many.
A server operating system can service users every bit either 1:1 or ane:many. Where a server operating system is the platform for VDI, Microsoft Server Desktop Experience is enabled to more closely mimic a workstation operating system to users. Desktop Feel adds features such as Windows Media Player, Sound Recorder and Character Map, all of which are not natively included every bit part of the generic server operating system installation.
Until recently, a workstation operating system could simply service users as one:1. However, in 2019, Microsoft announced the availability of Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD), which enables multi-user functionality on Windows 10, which was previously merely available on server operating systems. Thus, Windows 10 now has true workstation multi-user functionality. WVD is only available on Microsoft'southward own deject infrastructure, Azure, and there are stringent licensing requirements that make it inappropriate for all but enterprise organizations.
Display protocols
Each endpoint device must install the corresponding customer software or run an HTML5-based session that invokes the respective session protocol. Each vendor platform is based on a remote display protocol that carries session data between the client and calculating resource:
- Citrix
- Independent Computing Architecture (ICA)
- Enlightened Data Send (EDT)
- VMware
- Boom Extreme
- PC over IP (PCoIP)
- Microsoft
- Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP)
High-definition user experience (HDX) from Citrix is largely an umbrella marketing term that encompasses ICA, EDT and some additional capabilities. VMware user sessions can be based on Smash Farthermost, PCoIP or RDP. Microsoft Remote Desktop tin can just apply RDP.
The display protocol, or session protocol, controls the user display and multimedia capabilities, and the specific features and functionality of each protocol vary. PCoIP is licensed from Teradici, whereas Blast Extreme is VMware's in-firm protocol. In addition, EDT and Blast Farthermost are optimized for User Datagram Protocol (UDP).
The session protocols listed above minimize and compress the data that is transmitted to and from the user device to provide the best possible user experience. For instance, if a user is working on a spreadsheet within a VDI session, the user transmits mouse movements and keystrokes to the virtual server or workstation, and bitmaps are transmitted back to the user device. The data itself does not populate the user display, simply instead shows bitmaps representing the information. When a user enters additional data in a cell, simply updated bitmaps are transmitted.
Requirements
VDI requires several distinct technologies working in unison to successfully present a virtual desktop to a user. First and foremost, IT must present a computing resource to the user. Although this computing resources can technically exist a physical desktop, virtual machines are a more than common selection.
For on-bounds deployments, a hypervisor hosts the virtual machines that will deploy as VDI. Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops and Microsoft RDS may exist hosted on any hypervisor, whereas VMware Horizon has been engineered to run on its ESXi hypervisor. When organizations must apply virtual graphics processing units (vGPUs) to support highly graphical applications such as radiographic imaging or computer-aided design (CAD), it'southward common to use Citrix Hypervisor (formerly XenServer) or VMware ESXi.
A mechanism for mastering and distributing VDI images is necessary, and at that place is significant complexity involved with these processes. Depending on enterprise requirements, IT may employ one gold paradigm for all VDI workloads or numerous golden images. Minimizing the number of images decreases administrative effort, as each image adds exponential overhead. IT must open gilt images, revise them with Windows updates, base applications, antivirus and other changes, and then subsequently re-enable them.
Storage resources can be significant and may represent the unmarried near expensive attribute of VDI, especially when each virtual machine is allotted pregnant disk size. Information technology may elect thin provisioning, causing the virtual machine to use the minimum amount of deejay space and so expand as necessary. However, shut monitoring of actual storage requirements is necessary to ensure that storage expansion does not exceed actual space. To combat this possibility, organizations may choose thick provisioning, which causes the maximum amount of infinite to be fully allocated.
IT often uses layering technologies in conjunction with VDI images. By providing a non-persistent virtual desktop to users and adding layers for applications and functionality, Information technology can customize a virtual desktop with minimal management. For example, It may append an application layer suitable for a marketing department for those users, whereas an engineering science section would require a distinct awarding layer with CAD or other design applications.
VDI requires enterprise information to traverse the network, so IT must secure user communications via SSL/TLS 1.two. For instance, Citrix strongly recommends using its Gateway product (formerly NetScaler) to ensure that all traffic traverses the network securely.
Converged infrastructure and hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) products address the scalability and cost challenges associated with virtual desktop infrastructure. These products bundle storage, servers, networking and virtualization software -- often specifically for VDI deployments. Both Nutanix and VMware atomic number 82 the market share for HCI and can serve as the platform for Microsoft RDS, VMware Horizon and Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops.
Persistent vs. non-persistent deployments
VDI administrators may deploy non-persistent or persistent desktops. Persistent virtual desktops have a 1:1 ratio, meaning that each user has their own desktop epitome. Not-persistent desktops take a many:one ratio, which means that many end users share one desktop image. The primary difference between the two types of virtual desktops lies in the power to salvage changes and permanently install apps to the desktop.
Persistent VDI
With persistent VDI, the user receives a permanently reserved VDI resources at each logon, and then each user's virtual desktop tin can have personal settings such as stored passwords, shortcuts and screensavers. End users can as well save files to the desktop.
Persistent desktops accept the following benefits:
- Customization. Considering an paradigm is allocated to each separate desktop, with persistent VDI end users can customize their virtual desktop.
- Usability. Nearly end users expect to be able to save personalized data, shortcuts and files. This is specially important for cognition workers because they must frequently work with saved files. Persistent VDI offers a level of familiarity that non-persistent VDI does non.
- Elementary desktop direction. It admins manage persistent desktops in the aforementioned way every bit physical desktops. Therefore, Information technology admins don't demand to re-engineer desktops when they transition to a VDI model.
Nonetheless, persistent VDI also comes with drawbacks:
- Challenging paradigm management. The ane:1 ratio of persistent desktops means that at that place are a lot of private images and profiles for Information technology to manage, which can become unwieldy.
- Higher storage requirements. Persistent VDI requires more than storage than non-persistent VDI, which can increment the overall costs.
Non-persistent VDI
Non-persistent VDI spins up a fresh VDI image upon each login. It offers a diversity of benefits, including:
- Easy management. IT has a minimal number of master images to maintain and secure, which is much simpler than managing a complete virtual desktop for each user.
- Less storage. With non-persistent VDI, the OS is split from the user data, which reduces storage costs.
The most commonly cited drawback for non-persistent VDI is limited personalization and flexibility. Customization is more than express for non-persistent VDI, simply Information technology can layer a mechanism to append the user profile, applications and other data at launch. Thus, not-persistent VDI presents a user with a base of operations prototype with unique customizations.
VDI apply cases
VDI is a powerful concern technology for well-aligned use cases. To make up one's mind whether VDI is skilful fit, organizations should advisedly assess their users from the perspective of what they do and where they work.
Generally, local and remote users (who perform work on desktops from a centrally located site) could benefit from VDI. Mobile users (who work from a variety of unlike locations) are not always a good fit for VDI; organizations should evaluate these situations on a example-by-case basis. The aforementioned goes for roaming users, or users who split up their fourth dimension between local or remote sites.
Organizations must besides evaluate how their users complete their work, such as the applications, resources and files they utilise. Generally, employees autumn into iv categories:
- Job workers. These users are ordinarily able to do their jobs with a small-scale set of applications and tin can do good from VDI. Examples include warehouse workers or call center agents.
- Knowledge workers. These employees crave more resource than task workers and are well suited for VDI. Example include analysts or accountants.
- Ability users. These are mayhap the best type of worker for VDI; they may agree Information technology authoritative rights or work with CAD applications that require a lot of computing resources. For example, developers may apply VDI workstations to test end-user functionality.
- Kiosk users. These users work with a shared resources, such as a computer library. They would as well benefit from VDI.
There are other employ cases that work well with VDI:
- BYOD. Bring your ain device (BYOD) programs mesh well with VDI. Where users are bringing their ain endpoint devices into the workplace, fully operation virtual desktops eliminate the need to integrate apps inside the user'due south personal physical device. Instead, users tin can apace access a virtual desktop and enterprise applications without additional configuration. VDI also offloads much of the device-level management that often accompanies a traditional BYOD surround.
- Highly secure environments. Industries that must prioritize a high level of security, such as finance or military, are well suited for VDI. VDI enables IT to accept a granular level of control over user desktops and prevent unauthorized software from inbound the desktop environs. Alternatively, these organizations can likewise consider awarding virtualization for apps that need high levels of security. This procedure installs virtualized applications in a data center, keeping them separated from the underlying Bone and other applications.
- Highly regulated industries. Organizations that are required to comply with regulatory standards, such equally legal or healthcare companies, would benefit from VDI because of the power to centralize information in a secure deject or data center. That eliminates the possibility of employees storing individual information on a personal server.
Benefits of VDI
VDI as a platform has many benefits, including:
- Device flexibility. Because niggling actual computing takes identify at the endpoint, IT departments may be able to extend the life span of otherwise obsolete PCs by repurposing them as VDI endpoints. And when the time does come up to purchase new devices, organizations tin purchase less powerful -- and less expensive -- end-user computing devices, including sparse clients.
- Increased security. Because all data lives in the data centre, non on the endpoint, VDI provides significant security benefits. A thief who steals a laptop from a VDI user can't accept any data from the endpoint device considering no data is stored on it.
- User experience. VDI provides a centralized, standardized desktop, and users abound accustomed to a consequent workspace. Whether that user is accessing VDI from a home computer, sparse client, kiosk, roving workstation or mobile device, the user interface is the same, with no need to acclimate for whatever physical platform.
The VDI user experience is equal to or better than the physical workstation due to the centralized system resource assigned to the virtual desktop, as well as the desktop prototype's shut proximity to dorsum-end databases, storage repositories and other resources. Further, remote display protocols compress and optimize network traffic considerably, which enables screen paints, keyboard and mouse data, and other interactions to simulate the responsiveness of a local desktop.
- Scalability. When an organization expands temporarily, such every bit seasonal call center agent contractors, it can quickly expand the VDI environment. By enabling these workers to access an enterprise virtual desktop workload and its respective apps, these contractors can be fully functional within minutes, compared with days or weeks to procure endpoint devices and configure apps.
- Mobility. Other benefits of VDI include the ability to more easily support remote and mobile workers. Mobile workers comprise a significant percentage of the workforce, and remote workers are becoming more common. Whether these individuals are field engineers, sales representatives, onsite project teams or executives, they all need remote access to their apps while traveling. By presenting a virtual desktop to these remote users, they cab piece of work as efficiently as if they were in the office.
Drawbacks of VDI
When VDI first came to prominence most 10 years ago, some organizations implemented VDI without a justified business case. Every bit a result, many projects failed because of the unexpected back-end technical complexities, equally well as a workforce that wasn't fully accepting of VDI as an stop-user calculating model. It's also important to exam a VDI deployment to ensure that the organization's infrastructure and resource tin can reach acceptable user experience levels on virtual desktops.
Here are some potential drawbacks of implementing VDI:
Potentially poor user experience. Without sufficient grooming, providing the user with access to ii desktops (i.e., the local desktop and the virtualized desktop) may be confusing and outcome in a poor user experience. For example, if users effort to salve a file from the virtual desktop, they may search for it in the incorrect location. This may result in additional support requests to find missing files that were simply archived on the incorrect desktop.
Additional costs. Organizations should review financials associated with VDI in depth. While there are budgetary savings associated with extending the life of endpoint hardware, the additional costs for IT infrastructure expenses, personnel, licensing and other items may exist college than expected.
Although storage costs have been declining, they tin can still crusade VDI to become price prohibitive. When a desktop runs locally, the operating organization, applications, information and settings are all stored on the endpoint. In that location is no extra storage cost; it's included in the price of the PC. With VDI, nonetheless, storage of the operating organization, applications, data and settings for every single user must be housed in the data center. Workload capacity needs, and the cost required to meet them, can quickly balloon out of control.
Complex infrastructure. VDI requires several components working together flawlessly to provide users with virtual desktops. If any of the dorsum-terminate components encounter issues, such as a desktop broker or licensing server automatically rebooting or a VM deployment system running out of storage space, then users cannot make virtual desktop connections. While the VDI vendor's monitoring features offer some details regarding system issues and related forensics, big environments in particular likely need a third-party monitoring tool to ensure maximum uptime, which further adds to costs.
Additional Information technology staff. Maintaining staff to support a VDI environment tin can be difficult. In addition to recruiting and maintaining qualified It professionals, ongoing training and turnover are very real challenges that organizations face. Furthermore, when organizations undertake new projects, they may need to hire external consultants to provide architectural guidance and initial implementation assistance.
Licensing issues . Software licensing is an important consideration. In add-on to the initial procurement for VDI licensing, ongoing maintenance and support agreements bear upon the bottom line. Moreover, Microsoft Windows workstation and/or server licensing is required and may represent an additional price. VDI can complicate vendor software licensing and back up because some licensing and support agreements do not allow for software to be shared amidst multiple devices and/or users.
Reliance on internet connectivity. No network, no VDI session. VDI's reliance on network connectivity presents some other challenge. Although net connectivity is quickly improving throughout the world, many locations however have little or no internet access. Users can't access their virtual desktops without a network connection, and weak connectivity can cause a poor user feel.
VDI technologies from Citrix, Microsoft, VMware and others accost business organisation and technical requirements that enable users to access consequent virtual desktops remotely. Business needs and user experience should be weighed against resources requirements, costs and technical complexities to ensure that VDI is the right platform for a given enterprise.
VDI vs. RDS
Remote Desktop Services (RDS) and VDI are both ways to deliver remote desktops to users. Similar VDI, RDS enables users to admission desktops by connecting to a VM or server that is hosted in a local data center or in the deject. The desktop environment, applications and data all live on that VM or server. In that location are differences between RDS and VDI, however.
RDS was originally called Terminal Services, which was a feature from Windows' legacy operating system, Windows NT. Citrix wrote and licensed the code for Final Services. RDS is limited to Windows Server, which means that users tin can just access Windows desktops. However, VDI is not express to a single operating organization or awarding architecture.
To enable RDS for a user, Information technology must run a unmarried Windows Server instance on hardware or a virtual server. That one server simultaneously runs every user's instance. With VDI, each user is linked to its own VM that also must have its own license for the OS and applications.
For users to access that instance, they must connect to a network and their client devices must support Remote Desktop Protocol, a Microsoft protocol that supplies a user with a graphical interface. Using that interface, a user can connect to another estimator over a network connection.
For the most office, all RDS users are presented with the same OS and applications. Windows Server 2016 and later versions allowed for personal session desktops to have some persistency, notwithstanding.
RDS supports many users. Because each license is linked to a user via Microsoft'due south Client Access License, RDS licensing and administration tin can be simpler than VDI. RDS works well for organizations that need to support standard desktop applications such as Microsoft 365 or email.
VDI, however, is a meliorate fit under the following circumstances:
- Compliance and security. With RDS, all users share one server, which introduces some potential security risks.
- Business continuity. With RDS, a single network outage can affect every user. VDI is often more resilient because virtual servers can fail over.
- Custom or intensive applications. VDI is a ameliorate option for intensive applications such as computer-aided blueprint or video editing programs. Information technology is likewise ameliorate for custom applications, because information technology enables higher levels of personalization than RDS does.
VDI vs. DaaS
At that place are two primary mechanisms for delivering a virtual desktop to a user: virtual desktop infrastructure and desktop every bit a service (DaaS). The divergence between these two mechanisms is just a thing of who owns the infrastructure.
With VDI, the business locally creates and manages the underlying virtualization and resulting virtual desktops. This means the business concern itself owns and operates the VDI servers, takes charge of creating and maintaining all the virtual desktop images, and and then on. By deploying VDI, a business exercises complete control over the virtual desktop environment. This can be a preferred alternative for any business that is field of study to stringent compliance regulations or must provide a potent security posture. However, the boosted costs of buying, installing and maintaining VDI servers and software may exist prohibitive for some small businesses.
With DaaS, a third-party provider creates and manages the virtualization environs and virtual desktops. Most unremarkably, this includes not just the virtual desktop, but also apps and support. The outside provider owns and operates the VDI servers and controls the creation and provisioning of virtual desktop images. In effect, the business simply "rents" virtual desktops from the provider who provisions the requested instances and makes them available to users.
DaaS is often thought of as "VDI in the cloud" and is normally presented as a deject service. This can exist a preferred alternative for whatever business with limited IT capabilities where deploying VDI is undesirable, or when the business organisation is better suited to handling the monthly recurring pecker for virtual desktops.
IT tin more than hands scale upwardly and down desktops with DaaS by calculation or removing licenses rather than making changes to the infrastructure itself. This tin can be benign for companies that are growing apace or experience usage spikes during sure times of the year, such as Black Friday. DaaS may also ameliorate support organizations with GPU-powered applications by providing a more attainable style to access expensive hardware.
DaaS does have drawbacks, however. While vendors tout support for elementary or common apps such as Microsoft Office, the reality is that business concern application integration -- including databases, file servers and other resource -- is extremely circuitous. Every bit such, the implementation of true and useful DaaS products is often a lengthy, complex process.
Organizations that transition from on-bounds VDI to DaaS could choose betwixt a few different methods. Organizations could use the "lift and shift" method for VDI workloads, which includes moving applications without redesigning them or irresolute workflow. A more than comprehensive method includes rethinking strategies, as well every bit reviewing cloud offerings, which results in a more than comprehensive and updated engineering offering.
History of VDI
In the early 2000s, VMware customers began hosting virtualized desktop processes with VMware and ESX servers, using Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol in lieu of a connexion broker. During VMware'due south second annual VMworld conference in 2005 the company demonstrated a prototype of a connectedness broker.
VMware introduced the term 'VDI' in 2006, when the company created the VDI Alliance program and VMware, Citrix and Microsoft subsequently adult VDI products for sale. Virtual desktops were a somewhat hidden but optional capability of Citrix Presentation Server 4.0 and XenDesktop was later released equally a standalone product.
VMware released its VDI product under the name Virtual Desktop Manager, which later was renamed View, and then Horizon. Citrix'south products, XenDesktop and XenApp, were later rebranded to Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops.
Licensing was a pregnant hurdle for early VDI deployments, mainly due to Microsoft's Virtual Desktop Access (VDA) requirement. Organizations with Windows virtual desktops that were hosted on servers needed to pay $100 per device per year for VDA licensing. Microsoft Software Balls (SA) licensing included VDA, but simply for Windows devices. This meant that companies with tablets, PCs and smartphones that weren't manufactured by Microsoft were required to pay pregnant licensing fees.
Many organizations found a workaround by using Windows Server as the VDI's underlying Os. This prevented organizations from paying exorbitant licensing fees because the Windows Server license was a quondam fee; the VDA license was an annual cost, plus the price of the Windows Server license.
In 2014, Microsoft allowed Windows licenses to exist assigned per user rather than per device, which alleviated the costly problem of VDA licensing.
DaaS, a desktop virtualization model in which a 3rd-party deject provider delivers virtual desktops via a subscription service, began to gain traction in the mid-2010s. Amazon released one of the showtime DaaS products in 2014, offering single-user Windows Server 2012 equally the Bone. Other vendors, including Citrix, VMware and Workspot followed suit with their own DaaS products.
In 2019, Microsoft brought more than changes to the VDI industry when information technology released Windows Virtual Desktop, a DaaS offer that runs on the Azure cloud and provides a multiuser version of Windows ten. Organizations must pay for Azure subscription costs, simply the DaaS offering is included with a Windows 10 Enterprise license.
What'due south next for VDI?
The VDI market place is growing exponentially due to a diversity of factors, including increased adoption of BYOD programs and a greater demand for a mobilized workforce. Deject-based VDI, or DaaS, is in especially high demand. In 2016, the cloud-based VDI marketplace was worth $iii.6 meg and it is estimated to reach over $10 million by 2023, according to Allied Market Research.
The COVID-19 pandemic generated further interest in DaaS due to the suddenly heightened need for users to be able to work anywhere. During the COVID-nineteen pandemic, for example, DaaS allowed many organizations to more than hands transition to a work-from-home surroundings due to the desktop virtualization model's scalability and ease of deployment.
Many organizations are embarking on their journey to the cloud, and incorporating VDI requirements is an important aspect of architecting the side by side-generation infrastructure. Many experts believe that DaaS will exist a popular deployment method in the future considering it is a subscription-based SaaS model, a model that many software providers have moved to.
The deject subscription model makes sense from a vendor perspective, as well. Subscriptions generate a consistent, recurring acquirement stream rather than ane-time sales transactions that create irregular bumps in revenue. Vendors can more easily market consumption-based services because there are bonny benefits, such every bit lower maintenance fees and upfront costs.
Products and vendors
There are three key players in the VDI market: Citrix, Microsoft and VMware. Of these, Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops holds the largest market place share, followed past VMware Horizon and subsequently Microsoft Remote Desktop Services (RDS).
Citrix and Microsoft first came to market with virtualized apps and shared desktops based on server-based calculating. They subsequently offered VDI workloads based on workstation operating systems, whereas VMware initially launched VDI and and then later offered virtualized apps.
The VDI market too includes other vendors that can oftentimes be more affordable than the major, tried-and-true vendors. These options include flexVDI, NComputing and Leostream.
Many on-premises VDI vendors also accept a DaaS offering. For example, Citrix offers Citrix Managed Desktops, VMware offers Horizon DaaS and Microsoft released Azure-based Windows Virtual Desktop in 2019. Amazon also has a DaaS offering, Amazon WorkSpaces.
Other DaaS vendors include Evolve IP, Cloudalize, Workspot, dinCloud and Dizzion.
This was last updated in October 2020
Continue Reading Almost What is virtual desktop infrastructure? VDI explained
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Source: https://www.techtarget.com/searchvirtualdesktop/definition/virtual-desktop-infrastructure-VDI
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