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Recently, some customers have been asking me: “ What is the difference between the Disconnect, Reset, and Disconnect and Log Off options available under the VMware View client vs. the Log Off and Restart option under Windows 7 virtual desktop ?” Well, the only way I can answer that is by comparing the two options in the following table: Options under the VMware View Client Options under the Windows 7/8 Desktop Reset Desktop: When an end-user selects Reset Desktop under the VMware View Client, it shuts down and restarts the desktop. Any file that is open on the View desktop is closed without getting saved. Typically, this option is used when the desktop operating system stops responding. It is the equivalent of pressing the Reset button on a physical PC to force the PC to restart. The end-user will have to wait an appropriate amount of time for the system to start up before attempting to connect back to the View desktop. Disconnect : When an end-user selects Disconnect...

Every Service Provider in the market today wants a piece of the DaaS/WaaS pie. Desktop-as-a-Service or DaaS and Workspace-as-a-Service or WaaS (fka VDI) are the newest buzzwords. I honestly feel it is high time we started drinking our own champagne. I believe all service providers should consume their DaaS/WaaS internally within their organizations first before proposing any such solution directly to customers. The Service Provider can analyze the perfect use case of using VDI within their own Contact Center and BPO divisions, where they can provide employees with Non-Persistent desktops and their managers with Persistent Desktops. They should also identify an engineering division with the requirement of a power user. Here, we can deploy dedicated 1x1 desktops. This will help Service Providers in understanding the VDI behavior, lessons learnt, best practices and cost effectiveness that can be shared with customers who would be consuming these services. With DaaS/WaaS a new dimension o...

Recently, I faced a situation in which I had to activate Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise which didn’t have internet connection. In the earlier days of Windows 2003 there was a Phone Activation option within the wizard. However, in the current edition Windows 2008 onwards the option doesn’t exist. I am going to show you the steps involved in quickly activated Windows Server 2008 onwards over the Phone using the following command line parameters: Start –> Run –> Command Prompt right click and “Run as a administrator” Type the following command to retrieve the Product Installation id slmgr.vbs /dti (A pop-up windows will appear with a long string of digits) Call the Microsoft activation centers as per your locations from this Microsoft Activation Centers link I used the India number 1800 11 11 00 or 1800 102 1100 Provide the Installation ID to the customer care representative and they will provide a C onfirmation Number (A long sting of numbers) Type slmgr.vbs /atp ...

Recently I attended the VMware Partner Exchange 2013 and there was a session called “Technical Battleground – View VS XenDesktop”. In this post I will try and cover the differences that VMware showcased during their session and I am going to add an additional column for my comments and thoughts on this comparison. The following table shows the feature comparison between View and XenDesktop: VMware View 5.2 XenDesktop 5.6 (XD) My Comments Uses only VMware Hypervisor. Use the power of vSphere 5.1 with capabilities such as Fault tolerance, VMotion and Site Recovery Manager No tight integration with Hypervisor and flexible with XenServer, vSphere and Hyper-V I seriously feel it’s better to have multiple hypervisor support. That way you have the choice to: stick with the current hypervisor the company runs and manages;   use lower cost alternative hypervisors; or use a hybrid hypervisor model Content based Read Cache (CBRC) feature available on vSphere using RAM cac...

What is application virtualization? I am attempting to answer this oft-asked question here. Besides application virtualization, let us look at various other methods of delivery too. The minor differences between vendors and their capabilities often confuse our decision-making. Let us see how my blog helps in addressing these questions and more. Let us first understand what the different types of Application Models are. Traditional Application Deployment Session Hosted Applications (SHA) Application Virtualization (AV ) The application is installed locally on to individual desktops and laptops, either using manual or ESD methods The application is installed on the server and only the screen pixels, keyboard and mouse clicks are sent back and forth between the server and the client The application is separated from the OS, aka profiling, and installed in a virtual container. The entire package is stored at a fileserver from where it is streamed to the client or the serv...

Last month I submitted an idea @ Nokia Your Wish is my Command Contest . Unfortunately my idea was not selected due to poor responses of likes on Facebook since the user was required to allow Nokia application to access his or hers Facebook profiles and my dear techie friends refrained from doing that and did not caste votes for me. On the lighter side I thought let me post this idea to my personal blog and see if there are any enthusiast to build an application which could be a solid Hit in the enterprise and consumer markets. Challenges There have been a lot of recent incidents in which group of data thieves spread across the country have been recovering data from old smartphones in which people think they have deleted all their data. But unfortunately these data robbers have been extracting people information and selling them to marketing\advertisement companies and adult websites with intimidating personal photos and videos. In this modern era all smartphones have a lot of buil...