VMware View Virtual Desktops For Kindle Fire, Mac And Linux Review

VMware launched VMware View Clients for three new platforms, noticeably expanding the market for its desktop virtualization software and you can Simplify desktop and application management while increasing security and control with VMware View. Deliver a personalized high fidelity experience for end-users across sessions and devices and enable higher availability and agility of desktop services unmatched by traditional PCs while reducing the total cost of desktop ownership up to 50%. The most notable item in that mix is VMware View for the Kindle Fire and VMware View brings Windows desktops to various devices and can mix and match environments on various systems. Two other major selling points, according to VMware, is that View is supposed to help improve security while lowering operating costs and VMware is especially targeting education customers with these new options, touting VMware View to enable campus IT organizations to better support users on many more mobile devices and also ensuring that students have immediate access to their applications on these gadgets.

VMware Inc., the global leader in virtualization and cloud infrastructure announced the availability of new VMware View Clients for Kindle Fire, Mac and Linux, along with updates to its popular VMware View Clients for Android and iPad. Available today as technology previews, the new VMware View Clients for Mac and Linux allow IT organizations to empower more agile, productive and connected workforce or school communities by enabling an easy to access, high fidelity desktop virtualization experience optimized for the device of their choice. "More and more people want the freedom to choose the device that best fits their computing needs in school and into the workplace," said Pat Lee, director, end user clients, VMware. "With the new VMware View Clients, both IT and end users win with a complete, secure and easily-accessible virtual desktop on the devices that best meet their needs." While the proliferation of new devices is prevalent across all industries today, the education sector is at the forefront of this trend with labs supporting both Mac and Windows desktops as well as students bringing in their own tablets, laptops and PCs that are based on OS X, Windows and other platforms. The introduction of the new VMware View Clients for Mac and Linux will allow campus IT organizations to better support these end users and ensure that students have readily-available access to their applications and a consistent learning experience across devices. "Fifty one-percent of our faculty computers are Macs and just over twenty nine-percent of our student population uses Macs," said Steve Swartz, chief information officer and AVP of Technology at Fitchburg State University. "Having a Mac client running PCoIP is critical to our ability to extend VDI to these users."

"We're very excited about this release," added Dale A. Starr, junior associate director, Technology Support & Service, Isenberg School of Management at University of Massachusetts – Amherst. "We've recently started deploying Mac computers in a managed configuration. One of the sticking points that users are commonly running into is software that only runs on Windows. It will be a great benefit to have the PCoIP client for Mac." VMware View is a complete, virtual desktop solution that enables enterprises to improve security and lower operating costs, while simplifying desktop administration and management by establishing a modern, end-user computing architecture. The result is a more flexible, centrally hosted computing model that provides IT with greater control and end users with freedom to access to their desktop across the broadest set of devices. The new VMware View Clients deliver:

• Rich Desktop Experience with PCoIP: The new VMware View clients for Mac and Linux bring users the rich desktop VMware View experience to Mac and Linux users. VMware View clients with PCoIP provide end-users with top performance regardless of network conditions.
• Optimized for Mac OS X Lion: Designed from the ground up for the Mac and with support for Lion Full Screen mode, Mac users can seamless switch between their Mac apps and their View virtual desktop with a swipe on the trackpad.
• Simple Connectivity: The VMware View clients for Mac and Linux are tightly integrated with the VMware View 4.6 and 5.0 for simple setup and connectivity. Quickly reconnect to your desktop in a few simple steps.
• Available in Ubuntu Software Center: VMware View client for Linux is available in the Ubuntu Software Center, making it easy for desktop Linux users to install the VMware View client and access their virtual desktops.
• Available in Amazon Appstore for Android for the Amazon Kindle Fire: VMware View client for Android is now available in the Amazon Appstore for Android, making it easy for Amazon Kindle Fire users to install the VMware View client and access their virtual desktops.

Overview:

Transform Desktop Management, Energize Users: Deliver rich, personalized virtual desktops as a managed service from a virtualization platform built to deliver the entire desktop, including the operating system, applications and data. With VMware View, desktop administrators virtualize the operating system, applications, and user data and deliver modern desktops to end-users. Get centralized automated management of these components for increased control and cost savings. Improve business agility while providing a flexible high performance desktop experience for end-users, across a variety of network conditions.

Deliver Business Agility and Service Availability: Bring the agility and availability of cloud computing to the desktop and applications with VMware View. Built on VMware vSphere, View delivers desktops from a single integrated platform as part of your cloud services. Dynamically allocate resources to enable highly responsive and available environment to end users. Scale up and down desktop services on demand to quickly meet changing business needs and proactively protect against planned and unplanned downtime. Run your desktops as business critical services for your workforce.

Easily Control and Manage Desktops: Increase control of desktops, applications and data by delivering and managing them as centralized services. A single, powerful administrative console provides oversight of desktop services while enabling IT to execute previously cumbersome tasks like provisioning, updates and patches into a few clicks of a mouse. Manage desktop components separately for greater flexibility in provisioning, updates and delivery. Easily apply policies, quickly enable and disable users all from a centralized console for optimal business response. Free up time from maintenance for technology innovation.

Deliver a Better Desktop Experience: Unlike traditional PCs, View desktops are not tied to the physical computer. Instead, they reside in your cloud and end-users can access their View desktop when needed. VMware View with PCoIP delivers the richest, most flexible and adaptive experience for end-users around the world in a variety of network conditions. Business happens everywhere and whether online or offline, basic or 3D applications, LAN or WAN, VMware View delivers maximum workplace productivity.

Key Features:

• View Media Services for 3D Graphics enables basic 3D applications like Windows Aero, Office 2010 or those requiring OpenGL or DirectX in View desktops without the need for specialized graphics cards or client devices. (Requires vSphere 5 or later as the platform.)
• View Media Services for Integrated Unified Communications enables an integrated VOIP and View desktop experience for the end-user with an architecture to provide optimized performance for both the desktop and unified communication.
• View Persona Management (View Premier editions only) dynamically associates a user persona to stateless floating desktops. IT administrators can deploy easier to manage stateless floating desktops to more use cases while enabling user personalization to persist between sessions.
• PCoIP Extension Services allow WMI based tools to collect over 20 session statistics for monitoring, trending and troubleshooting end-user support issues.
• PCoIP Optimization Controls deliver protocol efficiency and enables IT administrators to configure the bandwidth settings by use case, user or network requirements to consume up to 75% less bandwidth.
• PCoIP Continuity Services deliver a seamless end-user experience regardless of network reliability by detecting interruptions and automatically reconnecting the session.
• View Client for Android enables end-users with Android based tablets to access View virtual desktops.
• Enhanced Security Settings enable client certificate handling customization using established browser certificate model to reinforce corporate policy.
• vSphere 5 support ensures that View desktop services run on the industry’s most complete and robust cloud infrastructure platform for flexible, reliable IT services.

RIM BlackBerry Mobile Fusion Next-Generation Enterprise Mobility Solution Review

Research In Motion announced that it will soon launch software that will bring security and management features once only found on BlackBerrys over to Android and iOS phones and tablets. The new plan for RIM revolves around focusing on what it does best for mobile device management software—asset management, configuration, security policies, group administration and centralized management and RIM appears to be trying to thread the needle between the bring your own device movement. System requirements include the latest version of BES, v5.0.3; Apple iOS 4 or later; Android 2.1, 2.2 or 2.3--it's unclear if Mobile Fusion will support the latest Android 3.0 Honeycomb tablet OS and some BlackBerry PlayBook security and management features require a Microsoft Exchange server or virtualized server. In addition to BlackBerry Mobile Fusion, RIM is also betting on an upcoming line of superphones running its in-development BBX operating system and an exact launch date for those devices has not been publicly declared.


Research In Motion introduced BlackBerry Mobile Fusion, the Company's next-generation enterprise mobility solution and RIM's entry into the multi-platform Mobile Device Management (MDM) marketplace. Building on years of leading enterprise mobility management solutions from RIM, BlackBerry Mobile Fusion will simplify the management of smartphones and tablets running BlackBerry, Google Android and Apple iOS operating systems. "We are pleased to introduce BlackBerry Mobile Fusion – RIM's next generation enterprise mobility solution – to make it easier for our business and government customers to manage the diversity of devices in their operations today," said Alan Panezic, Vice President, Enterprise Product Management and Marketing at Research In Motion. "BlackBerry Mobile Fusion brings together our industry-leading BlackBerry Enterprise Server technology for BlackBerry devices with mobile device management capabilities for iOS and Android devices, all managed from one web-based console. It provides the necessary management capabilities to allow IT departments to confidently oversee the use of both company-owned and employee-owned mobile devices within their organizations." RIM is the leading provider of enterprise mobility solutions with over 90 percent of the Fortune 500 provisioning BlackBerry devices today. The enterprise market for smartphones and tablets continues to grow in both the company-provisioned and employee-owned (Bring Your Own Device or BYOD) categories. BYOD in particular has led to an increase in the diversity of mobile devices in use in the enterprise and new challenges for CIOs and IT departments as they struggle to manage and control wireless access to confidential company information on the corporate network. This has resulted in increased demand for mobile device management solutions.

BlackBerry Mobile Fusion brings together the market-leading BlackBerry Enterprise Server (version 5.0.3) for BlackBerry smartphones; new management capabilities for BlackBerry PlayBook tablets built on BlackBerry Enterprise Server technology; and mobile device management for smartphones and tablets running Android and iOS operating systems. BlackBerry smartphones will continue to benefit from the many advantages of the end-to-end BlackBerry solution including the same advanced IT management, security and control available with BlackBerry Enterprise Server 5.0.3, which is part of BlackBerry Mobile Fusion. These advanced features include BlackBerry Balance technology supporting the use of a single device for both work and personal purposes without compromising the organization's need to secure, manage and control confidential information; over 500 IT policies; over-the-air app and software installation and management; high availability; and much more. BlackBerry Mobile Fusion will also introduce new self-service functionality for employees to secure lost or stolen BlackBerry smartphones and BlackBerry PlayBook tablets. BlackBerry Mobile Fusion is currently in early beta testing with select enterprise customers. RIM is now accepting customer nominations for the closed beta program which will start in January, and general availability is expected in late March. BlackBerry Mobile Fusion will provide the following mobile device management capabilities for all supported mobile devices:

• Asset management
• Configuration management
• Security and policy definition and management
• Secure and protect lost or stolen devices (remote lock, wipe)
• User- and group-based administration
• Multiple device per user capable
• Application and software management
• Connectivity management (Wi-Fi, VPN, certificate)
• Centralized console
• High scalability