Delivering Applications to Virtual Desktops

Transcription

1 ENDEAVORS TECHNOLOGIES Delivering Applications to Virtual Desktops How to keep users productive without killing your VDI ROI

2 Executive summary If your organization is implementing VDI, how are you going to get users the applications they need? VDI is about delivering desktops to users, not applications, so you need to choose an application delivery method. Many application delivery models for VDI work with about 80% of most organizations applications (due to technical or performance limitations). That means you need secondary delivery models for the other 20% of applications, increasing centralized storage, management time, and help desk and IMAC (install, move, add, change) calls as well as lower user productivity. This can significantly lower the return on investment for your VDI initiative. Application Jukebox software from Endeavors Technologies is a different kind of application delivery solution. It supports 100% of Windows applications and it looks, acts, and performs exactly like the applications are running natively. If you have VDI, only a technology like Application Jukebox can deliver the cost savings promised by VDI. 2

3 Table of Contents VDI needs application delivery... 4 Potential cost savings with VDI... 4 The management cost of traditional PCs... 5 The promise of saved costs in the VDI model... 5 Hidden costs of VDI management... 5 The 80% rule... 6 The promise of efficiency... 7 Disappearing productivity... 8 Application Jukebox: app delivery that maximizes VDI value... 9 Works with 100% of Windows applications... 9 Runs apps as if they re installed locally Efficient app delivery is key to raising the ROI of VDI

4 VDI needs application delivery Many modern application delivery models are available to organizations today, including server-based computing (SBC), terminal services, and other centralized application delivery models. Centralizing and executing applications at the server can often result in good efficiencies and cost-savings benefits in IT. Some applications, however, are not efficiently executed in a centralized computing model. When CPU or graphics-intensive programs are run on the server, applications can often run so slowly they re unusable. Other applications require a local data store to operate and simply won t function in a central-delivery environment. Industry experts report that about 80% of applications for about 80% of an organization s typical users will work with a central delivery model. Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) is the latest SBC solution to address the shortcomings of previous SBC systems. VDI can also provide some IT efficiencies as well. Many of the major VDI players are also application delivery vendors, and some people customers, analysts, and vendors alike mistakenly assume that VDI can intrinsically address the challenge of delivering all applications to users. But while VDI does provide several cost-saving and management advantages, VDI currently does not address applications VDI has no intrinsic method for delivering applications to users. Existing application delivery methods have to be layered on top of VDI for users to do their jobs. As a result, many of the existing application delivery methods either perform poorly on VDI (i.e., slow performance), and/or cost significantly more to support in IT overhead, which undermines the cost savings of VDI initiatives. This paper examines common ways organizations expect that VDI solutions can reduce costs, and then applies some of those cost saving assumptions to the different application delivery technologies that are in use today. The result will be a set of facts that exist in the real world of app delivery experiences today, and some best practice facts to be aware of when selecting an application delivery method for delivering applications to users over VDI. Potential cost savings with VDI Server virtualization was a big hit with both IT and finance managers. Replacing physical servers with virtual servers lowered the cost of acquiring and running machines in the server room, which had a huge beneficial impact on ROI. But desktop virtualization is a little trickier because the upfront acquisition costs is not a significant savings over traditional PC environments. 4

5 With VDI, the cost savings come in other areas, such as, according to virtualization expert Julian Weinstock, in ongoing management costs. Weinstock believes that desktop management costs, as shouldered by IT staff, represent 80% of the total cost of ownership for desktops in traditional environments. The management cost of traditional PCs The acquisition of a PC is roughly $800 to $1,000. Accordingly, the helpdesk services and IMAC (installation, move, add, and change) services are expensive, and those actions often take the user offline, which lowers productivity. Analysts place the annual cost of managing a PC at $3,400 to $5,900 per year per machine. The promise of saved costs in the VDI model The acquisition of the endpoint device (thin clients, repurposed PCs, bring-yourown-pc) in VDI cost models varies. One area that is more expensive in the VDI model is the initial setup: the server farm, storage array, network gear, and virtualization platform must all be purchased and managed, and when added to the cost of the thin clients, this can balloon the VDI costs to a significantly higher peruser figure (depending on the size of your organization, of course). The savings would then come from the reduced need for helpdesk and IMAC services. Weinstock quotes industry experts who place the resources required for VDI management at roughly half that of a traditional PC environment (mostly from fewer staff working helpdesk and IMAC positions). Weinstock doesn t discuss the potential savings in user productivity. One possible reason is that user productivity might be greatly affected by company policy regarding VDI or by the application delivery technology used to deliver the applications to users. Many centralized computing models deliver applications significantly slower than their locally installed counterparts but the practical effect is different for each application. Even without factoring in user productivity, Weinstock believes the total cost of ownership for VDI can be reduced 15 to 25 percent compared to traditional PC environments. Applying this calculation to analyst TCO numbers of $3,400-$5,900 per PC, that works out to reduced figures of about $2,500 to $5,000 per PC per year. Hidden costs of VDI management One of the big debates in the virtualization community about the ROI of VDI is in regards to the helpdesk and IMAC cost savings model above. That model relies on a few underlying assumptions: 5

6 VDI will be used for everyone Everyone will use a virtual desktop to do 100% of their daily work Everyone will use one of a minimal amount of base desktop images Everyone will use applications based on a centralized software distribution model (such as SBC, application virtuation, streaming, or terminal services) The 80% rule However, reality in large organizations doesn t often follow such a cut and dried outline. Industry experts say that typical centralized computing, as mentioned in the introduction, only works for about 80% of applications that about 80% of your users need. Your mileage may vary, of course and if you find that your organization runs smoothly with a handful of virtualized images and with all the applications delivered centrally, then that s great you are the perfect VDI use case. If you are like most organizations, VDI will be a good solution for most of your employees much of the time, but a poor choice for a smaller but significant number of them. Here are some scenarios in which some users would not be good candidates for VDI: A significant number of users require a unique base desktop image If applications are loaded directly onto the desktop image, sometimes the image is unable to run a critical application (sometimes based on performance, like Photoshop or AutoCAD, and sometimes because of a technical requirement of the application or a system conflict) If applications are delivered through SBC, terminal services, or virtualization/streaming, sometimes the delivery technology you ve chosen can t handle a critical application (for the same reasons as above) In those scenarios which occur in many organizations a second solution has to be found for about 20% of those users. How do you determine the 20% solution? Do you deploy those problematic applications to local PCs or workstations? Do you install those applications into the base Windows image for the virtual machine (VM)? (And if you do that, you (or your quality assurance employees) must perform regression tests to make sure they work properly inside the VM; how do you perform those tests? Do you build multiple varied images for employees having different requirements? 6

7 Each of these approaches adds to the total cost of VDI. More IT resources have to be hired to manage the second solution and the organization has gone from a single simple solution for desktops to a complex multiple-option set of solutions. Is there a solution? If there were an application delivery solution that worked for 100% of your Windows applications, you d be able to take advantage of these cost savings without having to implement a 20% solution. And if the solution ran applications as quickly as if they were natively installed, your cost savings would be even higher. If the solution let your users access the applications the same way they do now through the Start Menu and desktop shortcuts your employees would be more productive and less likely to call Helpdesk. In a later section, this paper will discuss how Application Jukebox software from Endeavors Technologies meets these requirements. The promise of efficiency Many VDI vendors include cost calculators based on some assumptions about the number of users and desktop images your servers can support. A common assumption is that each core in your server will be able to handle about 8 desktops (e.g., if you have a quad-core server, it will support 32 desktops). Another is that each desktop image will be able to handle multiple users sharing the same base disk images. The idea behind these cost calculators is that these base disk images will be delivered to users desktops, where applications (specific to each user) will be inserted on-demand with application virtualization, SBC, or terminal server technologies. But as we ve seen above, the capabilities of the application delivery model used is critical to whether cost containment is realized or not. If the application delivery model an organization chooses is not capable of supporting all its necessary applications, cost-saving benefits are undermined and the above assumptions then cannot be realized. Here are some realities that ought to be factored in when selecting an application delivery model for your VDI: Most organizations have a certain percentage of employees who need applications that aren t standard. Since deploying such unique applications physically to local workstations adds to IMAC costs, the estimated 50% of IMAC savings will not be realized. For resource-intensive applications, there is no way to run these apps without a fat client a PC for the user. 7

8 Installing applications into the base Windows image for the VM increases the size and resources requirements of the image. Each server core may support fewer than 8 desktops in this scenario; some VDI discussion boards have stories of cores only being able to support 2 or 3 desktops. The larger the image, the more storage is needed and it s not cheap hard-drive storage, it s expensive SAN storage (in many cases). This can significantly increase costs. If you choose to install apps into the base Windows image, regression testing takes time and effort. Regression testing is not something factored into PC management, so the results of that testing, depending on number and type of app, might eat significantly into your help-desk and IMAC time savings. If you choose to build multiple images, both management time and storage costs increase. The solution: Find an application delivery solution that turns these VDI costsavings assumptions into realities in your organization: VDI is given to everyone Everyone uses a virtual desktop to do 100% of their daily work Everyone uses one of a minimal amount of base desktop images Everyone uses applications based on a centralized software distribution model In a later section, this paper discusses how Application Jukebox software from Endeavors Technologies supports each of these requirements to maximize the value of your VDI. Disappearing productivity Most VDI cost models (like Weinstock s model, mentioned at the beginning of the paper) do not take into account the productivity lost when users have to use CPUor graphics-intensive apps in a VDI/SBC model. Anyone who s ever tried to use Photoshop over a terminal services connection knows that it s inefficient if not downright impossible to do anything but the simplest tasks. This seems like a big oversight. Again, there is no way to deliver resource-intensive applications with usable performance from a server. For Photoshop and AutoCAD users, this must be factored into the cost model; some application delivery solutions can manage this scenario with lower cost (and a better user experience) than others. In addition, think about how your users will need to be trained to access their applications if you use terminal services or another technology that puts apps 8

9 somewhere besides the Start Menu or desktop shortcuts. If you re changing the application delivery method to a web-based interface or really, anything different than what your user population is doing today there s a learning curve, which means lost productivity. Each organization utilizing VDI is affected differently by this, of course. Some companies may have a savvy user population who is quick to learn new ways to work; they are less affected by this. Others may have a significant number of users who are used to a shortcut on their desktop and who will fight and complain if any other access method is required. This type of organization may face significantly lower productivity during the transition time. The solution: Find an application delivery solution for use with your VDI that comes as close as possible to the preferred end-user experience. For many organizations, this means making applications available through the Start menu or as desktop shortcuts. Application Jukebox: app delivery that maximizes VDI value As mentioned above, a key part of the solution to keeping costs down with VDI is to find an app delivery technology that eliminates the need for a second solution to address the 20% problem. If 100% of your Windows applications work over a VDI without the need for large base images, too many different images, or locally installed exception applications, VDI can deliver on its promise of cost savings. Application Jukebox software from Endeavors Technologies fits the bill. Works with 100% of Windows applications Application Jukebox software streams applications from a central location just like other application streaming technologies. Unlike other streaming technologies, however, Application Jukebox streams the application to a cache on the client machine, then uses the client processor to run the application. The application can run on the virtualized desktop and be accessed as if the application was locally installed. For most applications, this will be sufficient. However, in virtual desktop sessions, the entire desktop is running on a central server, meaning that the apps are also running on the server. That means that complex applications will still be slow (like SBC-delivered or terminal server delivered applications). Users of these applications will still need PCs. However, Application Jukebox minimizes complex management issues usually associated with PC management in VDI environments. Each PC can have 9

10 Application Jukebox Player, which is transparent to the user, which will stream the most complex, graphics- and CPU-intensive applications to the user s PC and will deliver native performance. This works for all Windows applications the Application Jukebox team has not yet come across any application that doesn t work well through the Application Jukebox Player. When Application Jukebox runs 100% of your Windows applications, there s no 80% rule, so there s no need for a 20% solution a mix of thin-client machines and PCs will meet your needs without complicating management. That means there s no need to manage locally installed applications, no need to install applications on the Windows base image, no need for different application-specific base images, no need for regression testing. Application Jukebox extends the ROI that you get with a VDI project even to the users who still have traditional PCs. The promise of VDI cost savings is that much closer to being a reality. Runs apps as if they re installed locally Application Jukebox Player is a small piece of client software, roughly the size of an IM client (about 25 MB). It can be part of your virtual desktop s base image. When the users sign in, they can have their appropriate applications and resources instantly published to them. The way users launch applications is not based in a browser or in a piece of proprietary software. The applications are published to the Start Menu, and the applications can all have shortcuts on the desktop. If you re running a traditional PC environment today, chances are that Application Jukebox will provide your users their current applications by means that look exactly the same as what they re currently doing. That means high levels of user satisfaction, and almost no time spent teaching nontech-savvy users how to access their applications in ways that are foreign to them. This can save hours of time in user training, help desk calls, and IMAC hours, as well as increase productivity. Efficient App Delivery Is Key to Raising the ROI of VDI VDI carries much promise for delivering cost savings through more efficient IT services. However, the technology chosen for application delivery is vital the right technology can help your organization realize the full potential of VDI, while an incomplete application delivery system can eat into those savings and cause headaches for administrators and users alike. 10

11 The most important consideration of application delivery in your VDI is that 100% of your applications need to be supported. If met through a technology like Application Jukebox software, there is no need to manage multiple systems, and the ROI of your VDI investment can be maximized. Because of all the hype around VDI, it can be tempting for organizations to focus on the implementation of VDI without looking at the user experience or the impact on IT. Fortunately, if you and your organization choose the right kind of application delivery system no matter what the latest technology fad is you ll be in the best possible position to maximize your IT investments. About Endeavors Technologies Operating in Europe and the USA and expanding globally, Endeavors was spun out of a think tank at University of California, Irvine for a DARPA and Pentagon project for the United States government. Now in its third generation, the Application Jukebox product is the first and only application virtualization product that uses both isolation streaming and integrated streaming even for different parts of the same application. Endeavors, who has patents on application virtualization and streaming technology dating from 1996, continues to invest heavily in innovation, with nine patents pending. Endeavors is headquartered in Irvine, California, with offices in the United Kingdom and partners around the world. Contact: North America Alton Parkway, Suite 100 Irvine, CA USA Tel: sales@endeavors.com EMEA 11 Hall Square Boroughbridge North Yorkshire YO51 9AN United Kingdom Tel: UKsales@endeavors.com 11