VMware View Local Mode – Lessons learned
I’ve been working with VMware View Local Mode for couple of weeks now and I wanted to share my experience. VMware View Local Mode allows a virtual desktop to be downloaded to a laptop or desktop and to be executed locally. The CPU, memory, disk, network and graphics from the local desktop is being used to execute the virtual desktop. No remote display protocol is being used. VMware View Local mode is also part of the Client Side Desktop Virtualization (CSDV) Smackdown, a whitepaper which explains what CSDV is, when to use it and what the possibilities are. This whitepaper will be comparable to the VDI smackdown, only this time it will not be about server-hosted desktop virtualization, but client-hosted desktop virtualization. This whitepaper is expected to be released in Q1 of 2012. In this blogpost I will share my experience with VMware View Local mode, how it works and what doesn’t work.
How it works
The benefits of using VMware View Local Mode:
“With View Client with Local Mode, users can check out and download a View desktop to a local system such as a laptop. Administrators can manage these local View desktops by setting policies for the frequency of backups and contact with the server, access to USB devices, and permission to check in desktops.”
I assume you have a basic knowledge of the VMware View architecture. If not, here is a basic overview:
VMware View online bootcamp
VMware is organizing a nine-part VMware View Bootcamp: every day a new video is published for you to view. At the end of this bootcamp, you will have a good understanding of the VMware View solution, how to roll it out and how to optimize View in your environment. A free e-book of all the presentations is included in this bootcamp series.
“We will lock the discussions for the video each night and move on to the next video.we will show you how to get started and successfully roll out and deploy your virtual desktops and applications. We will have sessions covering everything from storage and networking best practices to PCoIP tuning and optimizing your base image. We will also touch on VMware’s new security server for PCoIP and how you can take advantage of powershell to write your own scripts for View.”
Starting July 19th, a new video will be released daily:
Design Considerations Guidelines for VMware View – Overview
- Speaker – John Dodge, Sr. Manager PSO Services, VMware
- Overview of the technical considerations to keep in mind while you’re designing a View environment
Hands-on with Ericom AccessNow for VMware View
Do you remember when you first saw Microsoft’s Xbox Kinect in action? Playing games without a controller! It looked kind of dumb at first, people standing in front of a TV making exaggerated and weird moves, but when you tried Kinect yourself for the first time, it was fun to do and it worked pretty well. However, after a while it turns out that Kinect is a 1.0 version with it’s own limitations and you’ll have to wait for a year before new games will come out that use all the capabilities of the Kinect.
This is kind of the feeling I have now about Ericom AccessNow for VMware View, the HTML5 client for VMware View. At first you think it’s probably not that good without a “real” VMware View client installed, but once you try it, you’re amazed how easy it is to setup and use it. After a short while, you’re starting to see the limitations the product still has and you’d rather wait for a next version which has more features and has a better user experience.
vSphere client for iPad now available, and it’s free!
After the release of the VMware View client for iPad last week, there is now a new VMware application for the iPad: the vSphere client! This client is now available for download at the iTunes Appstore and it’s free of charge!
The only thing you need to have installed is a virtual appliance from VMware: The vCMA.
Steps to take:
- download the OVF, import it in VMware vCenter and modify the ip-settings so it has a fixed ip address. An optional step is to create a DNS-record for this appliance. Now that you’ve installed the vCMA, configure your VMware vSphere client for iPad.
- Once the vCMA virtual appliance powers on, on the home screen of the iPad go to “Settings”, scroll down and tap on “vSphere Client”. Now enter the IP Address of the vCMA virtual appliance in the “Web Server” field. … Continue Reading
VDI Smackdown updated!
The VDI Smackdown whitepaper is updated with the lastest versions of the VDI-solutions.
The “Smackdown” is focused on solutions that are anticipated to have an important role in VDI deployments. An complete overview of available features is created to better understand each solution’s capability.
The solutions included in the feature matrix are: Citrix XenDesktop 5, Microsoft VDI with RemoteFX, Quest vWorkspace 7.2 and VMware View 4.6;
Compared to the previous VDI Smackdown more than 100 new- and updated features are included in this new release!
