Recent trends in IT – Desktop as a Service
Recent Trends in IT - Desktop as a Service
Harshal. S. Bidkar & Ajinkya. A. Khavare
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada
Ichalkaranji, Maharashtra.
[harshal.bidkar@gmail.com, aju_kh@gmail.com]
Abstract -- In an era where the Internet is continually redefining
the way we compute, the traditional corporate PC increasingly
seems out of place. While still a gateway to many of the
applications and services provided by IT, PCs are having trouble
keeping up with the high - paced and dynamic nature of today’s
global business environments. IT departments find PCs harder
and more costly to manage than ever before while users, who are
demanding greater computing mobility and flexibility, are often
frustrated by the limitations of their current desktop systems. At
the same time, emerging trends in cloud and utility computing are
reshaping the way in which corporations consume and manage
IT. The ability to outsource non-strategic IT assets and purchase
them as a service can help lower the cost of IT while allowing
corporate technologists to focus more on applications and
technologies that provide their organizations with a true
competitive edge. “DaaS” (Desktop as a Service) is the name given
to such a service that sees the emergence of cloud and utility
computing as an opportunity to transform the corporate PC from
a static, distributed device into a virtualized and centralized asset.
In this paper, we present the past history associated with
Corporate PC’s then VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure) i.e.
virtualized client desktop and lastly DaaS and its architecture
with a Case Study: Pike County School District.
Keywords: DaaS, cloud computing, VDI, TCO, etc.
I. THE CHALLENGE OF PHYSICAL CORPORATE
PC’S
Corporate PCs have become a millstone of modern IT
departments. On one hand they are required to deliver an ever-
increasing number of critical applications and services to end-
users. On the other, they have become increasingly costly and
complex to manage and secure, while at the same time further
underutilized in terms of their physical capacity.
There are many different views on what’s so complex about
managing corporate PCs. While there are a number of
challenges inherent in managing the software layers of these
devices (primarily the OS, applications and data), it is the
physical aspects of PCs that create many headaches for IT. The
following IT challenges are associated with the management of
physical PCs:
• IMAC (Install, Move, Add and Change) – Although
it is possible to automate portions of PC management,
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada Ichalkaranji
there are many elements of a PCs lifecycle that have
to be handled in person. Prime examples include
provisioning a new PC, moving the location of a PC
or upgrading its physical resources (i.e. CPU, memory
or disk)
• Security – Physical PCs are inherently insecure
because of their portable nature. Laptops can be easily
lost or stolen as can desktops, especially those in less
secure branch facilities.
• Underutilized – While most research pegs average
x86 server utilization at around 10-15%, estimates put
the average utilization of corporate PCs at less than
5%.
• Rapidly depreciating assets – According to a study by
the Federal Reserve Board of San Francisco, PCs
depreciate in value roughly 50% per year.
Users are also challenged and limited by the physical nature
of their corporate PCs. They have come to demand much
greater flexibility from IT and, thanks to the advances in
communications services, expect to be able to work at anytime
from anywhere. However, due to the physical makeup of their
corporate PCs, end-users still struggle with the following
limitations:
• Mobility – Many of users’ application and data assets
are tethered to their physical machine, making them
difficult to access from other locations either inside or
outside the office.
• Availability – The physical and distributed nature of
today’s corporate PCs make them hard to troubleshoot
in the event of a system failure. In many cases,
getting a user back online requires a desk side visit.
• Managing multiple devices – Users are amassing an
increasing number of devices (i.e. multiple PCs,
Smartphone, etc.) and having a separate physical
machine for work is becoming more and more
burdensome.
• Separation of personal and business computing –
Users are increasingly using computing for their
personal needs and, in many cases, are forced to
physically switch between different environments
throughout the workday to perform different
computing tasks.
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Recent trends in IT – Desktop as a Service
II. VIRTUAL DESKTOP INFRASTRUCTURE (VDI) –
THE ANSWER?
Many organizations have experienced firsthand the
transformational power and benefits of server virtualization.
Those same organizations and many others are expecting to be
able to realize similar benefits by moving to a virtual desktop
infrastructure (VDI) model, which is defines as client
computing architectures that leverage server-hosted virtual
machines.
The idea behind Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) is to
run desktop operating systems and applications inside virtual
machines that reside on servers in the data center. Desktop
operating systems inside virtual machines are also referred to
as virtual desktops. Users access the virtual desktops and
applications from a desktop PC client or thin client using a
remote display protocol and get almost the full features as
if the applications were loaded on their local systems, with
the difference being that the applications are centrally
managed.
Key benefits of VDI:
• Dramatically reduced desktop deployment complexity –
With VDI, provisioning new desktops is about
deploying virtual machines as opposed to physical
desktops. For example, an IT admin can copy an
existing golden VM image, assign it to a user and the
process is done. This is in comparison to having to
target a physical machine with a traditional OS image
and all the complexity that entails (i.e., device drivers,
location of the machine, etc.)
• Improvement in management, security and compliance
– Because all VDI desktops are centralized into well-
connected data centers, their software layers (OS,
Fig : 1 Virtual Desktop Infrastructure
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada Ichalkaranji
applications and data) become easier to manage. In
addition, because users access their virtual desktops via
PC remoting technology, it is possible for IT to finely
control the movement of data either into or out of these
systems. Finally, having all the desktops in a
centralized location makes implementing and managing
compliance systems and policies simpler.
• Customizable end-user experiences – Unlike shared
services server-based computing solutions which deliver
an alternate and locked down client experience, VDI
enables users to work in an authentic client OS
environment and to personalize that environment to their
liking.
• “Instant-on” desktops – With VDI architectures, it is
possible to offer a “instant-on” desktop experience by
enabling users to reconnect to their server-hosted virtual
machines without the need to wait for the system to boot
or to wait for the traditional logon process to complete.
When the user reconnects to their system, it’s in the
same state that they left it the last time they used it
(down to the last letter they may have been typing).
The Challenges with VDI:
Despite the many promise of VDI, the solution has some
significant challenges, most of which ironically are associated
with the physical aspects of deployment.
• Solution stacks complexity – In-house VDI
deployments are by their nature multi-sourced,
involving component technologies that are provided by
different vendors. This makes it very difficult to put
together a reliable end-to-end solution.
• Cost structures – Today’s enterprise data center and
virtual infrastructures are optimized for hosting servers,
not for desktops. Therefore, enterprises that implement
VDI on their existing virtual infrastructure quickly learn
that it will be almost impossible for them to meet their
TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) objectives.
• Operational complexity – Because VDI solutions span
many organizational silos, no single team is responsible
for managing and troubleshooting. This can create
disputes between internal IT departments that can leave
end-users worried about the overall quality of service
delivery.
Therefore, while many organizations believe in the promise of
VDI, those that have started implementation realize that an
innovative approach is needed if they are going be able to
reach the scale and TCO that they desire.
III. DESKTOPS AS A SERVICE (DAAS) –
TRANSFORMING THE CORPORATE PC
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Recent trends in IT – Desktop as a Service
The PC represents a general purpose technology whose
time to be delivered as an outsourced utility service has finally
arrived. At the physical layer, the majority of corporate PCs
are almost identical. Their “personality” or differentiation
comes from a combination of their specific software
configuration and user-level customization. It is exactly these
software layers that can be preserved in the move from
physical to virtual desktops by leveraging machine
virtualization (hypervisor) technology.
We can compare the same with examples such as
electricity, the goal is to move the generation of capacity (in
this case, client computing cycles) from being internally
produced to being consumed as an outsourced service, and
doing so without disrupting the tool ultimately being delivered
to the employee (in this case, traditional desktop computing
environments). DaaS model allows just this – for a service
provider to own and operate the physical infrastructure that
powers virtual desktops while enterprises retain control over
the provisioning, management and licensing of the virtual
desktops they use.
The primary difference between the VDI & DaaS solutions
is that with VDI, enterprise IT owns and operates the virtual
desktop hosting environment; with DaaS, the hosting
infrastructure is run by a service provider, which then offers
virtual desktops as a service to enterprises on a subscription
basis. This outsourcing arrangement creates a fundamental
separation between the management of the hosting
infrastructure (handled by the service provider) and that of the
virtual desktops (still the responsibility of the enterprise).
Thus, DaaS can be summarized as the only solution that
gives enterprise IT the full benefits of a virtual desktop
infrastructure (VDI), without having to incur the costs or risks
associated with selecting, owning and managing the physical
resources. We have summed up some responsibilities with
DaaS as opposed to VDI in Figure: 3.
Fig : 2 Desktop As A Service
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada Ichalkaranji
IV. IMPLEMENTATION OF DAAS USING
DESKTONE’S VIRTUAL-D PLATFORM
Desktone Inc. provides the only virtual desktop hosting
platform that enables desktops to be delivered as an outsourced
subscription service. The Desktone Virtual-D Platform
integrates all enabling technologies into a single, automated,
self-service platform. By offering DaaS, Desktone simplifies
large-scale desktop provisioning and management, transfers
transforms virtual desktop infrastructure costs from CAPEX
(CAPital EXpenditure) to OPEX (OPerating EXpenditure),
provides greater protection of physical resources and corporate
information, and increases business agility—all of which
reduces desktop total cost of ownership.
V. VIRTUAL-D PLATFORM ARCHITECTURE
Desktone’s DaaS approach consists of two distinct tiers:
enterprise and service provider. Key to enabling DaaS is the
fact that the Virtual-D Platform integrates all VDI functionality
while separating the enterprise and service provider tiers. The
Virtual-D Platform is a set of components and services that
align with the enterprise and service provider tiers, enabling
the delivery of highly scalable DaaS environments. The two
tiers are joined together with Desktone’s Access Fabric—a set
of distributed services that associates authorized users with
their virtual desktops. See Figure: 4 for architecture.
A. Enterprise Tier: Within this tier the system provides
operational automation, virtual machine lifecycle
management, desktop monitoring and reporting, and
supports access to virtual desktops from thin, rich or
repurposed clients. It includes
1. Desktone Virtual-D Enterprise Center -- A web-based
management interface for the enterprise desktop
administrator. Designed to support large user
populations, it provides virtual resource management,
virtual desktop administration and template lifecycle
management. The Virtual-D Enterprise Center allows
enterprises to continue using the infrastructure, best
practices and skill sets already employed for managing
desktops in the physical world, including those for OS
and application deployment, Active Directory, Help
desk, and security policies.
2. Desktone Virtual-D Portal -- A self-service, policy-
based portal that enterprise users can access from any
browser. With the Virtual-D Portal, users can access
their existing virtual desktops as well as manage those
virtual desktops or even create new ones, all without
relying on a system or desktop administrator. In
addition, the Virtual-D Portal assists users in
troubleshooting issues that may arise and also allows
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Recent trends in IT – Desktop as a Service
them to submit requests for additional virtual desktop
resources.
B. Service Provider Tier: The platform includes the
software, tools and best practices needed for service
providers to build and easily manage a virtual desktop
utility grid for delivering DaaS, while integrating with
their existing network and distribution infrastructures.
Designed specifically to enable highly scalable, multi-
tenant DaaS environments, this portion of the platform
is comprised of Desktone Virtual-D Elements that are
managed by the Desktone Service Grid
1. Desktone Virtual-D Elements -- The building block of
a virtual desktop utility grid, Virtual-D
Elements are racks that include all the hardware,
virtualization resources and software required to support
virtual desktops. Built as self-contained, independent
modular units of desktop service delivery, Virtual-D
Elements make it easy for service providers to scale
their DaaS environments. Service providers can build
Elements themselves using Desktone’s Virtual-D
Element blueprint, or can get them pre-fabricated from
authorized Desktone partners.
2. Desktone Service Grid -- A software framework that
ties individual Virtual-D Elements into a virtual desktop
utility grid. The Service Grid creates a loosely coupled
“federation” of Elements, manages pools across
Elements, and collects data on Element status.
C. Desktone Access Fabric: The Access Fabric links the
two separate worlds of the enterprise and the service
provider. It is a set of distributed services that provides
the association between authorized users and their
virtual desktop infrastructure. Through its DNS-like
architecture, the Access Fabric brings carrier-class
scalability to the VDI model. It’s an intelligent, highly
scalable system that automatically delivers best-fit
desktops according to user entitlements, policies, access
location and available resources.
VI. BENEFITS OF DAAS
DaaS provides a number of benefits that go well beyond
those associated with internally deployed VDI solutions. We
divide them as benefits for Enterprises and benefits for Service
providers.
A. Benefits for Enterprises:
1. Dramatically reduced desktop TCO – Because they
outsource the physical infrastructure powering their
virtual desktops, enterprises are immediately able to
achieve a positive ROI (Returns On Investments). In
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada Ichalkaranji
addition, they are able to convert CAPEX (in the form
of the multi-sourced components of an internal VDI
deployment) into OPEX, where they pay only for the
virtual desktops that they use. All of this translates into
reduced desktop TCO that’s achieved at the outset of a
goal that most enterprises hope to achieve in 18 to 24
months when deploying VDI internally.
2. Improved manageability & flexibility -- With DaaS,
enterprises are able to quickly deploy and scale virtual
desktop environments. Again, this is because the
physical infrastructure is already available from the
service provider. This capability enables IT to deliver on
many challenging types of projects (both short- and
long-term), such as scaling up desktop environments for
seasonal work or quickly deploying desktops for offices
in new geographic markets.
3. Reduced environmental impact -- DaaS allows
enterprises to minimize their carbon footprint on both
the back- and front-end of their VDI environment. On
the back-end, because the physical infrastructure is
hosted by a service provider, the enterprise data center is
relieved of the additional power and cooling
requirements normally associated with VDI. On the
front-end, enterprises can either extend the life of their
existing PCs by repurposing them as VDI-only clients or
can transition to true thin clients and greatly reduce
power consumption on end-user desks.
4. Improved end-user productivity -- Because DaaS is
delivered by a service provider with a Service Level
Agreement (SLA), users can expect better availability of
their desktops than can be delivered with physical PCs,
which often require a desk side visit when things go
wrong. In addition, because Desktone DaaS provides
global virtual desktop from just about anywhere.
B. Benefits for Service Providers:
1. Provide an offering that enterprises want but aren’t
equipped to implement -- The interest in VDI solutions
across many different industries is becoming
increasingly evident. However, also becoming clear is
the challenge of deploying VDI internally. Service
providers have the unique opportunity to build a VDI
infrastructure free from the constraints of the enterprise
data center and also to leverage economies of scale to
enable DaaS as a low-cost service for many different
vertical markets.
2. Leverage existing assets -- Service providers have the
core assets (in the form of hosting facilities and data
networks) that are critical for enabling DaaS. They also
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have extensive experience in offering related hosting
services and, therefore, have the backend management
and billing systems necessary to provide desktops as a
monthly subscription service.
3. Capture new service revenue -- Service providers
currently use many of their hosting assets to power
commodity service offerings that are under increasing
competitive pressure. DaaS allows service providers to
use the same infrastructure to offer a new and unique
offering that is highly differentiated from anything else
in the marketplace.
4. Flexible Service Offerings -- DaaS can be delivered
either as a hosted offering in a premise. In either case,
the service provider owns and operates the physical
virtual desktop infrastructure and the enterprise
consumes the offering as a service. In addition, service
providers can layer value-added services on top of the
base DaaS offering. These could be in the form of
network-based offerings, such as remote access to the
virtual desktops, or managed desktop offerings such as
OS and application deployment, level 1 end-user
support, etc.
VII. CASE STUDY – PIKE COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT
Pike County School District is in the rural foothills of the
Appalachian Mountains in Pike County, Kentucky. It includes
15 elementary schools, three middle schools, five high schools,
and two day treatment centers. The school district is committed
to offering equitable and safe educational environments, and
enabling a successful learning experience for all students.
A. The Challenges: Pike County School District is
committed to ensuring that all of its students,
administrators and teachers can access the IT resources
they need, whenever they’re needed. However, with a
limited budget and just seven IT professionals
supporting 25 schools that are spread across 700 square
miles, this was quite challenging.
1. Limited funding -- Schools traditionally purchase new
PCs when funding is earmarked for computing
resources. However, because funding levels are never
enough to replace all their PCs at once, especially when
they are cut, they end up doing so on a staggered basis.
The result is disparate environments and no parity for
the user experience. This inequality means that students
and teachers can't run the same versions of software and
they can't leverage the newest educational and
administrative applications.
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada Ichalkaranji
2. IT serviceability hassles -- The disparity also presents
challenges for IT management, since it is difficult for
the school IT departments to support so many different
computers, operating systems and applications for all of
the schools and grade levels. If they want to keep their
environment as uniform as possible, they have opt for
lowest-common denominator technologies. Scaling their
IT environments up or down, as student populations
change, is also extremely difficult.
3. Limited computer access -- Teachers, administrators
and students don't have universal access to their
computers. They can't use their applications from other
classrooms or from home.
4. Internet control concerns -- Schools grapple with
internet control issues. They need to make sure that
students who use the internet for schoolwork are not
accessing inappropriate content, and they need to guard
against malware that could be introduced into the
network if people download unauthorized software.
B. The Solution – DaaS: Pike County had been looking for
a way to resolve these issues for several years but never
found a solution that would work. Then they posted a
request for proposal for virtual desktops, and IBM
responded with the right solution.
In June, 2008, Pike County signed a five-year
agreement with IBM, which would provide Virtual
Infrastructure Access desktop hosting services. The
service includes IBM storage, System x servers, and
VMware virtualization technology aggregated through
the Desktone Virtual-D Platform.
The Desktone solution is an enabling technology for
IBM’s delivery of desktops as a service. The service
helps Pike County quickly realize the full benefits of
centralized virtual desktops without having to build and
deploy the infrastructure internally, and it dramatically
reduces desktop TCO and transforms virtual desktop
infrastructure costs from CAPEX to OPEX. Because it
is architected along two tiers (enterprise and service
provider), the Desktone Virtual-D Platform lets Pike
County maintain ownership and control over its
Windows OS images, applications and all relating
licensing, while outsourcing the physical data center
infrastructure powering the virtual desktops to IBM.
C. The Results -- Pike County rolled out the DaaS
infrastructure to seven of its schools on a trial basis, and
is now in the process of extending it county-wide
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1. Equitable access with existing equipment -- All of
Pike County’s DaaS-based desktops now operate in the
same way, with the same great performance, regardless
of how old the hardware is, what version operating
system it runs, and how much memory it has. Once its
roll-out to the schools is complete, Pike County plans to
extend the DaaS deployment to home-bound students
and teachers as part of its business continuity/disaster
recovery plan.
2. Simple desktop manageability: Reduce images from
40 to 1-- IBM helped Pike County create a standard
image that is used on all the client devices. Before, Pike
County had a different image for every machine and
model. They probably had close to 40 images, which
was very time-consuming for limited team of
technicians to manage. Now they we have a standard
image and centralized infrastructure and it is much
easier for them to support our entire district.
3. 64% cost savings over self-implemented system --
Because of budget constraints, Pike County could not
have afforded to implement a virtual desktop
infrastructure itself. They did a cost savings analysis
comparing what it would have taken for them to build
and deploy 1,400 centralized virtual desktops ourselves,
verses what it’s costing now through this service. The
DaaS solution represented a 64% savings for the TCO of
each workstation. Equally important, they are no longer
so dependent on funding levels because they don't have
to continually upgrade computing resources.
4. Dramatic performance improvements -- Before, it
could take 10 minutes to connect to the internet because
of all the scripts on the machines and slow processors.
Once users are connected, performance – particularly for
audio and streaming media – was sketchy. Now, users
can connect right away and performance is “fantastic”.
Their internet access speed is 10 times faster than it used
to be. This has a huge impact on students, who are the
major users of the new DaaS infrastructure. This has
been phenomenal for them since they can tell that the
virtual desktops are much faster than physical desktops.
Everything works better, there aren’t interruptions, and
the students are much more engaged.
DKTES’s Textile & Engineering Institute, Rajwada Ichalkaranji
5. Easy scalability -- If the student population grows, or
shrinks, they can respond quickly by altering the number
of desktops.
6. Controlled internet access -- All users and desktops
can go through a controlled access point to the internet,
enabling you to filter content, control software
downloads and minimize the risk of viruses.
VIII. CONCLUSION
The key takeaways from this paper are as follows:
• Physical corporate PCs are having difficulty keeping
up in today’s dynamic business and IT environments.
• VDI promises to make PCs more cost effective,
manageable and secure by transforming them into
internally delivered network services.
• Enterprises are struggling with their internal VDI
deployments due to solution complexity and cost. as
well as internal IT organizational challenges.
• DaaS allows enterprises to consume the benefits of
VDI as an outsourced subscription service delivered
by service providers.
• DaaS allows enterprises to realize the benefits of VDI
without the cost and risk associated with deploying
their own internal solution.
• DaaS allows service providers to build a new and
highly differentiated service offering that meets the
growing need of enterprises.
• The Desktone Virtual-D Platform is the solution that
enables DaaS or virtual desktops that are delivered as
a truly outsourced subscription service.
IX. REFERENCES
• http://www.vmware.com/products/resources/desktop/vdm_2.1_revi
ewers_guide.pdf
• http://www.vmware.com/products/resources/desktop/
vdi_strategy.pdf
• http://www.desktone.com/downloads/public/collateral/Virtual-D-
Fact-Sheet.pdf
• http://www.desktone.com/downloads/public/collateral/Desktone-
Desktops-as-a-Service-Whitepaper.pdf
• http://www.desktone.com/downloads/public/collateral/Reducing-
Desktop-TCO-with-Desktone-DaaS.pdf
• http://www.desktone.com/platform/tour.php
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Fig : 3 Responsibility with DaaS as opposed to VDI

Fig : 4 TCO summary for DaaS as opposed to VDI

Fig : 5 Desktone’s Desktop As A Service Architecture

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