All Things Technology Related Thread

[FRPLG]

Originally Posted by TheMalcolmConnection

Very, very interesting. It's tough to be a dick because the climate here is almost a "even though this is a W&L computer, it's MY computer." For me, the biggest benefit of users calling for installs is that we get to vet them. I imagine our calls will go down significantly once people realize how embarrassing it'll be to call and say, "SooooOoo, I was hoping to get this Hello Kitty! screensaver installed."

Since I'm in one building, I don't mind walking to someone's office to check out an app for them. What did you do for laptop users? That's my biggest concern right now since I have professors traveling all over the world and the last thing I want is for them to absolutely need an install and we can't help them.

My thought was to create a local backdoor account with like a 25 character password so they can install in case of emergencies, but the password would be prohibitive to them logging in as that account all the time. Sure, we have a couple savvy users who would change it, and I would just deal with that as I went forward.

Sorry for all the questions, but I'm in charge of this initiative for both sides of campus and we're wanting to work through all scenarios.

People just eventually accepted that the machine wasn't "theirs". I think most people sort of inherently knew that the free ride was going to end at some point. There really wasn't much blow back. Only a few times did we have have to go with the "if it is something you really want to debate then you can go to your director, convince them to fight for it, and then we can meet with management and debate it." Never once did they take us up. They knew that what they were asking for wasn't a business need.

In terms of laptop users we treat them the same although we don't have much of a permanent deployment off campus. Generally we have them use a VPN client to terminal back into their local desktop. Just curious but why do your users seem to have the need to install stuff? We keep our stable of supported tech narrow and business-need focused. I can't imagine what would much different in an academic setting.

As for the VDI. We run a large implementation of VMware for our server needs so it was natural to integrate their VMview product. Citrix was our focus when we began but the costs associated with it getting up and going versus just leveraging our existing resources were too much.

[TheMalcolmConnection]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

In terms of laptop users we treat them the same although we don't have much of a permanent deployment off campus. Generally we have them use a VPN client to terminal back into their local desktop. Just curious but why do your users seem to have the need to install stuff? We keep our stable of supported tech narrow and business-need focused. I can't imagine what would much different in an academic setting.

Maybe it might just be me being worried that we WILL run into something down the road? All laptops users just have a docking station, so VPN isn't an option if they need help. We DO pre-load Teamviewer (remote control software) on their machines, so if they have an internet connection, we can always remote in.

I guess I'm just being a Nervous Nelly with the fear that the ONE professor who goes to Indonesia and needs something will be like, "I REALLY needed that and I couldn't install it."

[FRPLG]

Originally Posted by TheMalcolmConnection

"I REALLY needed that and I couldn't install it."

Our answer to this would be, in a nice way, "And did the world end when you couldn't install this?"

In reality we just don't see people needing to install things very often. Patches and so forth(Java, Adobe, etc...) are another deal but we manage that stuff with actual patch management technology.