Linked by David Adams on Sat 20th Aug 2011 15:38 UTC, submitted by sjvn
In five years, Red Hat CEO Jim Whitehurst sees the traditional desktop becoming obsolete.
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RE[4]: Business Computers
by BluenoseJake on Wed 24th Aug 2011 16:38
in reply to "RE[3]: Business Computers"
Member since:2005-08-11
No, I did not give the perfect example of cloud computing, because in Nova Scotia, and most other provinces of Canada, we are required by law to be responsible for our customer's confidential data, and cloud computing is problematic, because any information that is collected by the organization must not be stored in an other country, or be shared with another organization without express written permission by the client.
If you don't know where your data is, then it is not secure, and it isn't yours.
Everything where I work is on the server, but a lot of our internal apps are web apps, and you can't trust the cache, or the browser. You can't keep clients from saving passwords (everybody has too many) so our computers, in the department I look after, are desktops, and will remain desktops.
People who need laptops get laptops from a pool, and are cleaned after they are returned. The few people who have full time laptops are not allowed to access confidential info.
oh, and network booting Windows isn't harder than anything else.
Any more questions?
RE[5]: Business Computers
by phoenix on Wed 24th Aug 2011 16:47
in reply to "RE[4]: Business Computers"
Member since:2005-07-11
No, I did not give the perfect example of cloud computing, because in Nova Scotia, and most other provinces of Canada, we are required by law to be responsible for our customer's confidential data, and cloud computing is problematic, because any information that is collected by the organization must not be stored in an other country, or be shared with another organization without express written permission by the client.
Yes, we have FOIPPA rules in BC as well.
If you don't know where your data is, then it is not secure, and it isn't yours.
Exactly. Which is why you should not have *any* local storage in the client computer. Period.
That way, you know exactly where everything is stored -- on the server. Everything where I work is on the server, but a lot of our internal apps are web apps, and you can't trust the cache, or the browser.
IOW, not everything is stored on the server.
You can't keep clients from saving passwords (everybody has too many) so our computers, in the department I look after, are desktops, and will remain desktops.
Sure, desktops are fine ... so long as they are network booted, with no local storage, mounting everything off the server, and storing everything on the server.
As soon as you put a local harddrive into a desktop, all bets are off. (Of course, you would also have to disable all USB ports to make it 100% "no local storage", but that's a bit harder to do.) People who need laptops get laptops from a pool, and are cleaned after they are returned. The few people who have full time laptops are not allowed to access confidential info.
This is where the vpn and remote desktop apps come into play, so that you don't have to run any critical apps off the laptop. The laptop basically becomes a thin-client. Again, you don't use the local storage for anything, not even running a web browser.
oh, and network booting Windows isn't harder than anything else.
It's a lot harder to do that Unix.
Features
Linked by David Adams on 05/16/13 4:23 UTC
OSNews is a sponsor of this year's O'Reilly OSCON in Portland, Oregon, USA. A lucky OSNews reader will win a free three-day pass, including two tutorials days. To win the pass, post a comment on this story saying something about Open Source Software or OSCON. We'll pick a winner at random next week. If you don't have an OSNews account, you may email us your entry. Part of the conference is the 9th annual Open Source Awards, and today the 16th is the deadline for nominations. If you'd like to nominate an outstanding open source contributor, do it here. Read on for more information about OSCON. Update: The 20% discount code for OSNews readers is "OSN."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/11/13 21:41 UTC
"Windows is indeed slower than other operating systems in many scenarios, and the gap is worsening." That's one way to start an insider explanation of why Windows' performance isn't up to snuff. Written by someone who actually contributes code to the Windows NT kernel, the comment on Hacker News, later deleted but reposted with permission on Marc Bevand's blog, paints a very dreary picture of the state of Windows development. The root issue? Think of how Linux is developed, and you'll know the answer.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/08/13 14:22 UTC
This is one of those news items that's fun to write, fun to read, fun to comment on, and where no one will be able to say anything unkind. It's all just one big ball of awesome fluffiness. TuneTracker, the BeOS radio automation software, has just released something very special: TuneTracker System 5, the first version designed entirely and specifically for Haiku. In fact, it actually includes Haiku in the software package. Better yet, TuneTracker also unveiled several system-in-a-box products - which have Haiku and TuneTracker pre-installed.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/02/13 15:28 UTC
Exactly twenty years ago, a document was published that played a huge role in establishing the web as we know it today. Twenty years later, and this simple and straightforward document is proof of an irrefutable fact: while closed technologies can change markets, open technologies can change the world.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 04/29/13 21:06 UTC
Oh multitasking. That staple of computing that got thrown out the window with many modern smartphones. We got some rudimentary thing in its place - but even as multitasking on phone and tablets improves, its user-visible side remains cumbersome. Windows 8 has a neat implementation, and now it's time Android follows in it footsteps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 04/24/13 22:24 UTC
They're here! Whether that excites you or not remains to be seen, but the Galaxy S4, which will most likely become the best selling Android smartphone of the year by a huge margin, has been reviewed by all the major sites, and there's lots of interesting conclusions in there - although I think most of you will get the gist.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 04/18/13 11:21 UTC
Nokia has posted its quarterly results for the first quarter of 2013, and just like the quarters that came before, there's not a whole lot of good news in there. The rise in Lumia sales still can't even dream of making up for the sales drop in Symbian phones, and when broken down in versions, the sales figures for Windows Phone 8 Lumias in particular are very disappointing. In North America, Nokia is getting slaughtered.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 04/16/13 9:29 UTC
The day has finally come: Google has started shipping Google Glass to the lucky few early adopters. Now that it's shipping, Google has also unveiled a lot more about the API and the specifications of the device itself. While the company had already given out substantial details at earlier occasions, there are still a few surprises here.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 04/15/13 22:44 UTC
Almost exactly three years ago, I wrote about why OSNews was no longer OSNews: the alternative operating system scene had died, and OSNews, too, had to go with the times and move towards reporting on a new wave of operating systems - mobile, and all the repercussions that the explosion of smartphones and tablets have caused. Still, I was wondering something today: why aren't we seeing alternative operating systems on mobile?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 04/14/13 18:22 UTC, submitted by MOS6510
You can say what you will about Windows Phone and Windows 8's Metro interface (I refuse to drop that name) - it's inefficient, unpopular, cumbersome, beautiful, ugly, organised, clean, limiting - but there's one thing we can all agree on: it's unique and distinctive. CNet has published a profile of Microsoft's Albert Shum, the man behind Metro, and he highlights what I think is at the very core of Microsoft's problems in mobile right now.More Features »
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2005-07-11
No, the corporate world will stay with tradition desktops for the foreseeable future, because managing them may be hard, but it makes managing the data easier, and safer.
Actually, you just gave an example of the perfect use for "cloud computing" or vpns or remote desktop or "web app" or whatever term you want to use for "all data is stored on the server, not on the client".
Corporate/university laptops and desktops should not have local storage (or local storage only for the OS and the apps). Everything should be stored on the server. That way, if a desktop/laptop/palmtop/tablet/phone goes missing, nothing is lost but the hardware.
Granted, you also have to make sure that remote usernames and passwords are not stored on the local storage.
It's really too bad that Microsoft makes it so hard to network boot Windows.