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Using Thin Clients with PeopleSoft?
lsmft2001 asks: "We're busy implementing a big ERP project with PeopleSoft. We currently run a mixture of Windows 95, 98 and 2000. These machines run most of the time, but all too often they fail for various reasons. Our IT department spends too much time fixing these machines, basically patching them enough so staff can get back to work. It's frustrating for them and for the users.
PeopleSoft only requires a browser to run. Has anyone implemented PeopleSoft without Windows machines? What I would really like to see is some kind of plug and play solution. If a PC fails, the maintenance folks replace the whole machine or the hard drive and everyone is back to work. I would like to see this solution for the 'power users' as well, where they could log on to any machine and have all their files and applications available to them. Everything here runs Novell Netware.
Has anyone implemented PeopleSoft with minimal client software? Could it be done with Novell and SuSe?"
If it runs in a browser, why can't you use firefox, galeon, konqueror, etc inside linux? the only thing that would make it heavily windows dependent is if it required activex. if it does, then i have to say you're shit out of luck. if however all they need is web to access peoplesoft, most distros are more than adequate and can fix the patching issue by automation through the network and in general better security, less viruses, adware, worms, etc.
- tristan
We recently upgraded to PS 8.8 at my work and though I don't use Linux at work, I do use FireFox/Mozilla. Both of which have rendering issues on some of our pages. Some relatively new versions of mozilla won't even respond to menu clicks. It's really not the OS you ought to be worried about with Linux IMHO, it's browser compatibility. (And about people writing applications with browsers and standards in mind).
As an alternate solution, I'd recommend Norton Ghost. Keep a backup of a "good" image for each PC model in the office. When a client fails, simply refresh the image (takes like 20 minutes). It's not especially elegant, but it gets the job done.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
There is a citrix client for a multitude of platforms. Setup a farm and they can connect no problem. Let their sessions stay open so even if they diss they can join back up. Spend some time setting up the servers so u don't have to reboot them every monday morning. but... it will cost you major cal $.
Crossover office can run IE. Never tried it but nomachines.com sounds like a citrix like platform.
If you are not IE specific then I'm not sure why the question is here.
Put an operating system on the machine that runs VMware (Linux, Windows, whatever). Install your "desktop machine" as you want it configured and then save the image on a read-only partition (or as a read-only file). Configure it to boot into the VMware image by default, and when the luser fscks it up, you can just step in with a knoppix CD, copy the image file over, and reboot the machine. Instant Computer Restore - ICR(tm), just add water(tm).
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
Currently PeopleSoft supports the following clients: IE 4.X, IE 5.x, Netscape 4.x, Netscape 6.x, and Netscape 7.x on all platforms where these browser run.
As server platform PeopleSoft supports Windows, Linux, AIX, HP-UX, Thru64, Solaris, etc.
Supported Databases are Oracle, Sybase, DB2, MS-SQL.
So there is no need at all to use Microsoft Software with PeopleSoft. Neither on the server nor on the client.
It would be a more efficient use of resources to urge support for standard data formats rather than specifying specific client software. However, if they did that , then it would be obvious whether or not PeopleSoft works. So instead, departments are kept in turmoil as they chase a moving target and never get to find out whether they got sold some snake oil.
A year or so ago, setting up a PXE linux based system took a little bit of effort, but today? It's cake. Check this out. Its a simple to setup PXE environment. The documentation is fantastic and it 'just works'. You can setup a simple browser only xwindows type environment or do what I prefer to avoid weird windows issues: Setup a Windows terminal server and use Rdesktop in that pxe environment to give everyone a real microsoft desktop. I had difficult making the sound pipe down to the local machine but . . .who needs that anyways? With the money you save on replacing those hard drives buy that staff IPod's (and two or three for yourself) (though getting stuff on the ipods with those pxe boots might be challenging).
.and so what if it does?
The things that fail most often are things that move . . . it is absolutely possible to eliminate every fan and drive with this type of environment. Ram fails, but its a whole lot less often that the drives . .
"What? Your system is just beeping. Oh. Well just use this system which I have magically moved all your stuff to already"
Snide remarks about marketing speak aside, If you're having so many computer failures maybe the problem is your IT staff. There are (Windows) computers where I work that haven't had any problems since I installed them, which in some cases is up to two years ago. Moving to thin clients because your IT department doesn't know how to support normal PCs isn't the right reason to move to thin clients.
I don't know how well it would work, but maybe trying Citrix Metaframe XP, or maybe having a port of a Windows Remote Desktop/Windows Terminal Services client, and having the whole Peoplesoft application published on the MetaFrame or Terminal Server.
Of course, that's assuming there is a client port for either of those for your OS. It would make it so you could reinstall/replace the client machine, and not have to install/configure Peoplesoft.
I have not used PeopleSoft, but I do have experience with browser only interfaces.
You mentioned "replace the whole machine with hard drive..." how about one step simpler... LTSP (ltsp.org).
No hard drive. No CD Rom. No Floppy. No Sound. (you can if you like, but we're talking simple.).
You just have one server or maybe one server and one or two application servers (LTSP, X, Peoplesoft).
I've set this up for several schools and it works great. Also at a few businesses for OpenOffice and Evolution. If a machine breaks, they just walk in and replace it and check it out later when they are scraping to build a few more standbys.
I have one place with 15 client machines that are 150MHz, 32MB Ram, video and ethernet over 100 BaseT and a "server" that is a whopping 700MHz AMD with 1GB Ram. (don't skimp on server RAM). It takes a minute to load KDE and Mozilla (Maybe 60sec for both) the first time (we use Mozilla for composer, IRC and Email), but then is very quick for simultaneous users (15 seconds from boot to browswer). Then nice thing is that whatever your servers run at is what you appear to be running at your thin client.
There is a Universal Life Value Check it
is certified to run on Netscape 6+ and IE 5.5/6. I work at PSFT, and although they told me not to, I went ahead and tried to work with it in FireFox, and it worked fine. As far as the server goes, its supposed to be able to work on a UNIX server, and you can use Oracle for the db, making Windows unnecessary at all ends.
Vonal Declosion
You should be using Sunblades with java cards.
If the issue you're trying to solve is desktop maintenance, then I strongly suggest going to an Ultra Thin Client like the Sun Ray architecture.
I have installed Sun Ray networks at universities, and they absolutely love them. Yes, I work with Suns as a profession, so if you feel you must, take this with a grain of salt. Then again, I'm very much pro-Linux and would love to see an LTSP installation as well, that doesn't reduce the maintenance as much as the Sun Rays will.
If you aren't familiar with them, think of a telephone... if it breaks, you unplug it and put a new one in place and as soon as you plug it in, it's working. Same thing. No hard drive. No fans. No noise at all. Nothing mechanical to break, nothing to fix.
They are effectively a remote display (+kb+mouse) to the Solaris system running the Sun Ray Server software... so everyone shares the same (remote) box. Suns are designed to be much more efficient in multitasking "server" environments than the typical PC, so you can run quite a lot of Sun Rays off one server without anyone noticing a degredation in performance.
Browser choices include Netscape, Mozilla, Firefox, and I'm sure others.
Desktops include CDE and GNOME (recommended) and soon, JDS (Java Desktop Environment = slicked up GNOME).
Another plus is "hot desking".
Say you get a page and have to run to the other end of the building, but you're in the middle of something, or remotely logged into the server you need to work on with tasks running you don't want to stop, etc. You either disconnect the display with a simple command or button push, or if you're using the available smartcards, you yank your card out and run. You get to the other end of the building or server room (whatever), you plug in your smartcard (if you're using it) or you just log in, and the display you had at the former location is now in front of you still running and active. I've done exactly this on many occasions, having something running on a console of a box, with the serial console controled via minicom in an xterm... but I needed to be in the server room to do something then get back to the console again. You get the idea.
Ports on the incredibly simple devices include: VGA (DB15); 4 USB (for keyboard, mouse, etc.); ethernet; power; audio out (in case the internal speaker isn't loud enough for ya); audio in, and video in.
Yes, you read that right, it has composite video (and audio) in, so you can do video-conferencing using these Ultra Thin Clients.
I'm leaving a lot out... these things are much nicer and more versatile than I'm describing.
I seriously think Sun should market these things more, everyone who I've demoed them for has loved 'em.
Anyways, just to prove I'm not just trying to sell new Sun hardware (I'm not a sales-droid, I'm a tech), check out the used ones on ebay. I'm running some Sun Rays at home on an old Ultra 10... got the former for $30/each and the latter for around $125.
- Preferences: Solaris 10 (servers), Ubuntu (desktops), Solaris 11 (personal servers) -
First of all--I work on EnterpriseOne primarily, and linuxhansl is addressing Enterprise products (Sybase gave it away). I have done an Enterprise install, but know enough to recognize the architecture differences, and know what to put where. *grin*
Check the MTRs for the thin clients:
1. Browsers other than Netscape and IE aren't supported. Mozilla support is in the works. However, a tweak to linuxhansl's post--it isn't all platforms--only on the client machines are browsers supported. That's what's important to you, but realize that a linux client isn't supported at this time, or in the next year. Windows XP is barely supported, so I doubt linux clients are going to be requested for my testing group for a while.
2. Novell and SuSE are not going to be supported for enterprise servers for over a year--RedHat Advanced Server 3 has precedence, and is hogging the development resources currently. I'm banking my hardware requests on that.
I think you're talking EnterpriseOne (because Enterprise is purely internet-based so the power user issue isn't a problem, and E1 has various implementation choices, like fat client), so you need to look into installing the WebSphere that comes with your folder of CDs and start up JAS. That gives you the flexibility you're wanting for your power users to only need a browser.
The weird part about assuming E1 is you say Win95, 98, and 2000 clients-only 2000 is supported for a client anyway on the E1 line. I'm really familiar with the MTRs, so you're confusing me there. Any way you can put more info in your post? I'd love to help you out!
Seriously -- PeopleSoft are the worst hacks out there. They can't develop anything worth crap. Concepts like "Standard Compliance" or "Usability" are completely lost on them.
Can remember if this was for SAP or peoplesoft...one of the two bought out the company. Anyway you might find some useful information if you google for TopTier. Another way of looking at this is just to look at what middleware adapters you can put together with Peoplesoft that will allow you to link in a web server. Both of these approaches reach straight back to the db Layer but with a bit of hacking can be made to work well.