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Converting Desktops to Thin Clients?
tfiedler asks: "I manage about 3500 desktop computers and was recently asked by my CIO to begin looking into thin client computing, something like WYSE terminals. I'd like to know, what are some good functional, and more importantly, manageable options to convert existing desktop computers into what would essentially be a Citrix terminal? I was thinking some brand of Linux that starts up an X11 session, starts the Citrix client and connects to our server farm. The user would see a Windows logon, our apps would function as normal and I'd get the benefit of performing a LOT LESS client-side maintenance. Any suggestions?"
Check out sunrays. They are dirt cheap and they now have a windows version of the software. I use them at home they are really that easy to setup. We run a windows and a linux sunray server here. 2 Servers that I upgrade every 2 years and then we have about 10 terminals scattered throughout the house. I'm on one right now actually. It's a simple solution and fairly cheap to deploy.
There exists some positive integer N that you are the Nth person to read this signature.
You're may be looking for the Linux Terminal Server Project.
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We use this where I work.
Essentially we have little sub-1Ghz client boxes with 512MB RAM and no hard drive. They boot off ethernet via PXE, grabbing a kernel and then mounting the root filesystem etc via NFS.
Newer setups have the client files in a vserver (google util-vserv) which allows for some convenience in seperating the server's components and those for the clients.
Some apps run locally on the client's processor/RAM, while others are run remotely "ssh -X" with the GUI piped back.
I'm trying to setup something similar at home, with a server image that should allow friends to connect and use 'nix while at my house (for rounds of frozen bubble, or whatever). You could email me (form on my website) if you want more info.