It seems that the new normal might be pushing Desktop as a Service (DaaS) to the rank of front-and-center business tool, up from the minor niche curiosity it was only two years ago. That notion is due to some sudden and formidable market movement, most recently from Microsoft.
Microsoft has had a virtual desktop service for a while, called Azure Virtual Desktop, renamed last year when it was called, the Windows Virtual Desktop. A rumor being mongered by Mary Jo Foley, the queen of Microsoft leaks, has it that Microsoft will be announcing yet another DaaS development next week during Microsoft’s Inspire virtual conference. The new service will probably be called Cloud PC, and instead of supplanting Azure VD, it’ll be its own product aimed at general businesses and available as part of a Microsoft 365 subscription. Azure VD is designed to let its customers use Azure’s glut of services, not those from Microsoft 365, so there’s room for both. Plus, why have one vaguely named platform when you can have two?
Microsoft’s not alone either. Back in March, another rumor was hawked by the Register. The gist of it was Alibaba Cloud was already testing a DaaS service of their own and that the company is looking to make its service available in both Windows and macOS flavors. And that’s all separate from DaaS solutions that already exist, a list that includes not just Microsoft, but also Amazon WorkSpaces, Citrix Managed Desktop, and VMware Horizon to name just a few.
So What’s DaaS and Why Is It Different From VDI?
The basic concept of DaaS is pretty straightforward. If you’ve explored using virtualization to run Windows on a Mac, then it’s a similar concept, just managed by someone else up in the cloud-o-sphere. For businesses, the tech first started in the data center and used virtualization servers to push desktops to users.
This is called virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). You sit at your desk and log into your desktop just as you would any other networked app, but instead of an app showing up, it’s your whole desktop complete with all your apps and you’re already signed into them, too.
The idea is that the hardware you need to run VDI on the client-side is much cheaper because you’ll use $250 thin-clients instead of $1,000+ PCs and notebooks. IT also has a much easier time managing centralized desktops from a security and patching angle than when they’re distributed throughout the office with X% always strolling through an airport somewhere.
DaaS is just the cloud version. You pay $X per desktop (user) per month and those users can sign into a fully configured desktop that’s being served and managed by a 24×7 IT staff. And those users are logging into their very own desktop, too, not the same pre-configured one every time so there’s no personalization. Your users will be able to configure their own settings, like text size, wallpaper, and browser shortcuts, and that’ll be persistent every time they log in.
What’s made DaaS a slow adoption prior to the pandemic was that it offered all the supposed benefits of VDI, but all the same problems, too, and with an even nastier network issue, namely the interwebs. And just like VDI, its cost isn’t easily discernable either.
The cost of VDI turned out to be much higher than businesses expected. The idea was to deploy cheap thin clients and then decrease IT man-hours by serving up centrally managed VMs to that low-cost hardware. In real life, though, VDI ran into several cost issues, not the least of which was licensing. Vendors like Microsoft were selling their VDI platforms with a per-user license and then double-dipping by charging another per-user fee for the desktop OS and sometimes the apps, too.
The idea of an easier management time for IT didn’t work out either. Turns out no one told app vendors about VDI, so a lot of mainstream software had trouble working with it. That means help desk calls increased and along with that IT costs.
And all that’s before we get into the network issues. VDI vendors consider 100- to just under 200 milliseconds worth of latency to be ‘acceptable’ in a VDI scenario. But if you’ve ever actually tried to work on a desktop that needs 200 milliseconds to respond to your mouse clicks, you’ll remember wondering whether your PC was built by druids. To keep that latency under control, IT folks started serving up VDI from multiple geographic locations so servers could be as close as possible to users. That’s pricey.
So that’s a lot of holes in VDI’s bullet-riddled body. Why is DaaS going to be different? Because the pandemic has made this tech a perfect remote work solution on paper and vendors want to cash in. That tends to make them smarter.
Why DaaS Might Be The Killer App For Hybrid Work
The pandemic has taught IT guys one thing: managing remote workers at home can be a skull-fracturing migraine. There are too many variables they can’t control so when users call with problems it’s next to impossible to help them. Network connections and a big bucket of different home network routers are problems made worse by users moving from their work-issued laptops to their personal devices. That opens IT up to an ocean of possible hardware clients they know nothing about. Now tack on all those shadow IT teams that have signed their workers up for apps IT doesn’t even know about, and you’ll understand why your support people are hiding under their blankets all day.
Now picture DaaS. Basically, it’s VDI managed by an always-on, third-party IT staff. You don’t need to worry about which devices your users are working on as long as they meet a list of basic hardware requirements. Security and access are handled on the DaaS vendor side and so is the app list — no more shadow IT headaches because if it’s not on the list of apps in the DaaS catalog, IT isn’t responsible for it. And with vendors like Microsoft offering DaaS with a pre-set app license, you can actually hold out hope for something semi-cost-effective, too.
Yes, the network is still a problem. You need a fat internet pipe to work DaaS right and that’s difficult to deploy across home users. Then again, most broadband connections are fat enough to handle at least one or two DaaS clients and that’s with some VoIP calls and other home tasks thrown in, too. Big gamer and movie streaming might be a problem, but that’s still a wait-and-see issue because DaaS vendors are getting smarter about deployment.
Again taking Microsoft as an example, the company has more than 60 data centers around the globe and it’s combining those with edge computing to serve up Azure VD right now. All those locations place Azure VD clients very close to most users, so latency issues are minimized. Vendors are also getting smarter about local caching and bandwidth management, too.
But Real Life Downsides Remain
So you can expect DaaS to work better than it ever has by year’s end. But will that be enough? There are still several gotchas for which the vendor marketing machines haven’t given a clear answer. The big one is security.
Sure, all your clients are in one back-end fabric, which means managing endpoint protection and identity management is easier. It’s also more secure from the perspective that the DaaS vendor can build a blockade laced with virtual barbed wire and Dobermans to keep the bad guys out.
But if a bad guy does get in—and experience tells us that one or more of them definitely will—well that’s going to be…bad. Now they have access to the DaaS server, which could mean they’d have access to every client simultaneously. But that’s “could” not necessarily “will.” Depending on your cloud app and storage architecture, though, they might have your services and data, too. Drop a ransomware scenario on that and you’ll have CFOs and IT guys taking long baths with their toasters.
As with anything even semi-new, the key is going to be going slow and smart. First, you test, then you jump. And that testing needs to start with cost. How much is DaaS going to cost, and I mean down to the nickel, versus how much will your standard IT support cost in a permanent new normal? If you’re wondering how much hybrid work is really going to cost, using DaaS is going to have a big impact. Question is, which way?
Facing $100+ per user per month is a DaaS probability; then again, it could be a standard remote access support price, too. So you’ve got to be very smart about why you’re investing that money and make sure you’re getting some ROI above what you’re doing now.
The architecture is going to matter, too. Network latency is part of that, and you’d think that’s the DaaS vendor’s issue, but it’s also going to be your problem. The vendors will need to worry about the wild and wooly internet, but that last hop onto your users’ home routers is going to be on you. That needs to be tested and if someone’s on an unacceptably slow connection, you’ll need to figure out why and fix it. Bottom line: even if the DaaS dollar numbers add up, you won’t be able to roll this out whole-hog. One user group at a time will be the name of the game, so for quite a while, you’ll have both DaaS and standard remote work IT problems at the same time.
Security? I think that’s simply going to be an ongoing risk as with everything else in the cloud, and you’ll either take it or you won’t. Every DaaS vendor is going to trumpet support for a long list of regulations, so compliance probably won’t be an issue. But you’ll need to figure out a tiered protection architecture that not only keeps your clients safe but your data, too; and you won’t be able to do that with all your eggs in a single vendor’s basket. That means more than one cloud and more cost.
From where I’m sitting, though, all my naysaying is about solvable problems. VDI is a proven technology so the foundation for DaaS is sound. Everything else is just a matter of time. Disagree? Tell me in the comments.
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