We are a University and use VMView. We have about 300-350 concurrent connections at any time on most days. We use zero clients in out library and some labs, and also use VDI so students can access campus ownedsoftware from their personal laptops. In our meeting yesterday with our licensing rep he told us we need to have a studnet option component. With VDI, when virtualizing Windows OS or a Microsoft app, such as office to a personal owned device, you have to have a Windows OS AND software assurance on that personl device. As an option we can purchase this "student option" which covers the OS and software assurance, as well as the required VDA license. This was all news to us, I suspect it is a new MS add in since we last reviewed our licensing.
At any rate, this will add about $200K per year to our licensing costs, making VDI cost prohibitive. I thought about using a Linux desktop, but I just got off the phone with VMWare support, and the agent / tools are not available from VMWare for Linux desktops.
1- Has anyone else run into similiar license issues with MS? What did you do to resolve it?
2- Has anyone else successfully created Linux desktops for VDI? How did you adress the issue of tools and agents?
Thanks everyone