Surgient Success

Another question is how can use VTMS in a classroom environment? Is it only for online training/virtual classrooms? In the classroom environment are there any specialized tools that unique for onsite training? Can it only work in my classroom or can I use it in learning-provider classrooms as well?

Thanks again!

Because VTMS provides a web-based interface into the lab environment, you can use it anywhere that has web access and acceptable bandwidth.  It can be used in any type of training scenario, whether it be at your location or a customer site, or even self-paced training at home.  We even have some customers that use it to give demonstrations to their customers and allow for hands-on evaluation afterwards.   Each individual user would need their own monitor, keyboard, and web browser.  Their experience will look and feel just like they are sitting in front of the computer that is powering their lab, only someone did not have to run around the room installing each user desktop first.  That's one of the beauties of Surgient!

 Please let me know if I did not explain this well enough or if you have any additional questions.

 Thanks!

 Jackie.

Thanks!

Jackie -

I can see many usees for such an application.  We believe in hosted solutions and have both Blackboard and Saba Centra - so I am hoping for a good fit. 

But I am wondering about licensing for the software and I am hoping for a simple straighforward solution.  For example, suppose we have a graduate class that needs 20 concurrent seats of SPSS.  Can you please explain how the licensing works - is this virtual lab space in line with the terms of most software agreements?  Also, who buys the software, manages the renewals, etc.

Thanks! HiEdTechie

HiEdTEchie -

From the way your question has been phrased, it sounds like you are considering a hosted solution. In all cases, hosted or on-site, our customers must procure licenses for any licensed software that they wish to place into the image and handle the installation themselves.  In the case of our hosted customers, Surgient will furnish the base images, which are generally a flavor of Windows, for which we have volume license agreements with Microsoft.

Generally, to be "compliant", you will want to ensure you have one license per the maximum number of concurrent users you expect to have using that product at any instance in time. If your capacity can support 20 users, but you know you will never have a class larger then 10 using a particular piece of software, then you will only need 10 licenses. However, if you end up using 11 one day, you have violated license agreements.

Thanks,

 Jackie

Jackie,

Very often software licenses are entwined with proprietary licensing daemons, use hardware dongles, or integrate 3rd party solutions such as the Flex LM.  What options / solutions exist to enable us to integrate such software titles? (examples include MATLAB, Maple, SPSS, CATIA, Pro-E, etc.) 

Are we required to pursue node-locked licenses for such titles and specify the VTMS server as the node?  If so, in your experience have any software companies balked at assigning multiple licenses to the same node?

Thanks, HiEdTechie

HiEdTechie -

 I confess I am not familiar with all the scenarios and software you mention.  However, I can tell you that things are handled on a case-by-case basis and generally recommend working with the vendor to figure out licensing.  Virtualization is still a new enough concept that in many instances, licensing for it hasn't yet been handled, or possibly even considered. 

I can tell you that a couple of years ago, I did work with a customer that had MATLAB and their solution was to put the license server inside the image.  However, it would have also been possible to setup a static license server within the environment for the same purpose.  This just proved to be a more viable solution for them given their requirements.

Thanks,

 Jackie.

Certainly makes sense.  Are you aware of any software vendors which specifically state they do not permit installation/ access via virtualized environments?  I am asking as for many years the notion of promoting ease of access via Flex LM was a concept foreign to many vendors.  What has your experience been?  or is this truly too soon to tell?

I am not aware of any.  We have yet to have a customer that was unable to put the software he desired into an image.  However, with that said, I think the majority of our customers on the training side of the house are training users on their own software or software of their partners, and thus licensing doesn't tend to be as much of an issue.  I have seen those customers use a variety of products, including various databases and Microsoft products, all without any licensing issues that I was aware of. 

With that said, I do not know if the customer always goes forward with the explaination of how he intends to install the product - he needs 40 copies of X and buys 40 copies of X.  I'm not sure that a vendor would typically ask about how the user intends to install the product.

Jackie.

Interestingly, Microsoft is one vendor that says you can not virtualize Home editions of the Windows Vista operating system.  That's not unexpected given the audience they intend it for (home users). 

Other software vendors tie their licenses to specific machines through machine properties or they have gone so far as to detect virtual machines: some obscure stock trading programs and niche vertical applications come to mind.  These vendors are living in the dark ages.

A larger threat than licensing to virtualization is Product Activation like that which is built into Windows Vista, Adobe Creative Suite, Diskeeper, and a growing list of vendors.  Some of these trigger on basic machine changes like RAM size or Ethernet MAC address.  Where activation is sometimes enforced every six months (Vista), deployment in virtual machine can trigger every time creating usability issues.

Like Jackie says, Surgient has a set of Best Practicies that avoids scenarios that don't work or we have working relationships with a number of vendors that are aware of our solutons including Microsoft, Adobe, SAP, IBM, Oracle, HP, Mathworks, etal.

In addition, VMware's own ESX Server is licensed through FlexLM so we're very familiar with how to monitor and manage capacity utilization of these kind of licenses.

Hope this helps -

It sure does. So when the time comes we will need to be certain to use Win XPSP2 or Vista Business/ Ultimate, etc. (?).

Can you please provide an example or two of what usability issues are experienced when the product activation occurs?  Are you saying that there are titles that cause a product activation pop up to come up on the screen and thus necessitate intervention?  Is this resolved by the Instructor, support team, or (hope not) end user?

Also, very glad to see awareness of FLexLM!!

Best, HiEdTechie

Usability issues would be around customers who provide Windows licenses based on retail media, which are incompatible with hosting as well as trigger activation.  Depending on which version of WGA/SPP is present you're told you have 30 days or 3 days to "activate" and Windows reminds you incessantly.

We would never inconvenience Instructors or end-users to asking to activate or "live with" these issues.  Instead we work with image providers to avoid activation issues early on the content development cycle.

Jackie,

I've now just read the VTMS Instructor Handbook and User's Guide, ver 5.0 and have a few questions.

How are application files uploaded and also downloaded from the virtual application?  For example, a student accesses the lab to create a PowerPoint or analyze data using SPSS, so how does the student (or faculty for that matter) load the input data file?  And how are files and/or objects such as output files and generated charts extracted? 

I see VTMS as a solution for a virtual classroom environment; but also to provide faculty, graduate students, etc. access to applications (e.g. SPSS) for computational purposes.  And they would need to import data files to do so.  Surely I am missing something, or is the intention to not permit transfer of data files?? <head scratching>

Sorry for all the questions; the info in the User Guide (pps. 25- ) discusses adding materials; but is this a 1-way street?  Can modified files be exported?

Best, HiEdTechie

We have generally discouraged customers from allowing their users to upload/download from within the VM.  There are many issues associated with this, including the introduction of viruses into the environment, malware, and even software theft. 

For an onsite environment, our customers are free to make their own decisions about what they allow within their VMs and onto their network - this really is outside the realm of Surgient.  For our hosted customers, we handle this on an as-needed basis and work with the customer to come up with a solution that we feel will minimize the compromize to our hosted environment.

I hope this helps.

Jackie.

It helps some.  It also adds clarity as to the guidelines for use.

As ours would undoubtedly be a hosted solution, the inability to upload/download data files obviously serves to define how the virtual labs can be used. I am thinking that a temp directory that is permissive of uploads/ downloads would be something to consider. Otherwise use may well be limited to those pre-loaded library objects.  That isn't all bad if all you wanted to do was run a lab with no assessment of the student work. That is, provide a virtual practice space within which an instructor can shadow to ensure competencies are met.

I suppose Virtual Labs is not a solution then to provide remote access to applications for instructors.  I had been hoping that the built-in scheduling tool would enable us to leverage licenses and 'democratize' access to hosted applications.  Or am I barking up the wrong tree?

 Best, HiEdTechie