12 Feb
2012
12 Feb
'12
2:21 p.m.
On Sunday 12 February 2012 04:58:58 pm Timothy Pearson
wrote:
A specific type of cloud computing, yes. Most cloud computing is Web
based, but there are a few instances of cloud computing where the entire
desktop GUI is handled on the remote server and the client is just an I/O
device with a network connection.
Just to jump in here, there is one use case for a
lightweight DE that
doesn't involve obsolete hardware: multiuser mainframe-type systems.
When
you have 50 users on one central server, each with a session that is
being
accessed via a remote desktop protocol such as VNC or even the X
protocols, slight reductions in the overhead of each session make a big
difference overall.
Just something to think about in these odd times, when the personal
computer is being "replaced" with a variant of the old central mainframe
model....
Tim
Are you talking about cloud computing? I've been wandering how that would actually work.
I mean, if we all get
rid of our boot devices and use "the cloud" to boot our computers and run
our apps, how would we configure our computers to know what server(s) to
boot from? How would TDE tie into that (as in, how will it work being
loaded from "the cloud", and how would the TDE desktop environment change
as a whole)? I know that's thinking way far in advance as far as TDE goes,
but I'm just curious ;-)
Remember these?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_Computing_Devices
Make the monitor into a touch flatscreen, update the network conection
with WiFi and Gigabit Ethernet, integrate the optional monitor and
keyboard into a laptop- or tablet-like device and I think you have where
we are going.
Truly scary for developers, content producers, or anyone with data worth
stealing, but for the masses it might actually work rather well (and there
would be big bucks to be made in providing computing services to these
devices).
Just my $0.02. :-)
Tim