Limiting interactions between office components

From the TechNote Dept. A new article from Mr. Dave Bryant explains how you can leverage the File and Folder Security to prevent Office from launching unauthorized Office applications through OLE.

<<< Click here to read the article.

How to use Runbook Parameter Linking

From the technotes-R-us dept. Patrick Kaak has written the second part of his article series on how to wrestle the most out of RES Automation Manager. This time he dives into how to use parameters between modules and run books. This makes short work of expanding existing functionality in Automation Manager Modules. The idea is really simple. For those of you back in the day who started out writing batch files, a module parameter is equivalent to putting in %1, %2 etc into a script.

The beauty of using parameters inside the RES Automation manager is that you can do it without any scripting, yet still benefit from using information which as already been entered across multiple modules.

<- Click here to read the article

New Intel-RES Whitepaper

From the VDX Inside dept. On behalf of my good colleague Jeff Fisher, I would like to share with you all a new whitepaper which was joint developed by Intel Corporation and RES Software.The paper highlights the value add of RES VDX, when dealing with the challenges of deploying server-based VDI.  Intel has been running a campaign around “Intelligent Client” for a while now, with the goal of evangelizing a hybrid approach to Desktop Virtualization. Clearly Intel as well as RES Software believes that one size doesn’t fit all. As a consequence Intel has created messaging which states (and I happen to agree with this), that although there is a time and place for VDI in the enterprise, a wholesale move to this kind of environment doesn’t make sense because it ignores increasingly capable rich endpoints.

Obviously, this is a great fit with RES Software’s VDX technology and Intel has been working with it for around 6 months now.  They are showcasing VDX in a number of demo environments, including their client virtualization lab in Folsom, CA, which is often visited by Intel enterprise business development managers and their customers. As a result, Intel have started a joint effort with RES Software around VDX and Intelligent Client which so far has seen us included in both a media event they held about a month ago (see Jeff’s post here), a Cloud Builder event that we attended last month in Belgium and now, a published white paper that I’ve attached for your use. The whitepaper contains some very interesting benchmark numbers to contemplate.

You can download the whitepaper right here:

Detecting other types of hardware with WM

From the Community Hero Dept. A new article has been posted on Iain Brighton‘s Virtual Engine blog. This time Iain tackles a problem which could help others get way more flexibility out of the RES Workspace Manager, than originally designed for – I love when that happens! :) Anyway, Iain has been digging around in the hardware related parts of the registry to find out how to detect the presence of other hardware than just USB removable drives. Go check out his article here.

New technote: Application Standardization with AM

From the technote dept. A new article RG03C has been added to the Tech Library by resident guru, Sascha Maier. In this article, Sascha takes on Gartner’s view on how to archive corporate bliss through the process of application standardization through out the enterprise. While this by no means is an task to trifle with, things do not actually have to be as hard as you might think. Using the RES Automation Manager, it is possible to not only gather a structured overview of what’s out there, but also deploy sets of applications to different groups of computers, also in a very structured manner.

While other deployment methods do exist, keep in mind that Automation Manager is designed to be domain independent, massively parallel in operation and offer a lean&mean way to get to where you need to be very quickly. In this article sascha illustrates how exactly to reach your standardization goals using RES Automation Manager.

<<< Click here to read the article.

I’m still on PowerFuse 2008 – Should I upgrade?

From the get-to-the-choppa dept. The short answer to the title question is: YES! If you’re still on PowerFuse 2008, this would be a great time to consider upgrading. Although RES Software does not currently not enforce an end-of-life policy for the 2008 product, you would do well to consider the advantages of upgrading. The effective policy is as long as there is a viable number of customers who utilizes a given version, that version is supported, however new features will not be added to that version. As many of these questions usually end up in my inbox anyway, I have written this piece to cover some of the most common reservations and concerns that the few remaining PF2008 customers may have. It is my ambition to dispell some of the misconceptions about an upgrade from PowerFuse 2008.

Read more »

Technote: All about the Baseline Desktop Analyzer

This article was written on Saturday last week after Citrix Synergy. Wow..! That’s simply the best I can currently can come up with, as I’m unwinding at the Gloria Ferrer vineyard with my better half in Sonoma, enjoying a bottle of ’99 Carneros Cuvée, after an intense week of Synergy 2011. If you follow my tweets, or have read Bill’s post-synergy article, you’ll know we had an overwhelming response to our booth demos and the brand spankin’ new Baseline Desktop Analyzer cloud-service, which will be available for FREE July 1st. During Citrix Synergy, my buddy Gabe Knuth from TechTarget tracked me down for an interview to get the scoop on this new offering. You can see the interview in details by clicking on the video above.

Parts of the video demo may be slightly hard to see, so let us dive a bit more into the Baseline Desktop Analyzer, or BDA as we refer to it shorthand. It’s essentially a free service to give customers and integrators the ultimate overview of the current state of affairs in their IT environments before embarking onto new projects. It doesn’t matter if it’s WinXP->Win7 migration, Physical to VDI, XenDesktop, XenApp, VMware View etc. The situation is a bit like navigation on the high seas: Where ever you are going, you need to get your bearings before you set sail in any direction.

To better prepare yourself for the journey and using DBA, you’ll do well by studying this article. Click here to read it.

New technote: Creating unique logonnames

A new technote RG03A has been posted to the RESguru Technote Library by resident Guru, Mr. Patrick Kaak. This time we’re opening up the innards of RES Automation Manager to discover how it can be configured to create unique loginnames automatically from a CSV file. This is extremely useful when you have two or more full usernames in your list which using your company’s naming convention, would result in duplicate usernames. For example if your naming convention results in firstname’s intial + lastname, both John Smith and James Smith would result in jsmith. This article shows you how to build a module that will detect that and create resulting unique logon names anyway. If you prefer the fast-track you can also download the buildingblock and try it out in your own environment.

<<< Click here to read the article

Two new RESguru technotes

From the we-work-harder-so-you-don’t-have-to dept. My esteemed co-authors Patrick Kaak and Sascha Maier have produced a couple of new articles, which you may find interesting. Patrick has reworked another blog article he found, which compares different profile manager technologies, while Sacha has created an article that describes how you can first-time set up the correct initial keyboard for users in an international organization. This article also includes a buildingblock. Have a look at the articles in the Technote Library below:

<<< RG038 – Differences between profile managers

<<< RG039 – Mapping the right keyboard to the right people

RESguru.com increases writer staff by 200%

From the More-is-Merrier Dept. Today April 18th, it is my pleasure to welcome 3 new guru’s as technical co-writers to RESguru.com. All three gentlemen are seasoned industry professionals who posses plenty of field experience with RES Software products. In no particular order, I am very pleased to introduce Patrick Kaak, Sascha Maier and Sander Wilmink. You can read their bio’s in the newly updated Writers section, which you can find in the black top menu. Each writer has in preperation for this announcement prepared an new technical article. Sander’s will be online shortly, but in the meantime have a look at these brand new technotes:

<<< RG034 – User driven app-install with WM & AM

<<< RG035 – Migrating to Win7 with Workspace Manager