Citrix announce a thin Pi

[Dis93]

I disliked the thin client model Sun tried xx years ago.
Now Citrix are about to launch a Pi based version.
https://www.citrix.com/blogs/2016/05/24 ... -ready-pi/
I was already imagining having a few Pis around my house doing simple tasks but with the ability to stream/thin client from my gaming rig/home server when the task was beyond the Pi due to hardware/software limits.
I've seen a few home brew versions knocking about, but to me this presages something more interesting. Are we going to see something less enterprise and more home friendly emerging?

[Heater]

What on Earth is this thing? Citrix HDX system-on-chip (SoC) architecture and all.

Why would anyone need one?

[fruitoftheloom]

http://xenappblog.com/2015/thinlinx-on- ... mpressions

https://www.citrix.com/blogs/2015/12/10 ... nt-for-50/

[epoch1970]

Cool. But I'm afraid the cost of VDI still remains in the server(s), I'm not too sure about a SoHo VDI solution.

[scruss]

Why would anyone need one?

There are still plenty companies using really old thin clients. I think I've recovered from using a Wyse Winterm from a rural backwater to a server in another rural backwater (being Edmonton, AB). Maybe.

[Heater]

I thought a PC running a web browser was a "thin client". Especially with today's idea of web apps and cloud services.

Something like the Pi running web apps in a web browser or Chrome OS makes about the thinnest thin client the world has ever seen.

Why do we need this Citrix thing ?

[Pithagoros]

Because Citrix is widely used in business. There are quite a few virtual desktop environments around too. Thin client terminals (which have been available for years) are an alternative to deploying a PC. This thing is a cheap way of enabling a monitor and a network cable to access resources deployed via Citrix. It's not a mainstream setup but it has its place.

I don't think it's supposed to be aimed at the average Pi user.

[LetHopeItsSnowing]

I thought a PC running a web browser was a "thin client". Especially with today's idea of web apps and cloud services.

The browser is the thin client, not the PC.

The PC still has a large software deployment (OS, desktop, browser, email client, business applications, etc), making it, in this language, a fat client.

Why do we need this Citrix thing ?

Need? You dont need it, but its an attractive proposition to businesses to centralise all the resources which would have previously been in all those PC's on desks and have a very small computer be a thin client for the OS, desktop, browser, email client, business applications, etc.

[blc]

Why do we need this Citrix thing ?

If you're asking this question then it means it's not for you .

[piglet]

Nice! I currently use a Pi 2B with Citrix Receiver in preference to my home desktop for working from home/callout/support. The only thing I miss is the ability to connect multiple screens...

Are these things built around compute modules?

[JumpZero]

Hi!
These last 5 years I worked for a company that uses Citrix. I must admit that work related it's very good. It's an engineering company with many construction sites around the world. On any site you received a dumb PC and connect to the company/Citrix site via a web browser (IE) an your company id/password. You are then connected to a virtual Windows XP PC with all the standard office tools: outlook, excel, word, + the company specific software (all projects database). You can even save your work and get it back next time you connect from anywhere. Everybody has the same virtual machine so IT guys work is much more easier, if they add/remove/modify software it's done for all users. You can even connect from home, you have to install what they call a Citrix receiver, it's available for Windows, OSX, Linux and even Android. I had it on my Android tablet. So I believe for such a company using Pi instead of a PC is possible and has numerous advantages: size, price, no mechanical part, no fan and dust, etc.. However most of the time the PC are already here.
It looks like we are back in the terminal / mainframes years.
--
Jmp0

[scruss]

Browsers are not locked down enough to be thin clients for some business IT managers. Can you run native Microsoft Windows programmes in a browser? You can on a thin client box, and none of the pesky data leaks into an uncontrolled browser cache.

Set up correctly, on a fast network with a big server and not too demanding users, thin client boxes have much less maintenance and expense than desktops. My buddies in IT at electrical utilities love 'em.

[fruitoftheloom]

Nice! I currently use a Pi 2B with Citrix Receiver in preference to my home desktop for working from home/callout/support. The only thing I miss is the ability to connect multiple screens...

Are these things built around compute modules?

""ViewSonic® SC-T25 Raspberry Pi 3 Thin Client""

http://www.viewsonic.com/us/sc-t25.html

[JumpZero]

""ViewSonic® SC-T25 Raspberry Pi 3 Thin Client""

http://www.viewsonic.com/us/sc-t25.html

It seems there is a bug on their page they say: network RJ45 Gigabit
but when you open full spec they say: 10/100 BASE-T

[MarkHaysHarris777]

What on Earth is this thing? Citrix HDX system-on-chip (SoC) architecture and all.

Why would anyone need one?

My older daughter's nursing school (several years ago) used Citrix for everything. I went through hoops with her to setup Citrix on her gnu+linux (openSuSE) desktop at the time... what a pain... and these guys are providing (for a fraction of the cost of my daughters machine) a small package ready-to-go with Citrix and the power of the Raspberry PI !

~very cool...

[BMS Doug]

Nice! I currently use a Pi 2B with Citrix Receiver in preference to my home desktop for working from home/callout/support. The only thing I miss is the ability to connect multiple screens...

Are these things built around compute modules?

""ViewSonic® SC-T25 Raspberry Pi 3 Thin Client""

http://www.viewsonic.com/us/sc-t25.html

So Pi3 based then, very nice. I wonder if they have integrated heatsinks?

[ghans]

Aren't there Browser plugins which allow Citrix'ed
software to run from (or inside ?) browsers ?


ghans

[MarkHaysHarris777]

Aren't there Browser plugins which allow Citrix'ed
software to run from (or inside ?) browsers ?

Yes, but its like a lot of other plugins too... the real Citrix client woks better (sometimes its the only option) than the Citrix plugin... I remember my daughter had fits with that... she was able to use the browser (limping along) till I got the real Citrix running on her desktop.

I mean, that's the cool thing here... this company has done the work of placing the Citrix 'value add' on the PI, and packaged it with style. Very nice.

[Ian B]

We've been using Citrix ICA (alongside IceWeasel) on Rasp Pi, 2 & 3 plus as a test on Zero, at work in a limited trial since late last year, the new version of the receiver client that was released for Arm based Linux around December of 2015 (v13.3) made a step change in both stability and UI for us. Obviously when it comes to true thin client you don't want the user to have native OS level access, we've had to develop a build that strips lots of things away and adds more security to achieve this. We already have the expensive back-end in place as that is our strategy as a business (much simpler support model than having to deploy packaged applications to multiple hardware platforms, deploy once to Citrix and then you just need receiver on the various hardware platforms) so the cost of the various end client options is an easy like for like comparison. We get good performance and the Pi platform is comparable to both our repurposed Dell desktops and dedicated HP thin client machines in most instances, the only places that they struggle to compete are video playback and the lack of bluetooth headset support.

The recent Citrix news story, I believe, related to a fully packaged solution that offers the hardware, cased in a professional looking enclosure and the software that has already had that work done, this time using the Citrix HDX SDK for SoC which is a development kit to allow hardware specific Citrix Thin client builds . They also appear to have had some help from the foundation on optimising for the hardware I believe.

Interestingly the software, ThinLinx, is available separately if you want to home-brew a solution ($10) with a 30 day free trial.

[Dis93]

Interestingly the software, ThinLinx, is available separately if you want to home-brew a solution ($10) with a 30 day free trial.

Hi Ian B.

I downloaded the ThinLinx client, I only played about for a few minutes, couldn't get the Wifi setup, although I didn't put much effort into it. I realised I needed something for the client to connect to, could you point me in the right direction? I really like the idea of having a homeserver and thin clients.
(I'll also admit I've not researched this enough)

[fruitoftheloom]

Interestingly the software, ThinLinx, is available separately if you want to home-brew a solution ($10) with a 30 day free trial.

Hi Ian B.

I downloaded the ThinLinx client, I only played about for a few minutes, couldn't get the Wifi setup, although I didn't put much effort into it. I realised I needed something for the client to connect to, could you point me in the right direction? I really like the idea of having a homeserver and thin clients.
(I'll also admit I've not researched this enough)

https://tls.thinlinx.com/store/index.ph ... cense.html

[Dis93]

I got that end, fruitoftheloom.

If I could have been bothered to hook up an ethernet cable maybe the browser that launched would have connected to the remote sites it tried to reach.
It needs a local Citrix server to connect to. A cursory search threw up some open versions that I could d/l and play about with.

I hoped Ian B could have short-cut some of those efforts. I may play about with it more tomorrow between other stuff I have to do.

[Ian B]

I got that end, fruitoftheloom.

If I could have been bothered to hook up an ethernet cable maybe the browser that launched would have connected to the remote sites it tried to reach.
It needs a local Citrix server to connect to. A cursory search threw up some open versions that I could d/l and play about with.

I hoped Ian B could have short-cut some of those efforts. I may play about with it more tomorrow between other stuff I have to do.

I'm afraid I don't have a short cut for the Citrix server side, as I said my company already has all the hardware in place as that is our strategic direction for end user devices.

As for setting ICA up to run on the Pi. We installed Ice Weasel, then installed the Arm version of the Linux Citrix Receiver. Then make sure the Citrix plugin is enabled in Ice Weasel and browse to the server address from the browser. We did try to use the Citrix Client natively but didn't have any joy