Leostream

Leostream Announces VMware Enhancements In Its Connection Broker 7.0

August 31, 2010 by Robin Wauters Leave a Comment

At VMworld 2010, Leostream announced VMware enhancements in the Leostream Connection Broker 7.0, which provide customers who operate a VMware virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) with much more powerful management capabilities and improved scalability.

In the latest release of the Connection Broker, Leostream provides tight integration with VMware View, enhanced desktop provisioning, cluster management and linked clone support.

The Leostream Connection Broker, the most widely deployed, vendor-independent technology of its kind, enables IT managers to maximize the value of existing IT investments by easily integrating an array of clients, back-end systems and viewers to create a hosted VDI. Additionally, the Connection Broker integrates easily with existing network infrastructure with no changes to essential data center systems, such as authentication services and SSL VPNs. Once integrated, the Connection Broker provides a flexible set of policies for exact implementation of business rules for system administrators, users, and machines.

New VMware enhancements in the Leostream Connection Broker 7.0 include:

VMware View Support – Tight integration allows soft PCoIP connections for View users who require high-performance graphics. This also provides View adminstrators with the versatility of the Leostream Connection Broker, letting them extend VDI to include a variety of different platforms, while providing users with a single login to all resources.
Provisioning Enhancements – Additional configuration options for provisioning substantially improve the scalability of VDI in VMware environments. The Connection Broker allows lower and upper thresholds on pool size, and provides complete control over the virtual machine (VM) lifecycle, including how new VMs are provisioned and when they are deleted.
Linked Clones Management – Leostream can now create new linked clones from snapshots of parent VMs, which optimizes storage, simplifies the creation of new desktop images, and makes image management easier and more efficient.

These new enhancements provide View users with powerful ways to extend the capability, reach, and security of VDI deployments. This includes Leostream’s location-based policies and native integration with Cisco VPNs, as well as the ability to integrate a range of systems – from Citrix XenApp to the Oracle Sun Ray System to Linux virtual desktops – into a VDI that includes View.

Leostream Updates Connection Broker

July 16, 2009 by Robin Wauters Leave a Comment

Leostream today announced new functionality has been added to its vendor-neutral connection broker that simplifies the management of virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). Already the most effective technology of its kind for VDI deployments in heterogeneous environments, the Leostream Connection Broker 6.1 now also features enhanced policy and reporting capabilities, power control for physical machines, Web browser access to Citrix XenApp applications, and bulk delete, refresh and release actions for even easier IT administration.

The latest version closely follows the April release of the Leostream Connection Broker 6.0. Leostream’s goal has long been to anticipate market demand for virtualization solutions and continually build upon its already mature connection management technology to meet this demand. This is especially important for enterprises that need to handle the multi-vendor environments that invariably exist in larger-scale virtualization projects. As a result, the Leostream Connection Broker provides organizations with the capability to integrate existing technology easily and achieve the maximum ROI for end-user computing.

The Leostream Connection Broker, delivered as a virtual appliance, is the software management layer that ties desktop images in the data center to users’ thin client, laptop, desktop or Web interface. It allows enterprises to provide end-users with a virtual desktop experience equal or superior to traditional desktops. End-users can access their virtual desktop from any machine, regardless of location, due to the technology’s ability to direct users to their own virtual desktop image. IT managers can also maximize the virtualization of existing resources by easily integrating an array of clients, back-end systems and viewers. Additionally, the product integrates with existing data center infrastructure without changes, including authentication services and SSL VPN systems, and provides a rich set of policies for the exact implementation of business rules for users and machines.

Particular highlights of Leostream Connection Broker 6.1 include:

Policy Enhancements: Expanded flexibility of policies offers “granular customization” to suit an enterprise’s precise needs.
- Policies can now be applied to hard-assigned desktops, providing consistent policy application for all types of machine assignment.
- Policies now allow administrators to offer as many resources as desired to the end-user, but can limit the number of machines actually assigned to a set limit, improving control of license usage.
- Power control and release policies make it easier to reuse power and assignment options.
Enhanced Reporting: New reporting features have been added to give IT greater insight and control. A metrics report provides information on disk usage and load averages for all Connection Brokers in a cluster, with another report summarizing the setup of all policies.
Web Browser Access to Citrix XenApp: An extension of the Connection Broker’s current XenApp functionality, end-users can now launch Citrix XenApp desktops and applications via the Connection Broker Web browser.
Access and Power Control for Physical Machines: The Connection Broker can make Microsoft SMS server calls to power up physical machines. This Wake-on-LAN feature allows users the convenience of starting and accessing physical machines from remote locations, while providing enterprises with greater control over power use.
Bulk Actions for Improved IT Management: Bulk delete, refresh and release actions bring improved ease-of-use to IT administrators.

Leostream Pushes Connection Broker 6.0

June 1, 2009 by Robin Wauters 1 Comment

Leostream announced late last week a new version of its vendor-neutral connection broker. The Leostream Connection Broker 6.0 features native support for Citrix XenServer, along with additional highlights including extended monitor support, an enhanced Web interface, more powerful USB device management and reporting capabilities.

The Leostream Connection Broker, which is delivered as a virtual appliance, is the software management layer that ties desktop images in the data center to users’ thin client, laptop, desktop or Web interfaces. With it, enterprises can provide end-users with a virtual desktop experience equal or superior to that of traditional desktops. End-users can access their virtual desktop from any machine, no matter where they are located, due to the Connection Broker’s ability to direct users to their own virtual desktop image.

For IT, the Leostream Connection Broker allows managers to maximize the virtualization of existing resources by easily integrating an array of clients, back-end systems and viewers. In addition, management can rest assured that its virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) is secure. The Leostream Connection Broker integrates with existing authentication and security protocols without changes, providing a rich set of policies for exact implementation of business rules for users and machines.

With its new version, the Leostream Connection Broker 6.0 offers native support for Citrix XenServer, easily installed as a virtual appliance on Citrix XenServer 5. As a result, enterprises can now create a VDI entirely on XenServer. This new capability builds on Leostream’s previous Citrix offerings. This includes Leostream’s long-standing Citrix Ready verified support for XenServer Centers and the more recent addition of XenApp Integration for delivering desktops and applications side-by-side. With Leostream, organizations can deliver Citrix desktops simultaneously with other virtual, physical or bladed desktops or Terminal Server sessions, create pools of Citrix desktops or applications for delivery to different groups of users, and assign desktop and application pools based on end-user policy and location.

The Leostream Connection Broker 6.0 also provides extended monitor support. Virtual desktops can be split or spanned across multiple screens with no degradation of performance. This enables IT to provide virtual desktops to end-users accustomed to multiple monitors.

Additional enhancements in the Leostream Connection Broker 6.0 include:

More Powerful USB Device Management: End-users can attach and employ USB devices on virtual desktops with the same ease-of-use as physical desktops, while IT management has complete visibility and control over which USB devices are permitted;
Enhanced Reporting: IT can now monitor resource usage; and
New Integration with Syslog Servers: New integration features allow for more effective compliance and auditing.

Apologies For The Radio Silence

April 28, 2009 by Robin Wauters 1 Comment

We would like to apologize to our readers, and particularly those who subscribe to our RSS feed and/or e-mail newsletter, for not posting any news for the past couple of days. We moved offices and it took us a while to get our internet access back. But we’re back now, and here’s an overview of what happened while we were sitting on a tropical island in no-internet-hell.

Veeam has a new CFO (William H. Largent)

BlueStripe Software raised Series B funding to the tune of $8 million from Valhalla Partners and Trinity Ventures.

CohesiveFT added both Fedora Core 10 and Internal Eucalyptus Cloud Deployment Option to its Elastic Server platform

Tranxition has announced general availability of LiveManage for Virtual Migrations 7.0

VMware has announced vSphere, its infamous cloud operating system (and then some)

rPath has announced rBuilder 5

Pano Logic has appointed Parmeet S. Chaddha as executive vice president of engineering

VMware put out their financial numbers for the first quarter of 2009

Leostream released Connection Broker 6.0

Citrix today announced that the beta release of XenServer 5.5 (code-named “Project George”) is available

Leostream (Finally) Ships Connection Broker 5.3

February 10, 2009 by Robin Wauters Leave a Comment

Leostream Corporation, a developer of virtual hosted desktop software, has finally gotten around to updating its Connection Broker software to version 5.3.

To get an idea of what changed, you can check the release notes here (PDF).

Here’s a quick run-down:

Citrix XenApp support when used with Leostream Connect (Windows and Linux® version) and Wyse thin clients.
Remote upgrade feature for Leostream Connect client
New > Status > Downloads page with links for downloading the Leostream Agent, Leostream Connect, and Leostream Documentation
New ability to specify multiple authentication server addresses inside one record on the > Users > Authentication Servers page
New Domain option on the Test Login option on the > Users > Users page
Allow additional special characters on smart card logins
Enhanced USB support in policies when used with Leostream Connect version 2.2
Context sensitive help for Connection Broker forms
The Templates pool has been removed from the > Resources > Pools page. Please, use VMware® VirtualCenter to view the templates you use for provisioning
Bulk upload feature, to import users, desktops, and clients from a CSC-file.
Additional columns available on the > Users > Users page to list Active Directory attributes for users

eG Innovations And Leostream Team Up

October 29, 2008 by Robin Wauters Leave a Comment

eG Innovations, a provider of performance monitoring and triage solutions for virtual and physical IT infrastructures, and Leostream, developer of virtual hosted desktop software, announced today that they have established a technology partnership to leverage their combined strengths and define a new standard of performance and flexibility in the area of virtualized desktop computing.

Under the agreement, eG Innovations’ virtualization monitoring software, the eG VM Monitor, has been enhanced with specialized monitoring capabilities for the Leostream Connection Broker software. With this integration, organizations deploying virtual desktop environments have a comprehensive solution to establish, monitor, and report performance baselines for end-user virtual desktop access to enterprise applications.

Part of the eG Enterprise Suite, the eG VM Monitor is a comprehensive solution for monitoring and managing all aspects of virtual hosts and guests, whether the infrastructure is used to support server or desktop applications. Coupled with the ability of the eG Enterprise Suite to monitor over 80 applications eG VM Monitor – with its patent-pending In-N-Out Monitoring technology — provides a comprehensive end-to-end solution for monitoring and managing the performance of virtual IT infrastructures. The eG VM Monitor won the Best of VMworld 2008 Gold award in the Application and Infrastructure Management category at the VMworld 2008 conference in September.

The Leostream Connection Broker is an independent, flexible, cost-effective solution for regulating access to end user computing resources hosted in the data center. Leostream provides a comprehensive approach to desktop virtualization. The product enables organizations to manage end-user access to computing resources such as desktops, Terminal Server sessions, and streaming applications. It provides a scalable, fault-tolerant management layer that centralizes and consolidates IT resources in the data center and then creates, assigns, and delivers desktops to end users.