The MAGIC of VDI (A USE CASE : CLASS MANAGEMENT SYSTEM ON TOP OF VMWARE HORIZON )

VDI Use Case – Class management System.

Recently we got a special request from a customer. They wanted a solution whereby they can implement and deliver a class management solution.

The requirements :

• An effective class management solution
• Integrated Exam management and delivery solution.
• The solution should be integrated with their Active Directory.
• The teacher should be able to perform the below mentioned tasks on the student’s screen.
• Have a real-time visibility of student screen.
• Control student screen.
• Draw and write on the students’ screen.
• Give stars/appreciation to the student depending on their performance.
• Convey message over chat or audio to individual students.
• Create, deliver, evaluate multiple chose question exam.
• Export results of the exam.
• Have a secured shared file location where the teacher can send and receive documents.
• Sending and receiving documents from an individual student during the class.
• Record the class.

Solution:

With proper research we were able to find out a software which is available in the market by the name of Net Control 2 Pro (Please click on the link here to checkout this amazing software). After thorough testing, we figured out that this is the most appropriate solution which satisfied all the customer needs with some additional cool features like whiteboard, broadcast etc

 

The Whiteboard feature allowed the teacher to open a whiteboard on his screen and broadcast his screen for all the students to see. While the teacher would write/draw on his screen, the students are able to see the inputs in real time.

The customer actually liked the solution but now we had to figure out a way to deliver this in the most efficient and fast manner. During the presales process, we concluded that VDI is the best way to more on with delivering this solution to the customer.

Now that’s where my skillset comes into the picture.

A POC of delivering this class management solution on top of VMware Horizon was agreed with the customer.

Primarily,  we focused on keeping the architecture simple for the customer to see the magic of delivering application and desktops with VMware Horizon.

POC:

Use cases:

•      VDI for teachers to be delivered over laptop, computer and Samsung Tablets. 
•      VDI for students to be delivered over laptop, computer and Samsung Tablets.

 

This amazing experience started with choosing the students and teachers and subject for the POC.

After we had the list of all the stakeholders, we started adding them to the AD security group which we created for the purpose of this POC.

Then began the installation and integration of various VMware Horizon components.

For minimal management, we used two R640 servers as hosts with one vCenter. Also, we created just one connection server, two golden images (one in English and the other one in Arabic).

The connection was simple too. The physical servers, computers and the access points were connected to the same Switch. After establishing the proper connectivity, we were able to deliver a successful training class with 25 students and 1 teacher. The same class was delivered where some students were using computer, other were using tablets. The teacher was transitioning between the computer and a tablets. We tested almost all the features and it was totally an amazing experience.

The credit of delivering the class management solution with such a smooth and easy fashion was explicitly captured by VMware Horizon. A setup which would have taken us 3-4 days, was delivered in 3-4 hours. 

 

Net Control 2 Pro  : https://www.netcontrol2.com/pro