
Amazon WorkSpaces - jamesjyu
http://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/
======
killerpopiller
Sigh, grumpy german privacy data protection consultant here.

Can't be used in G. for the same reasons MS Office 365 is off limits,
sensitive personal and business data don't belong in non german-hosted clouds.

One part of me wants that easy carefree cloud life, the other part doesn't
want to feed the US-overlord anymore with our precious informations.

~~~
hyperbovine
Don't place your precious information in the cloud. NSA or no NSA, was it ever
a good idea to store your deepest secrets inside of a nebulous black box that
you don't control? What sane person would do this in real life?

~~~
k3n
Because money?

The price differential between buying the hw/sw & staffing a professional (or
team of professionals) to curate and maintain it 24/7/365, or simply off-
loading it all to an outside party, could be huge -- I'd dare say huge enough
to make or break a company. From an executive POV, why care about data safety,
when hosting it yourself makes your business model non-viable?

I realize there are lots of problems with this line of thinking, and I'm not
advocating it at all, but I'm willing to bet this has been the case for some.

~~~
ENGNR
Exactly, the more efficient solution is having a government you can trust.

~~~
toyg
For some values of "efficient".

Building a government you can trust will take several generations, with each
generation providing hundreds of thousands ENTIRE LIVES to the cause. It might
be efficient in the grand scheme of things, but from an individual or even
corporative point of view, it's terribly inefficient in any timeframe you
might consider.

------
zmmmmm
How sad that this is launching after the NSA scandal has pretty much ensured
it will fail, and perhaps can't be achieved for decades.

This is almost certainly the most efficient and optimal way to do desktop
computing. We've been waiting really for decades for networks and CPUs to get
good enough that it's actually viable for a real good experience on the client
end. And when we finally get there, the NSA and others are here pissing all
over the party.

I hope that some day there is a full accounting of the enormous economic
damage caused by the reckless, dangerous people in charge of these
organizations.

~~~
d23
> How sad that this is launching after the NSA scandal has pretty much ensured
> it will fail, and perhaps can't be achieved for decades.

I honestly doubt 99% of consumers care, since the NSA isn't concerned with
their business.

That's not to say that attitude is right or wrong, but it's probably the last
thing on most peoples' minds.

~~~
dmix
> I honestly doubt 99% of consumers care, since the NSA isn't concerned with
> their business.

The NSA is hardly the only organization/party who could exploit a service like
this. Every local police force could get a warrant to search your personal
computer data without you ever knowing.

I recently attended a talk on wiretaps by a lawyer recently, and when there is
an investigation going on, police used to tap 1-2 cellphones a few years ago.
Now 50+ people at a time are brought up on a warrant. Including a lot of
people who aren't related to the crime (for ex. the targets mother).

So who is the "1%" of that 99%? Who should care about their privacy? How do
consumers know they aren't in that 1%? The answer is they can't and they don't
know.

But ultimately, they just don't care. Until it:

A) affects them personally (or to someone they know),

B) someone explains why it matters (if they have a technical knowledge gap)

C) widely publicized examples of abuses become part of mainstream news

Those three combined could eventually become widespread enough to destroy
services like this. But right now, yes, the risk is still minimal in terms of
public perception.

~~~
cantankerous
"Every local police force could get a warrant to search your personal computer
data without you ever knowing."

They can also get a warrant and come to your house and go through all of your
stuff (including your personal computer) there. Of course you'd know, but not
until it happened. There's no real "protection" from a legal search warrant.

~~~
dmix
Search warrant != wiretap warrant.

The privacy implications and constitutional externalities are much larger (and
easily abused) when it involves the interception of voice calls, emails, sms,
locations, etc and now potentially all computer activity that happens in
memory.

Wiretaps involve analyzing past data _and_ actively monitoring new
communications. Including every person you call or every website you visit.
Police often have to delete 99%+ of intercepted data because it's irrelevant
to the case.

That's different in many ways from a single physical search warrant on a house
or computer.

And now they are becoming the go-to investigative tool for every criminal
case...

~~~
tedunangst
I'd wager police also have to ignore 99%+ of the junk in your house when they
execute a regular search warrant. They're going to look through your underwear
drawer, but they're not actually going to confiscate all your underwear.

~~~
dmix
99% of the things sitting in any persons house at any moment is _not_ as
private as their ongoing phone calls, emails, websites they visit, etc. Nor
does it simultaneously invade _other_ peoples privacy in the process (any
person they communicate with)... over a multi-month period.

Using your analogy, the 99% of things the police are supposed to ignore, such
as their clothing drawers, does not carry equal weight in terms of privacy.

I'm not unique in having this position, lawyers/judges/courts view it as a
much broader breach of privacy as well and they (often) require much stronger
legal restrictions for the police than a standard search warrant.

------
workhere-io
Cool! NSA's industrial espionage is so much easier for them to perform when
you store your company data directly on American servers.

[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/09/nsa-spying-
braz...](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/09/nsa-spying-brazil-oil-
petrobras) [http://www.dw.de/germany-fears-nsa-stole-industrial-
secrets/...](http://www.dw.de/germany-fears-nsa-stole-industrial-
secrets/a-16925289) [http://www.globalresearch.ca/nsa-busted-conducting-
industria...](http://www.globalresearch.ca/nsa-busted-conducting-industrial-
espionage-in-france-mexico-brazil-china-and-all-around-the-world/5355026)

~~~
ams6110
Likely easier for them to penetrate a typical corporate network than Amazon's

~~~
JTon
Unless Amazon is secretly in bed with them as well

~~~
fidotron
Amazon are building the CIA a cloud, so they'll at least be talking.

------
jeffbarr
There's more information in my post at
[http://aws.typepad.com/aws/2013/11/amazon-workspaces-
desktop...](http://aws.typepad.com/aws/2013/11/amazon-workspaces-desktop-
computing-in-the-cloud.html) [Fixed]

~~~
jhartmann
Jeff, Are there any plans to offer something like ubuntu images in the future
for VDI? Many developers really don't use windows much anymore, and you could
probably offer a more competitive price point when there is no need for
licensed software. Obviously we can set up our own stuff using raw EC2
instances, but having a simple solution like this is definitely appealing.

~~~
jeffbarr
We'll certainly keep an open mind and think about offering other OS's in the
future. Like every AWS offering, we launch an MVP and then iterate rapidly.

------
phelmig
The NSA is gonna love this.

I think their timing is quite bad. I doubt many non-us companies will start to
move a big part of their infrastructure to the cloud of a US company right
now.

On the other hand for smaller businesses that don't have to fear espionage
this could be a really cheap way to lower costs.

------
l0c0b0x
Holy mother of god!

I've been managing full 2,000 virtual desktops and about 100 servers... I've
been looking for a way out! (out of licen$ing/$oul agreement with MS and
VMWare).

Of course latency would be an issue, I wonder what solutions they have for
low/limited-capacity clients.

~~~
l0c0b0x
Yikes! Just looked at the pricing:

[http://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/pricing/](http://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/pricing/)

Talk about high TCO! (yes, you still need the hardware to run this service).
With office going online now, I'm wondering what their strategy is. This is
really not what I was expecting.

~~~
luma
Excluding your endpoints, do you have a current cost accounting of the entire
infrastructure capex, opex, software licensing, and any professional services
behind your existing 2000 seats? I work extensively in this field and the
numbers they are throwing out are extremely competitive with existing on-
premises View or XenDesktop implementations I've been involved with.

~~~
l0c0b0x
We're running on 4-5yr old hardware... and our maintenance contracts, even
though high wouldn't amount the yearly costs to use this service. This is at
least a decent option if you're planning on new infrastructure.

~~~
willthames
What about the costs of running the hardware - power, cooling, network
switches, storage arrays, datacentre rental (or opportunity costs of using a
server room versus more desk space for example)?

Not saying it still wouldn't work out cheaper for you, but worth bearing in
mind.

------
felixrieseberg
As a microsoft employee: Windows 7? Windows Server 2008? INTERNET EXPLORER
_9_?

What is this? A virtual desktop service for time travellers?

~~~
tghw
Come on, you know better than this. Microsoft has given everyone good reason
to be skeptical of every other Windows version. XP? Solid. Vista? Nope. 7?
Solid. 8? Off to a rocky start...

~~~
scholia
He's referring to the out-of-date and inferior version of Internet Explorer
(hence his use of caps).

They could have installed IE10 or IE11 -- which are good. I can't think of a
good reason for installing IE9, though maybe someone will come up with one...

~~~
wvenable
Some of our internal corporate apps require IE9 as IE10 presents compatibility
issues. I'm not at all surprised that it IE9 is part of the baseline.

~~~
daigoba66
I'm genuinely curious how this app that works with IE9 can't work in IE10.
From my experience, Microsoft has put a lot of effort into making IE backwards
compatible. You might have to force IE into a specific mode, but I can't
imagine an app for IE9 not working at all in IE10.

~~~
wvenable
We've been in the tough situation where some business/banking websites only
worked in IE9 while others that we were having trouble with only started
working properly in IE10. Ultimately we rolled back to IE9 because the former
out numbered the latter and because IE9 is still the standard version of our
corporate image.

IE10 snuck onto a few servers and unrestricted desktops because it was
installed silently through Windows Update along with the normal patches. That
did give us the unexpected opportunity to test it out with real users.

------
peteretep
> Amazon WorkSpaces clients are available for both Windows and Mac computers
> as well as for the iPad, Kindle Fire, and Android tablets.

How am I saving on licensing cost then? If I can install the client on a Linux
machine, it makes sense. If I need an Apple or a Windows machine I'm ...
double licensing?

~~~
pkulak
This could be an awesome option for Chromebooks too. Shame they're only
targeting large IT departments.

~~~
vnchr
Would be nice if Amazon had their own Chromebook equivalent stripped down for
this use case. Maybe soon.

Kindle XL HD Flamethrower Lappytop.

------
toddmorey
I can see this really helping with the BYOD revolution that's happening in
enterprise. There's been an increasingly awkward mix of personal use and data
with computers meant for corporate work. Virtual Desktops done well can really
help here.

I can see more companies providing funds to employees to buy the device they
prefer instead of provisioning a machine for each employee (ours does that
already). Then the computer can be used locally for personal needs and through
the virtual desktop for work.

Though as I've been traveling more lately, I can see how the need for a
persistent, high-quality internet connection can be an issue in the field.

~~~
watty
I could buy a new laptop every year compared to the $75/month fee.

~~~
rrrhys
And licenses?

------
Tomdarkness
How powerful is the 1 vCPU? If it is anything like 1 EC2 compute unit then I
don't see this being useful for anything more than basic office work (i.e MS
Office).

Plus if I already need a computer running OS X or Windows then why would I
want to pay again for renting a Windows license (As in, the monthly cost will
include the cost of the Windows license)? How would the specs of the Amazon
WorkSpace compare to the existing Windows or Mac Desktop PC? It might be more
useful if I could use a thin client running some barebones Linux distro to
access the remote workspace.

~~~
superuser2
This is not for _you_ , it's for an IT department with a nontrivial number of
desktops. You pay again because centralizing users on a single machine that
you can update/troubleshoot/fix/install software on _once_ is often more cost-
efficient than trying to manage 1000 autonomous Windows desktops.

~~~
Tomdarkness
I know it is not designed for people like me, else I'd be asking where the
Linux options are ;)

I don't work with a company that has a large IT deployment anymore but when I
did their processes was not that different. They had a single image that was
on every single PC and contained "standard" software. If there was any kind of
problem with the machine, they'd just reimage it remotely (PXE) and if it
still had problems they'd just send the machine back to Dell and get a
replacement.

Although management/maintenance was not really my point. Rather, if you
already have functional working machines with Windows / OS X (or have to
purchase them) then Amazon WorkSpaces seems expensive. If it was accessible
via some cheap thin client that did not require a separate client OS license
(+ the hardware that comes with machines ables to run Windows / OS X) then it
would seem more appropriate.

~~~
superuser2
This is common, but Virtual Desktop Infrastructure is increasingly common
currently. The only novel thing about Amazon's program is that the server is
in EC2 instead of the corporate server closet.

As I understand it, some of the motivators are:

1) The image is immutable (by normal users). Each startup is clean, so the
potential to screw up your install is very low. Only user folders (redirected
to network storage via GPO) persist.

2) You can indeed use thin clients, i.e.
[http://www.neweggbusiness.com/Product/Product.aspx?gclid=CIT...](http://www.neweggbusiness.com/Product/Product.aspx?gclid=CITWr57V4roCFQVgMgodfl4AMQ&Item=9B-59-222-087&nm_mc=KNC-
GoogleBiz&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleBiz-_-pla-_-
Thin+Client+Systems-_-9B-59-222-087&ef_id=UoPpowAABNx6jQGo:20131113210539:s)
with VDI. You can also use old/underpowered/very cheap PCs.

3) Unlike an RDP setup, each user has their own OS instance so you don't have
concurrency issues.

4) Windows Server and User/Device CALs are indeed very expensive. However,
license costs for the clients are not even slightly relevant because
mainstream desktop/laptop hardware comes with mandatory OEM licensing anyway
and large businesses are not typically building their own PCs.

------
JunkDNA
I'm wondering what customers they are targeting this to? A lot of big
companies who would care about data on laptops probably have an equally
kneejerk reaction to data in the cloud. You could argue it's for small
companies. But they have to be a certain size before something like this
starts to make sense. I don't do desktop support IT kinds of things, so
perhaps I'm being a bit too sweeping in my generalization?

~~~
deleted_account
Outsourcing. Rows upon rows of software developers are sitting in Shenzhen
right now working on virtual desktops based in the US.

~~~
olalonde
Where do you make the connection between "virtual desktops" and outsourcing?
Also, who are those Shenzhen developers and who are they working for?

------
lukeqsee
If latency becomes a non-issue (ever tried using remote desktop or even SSH
over a high-latency connection?), I think this stands a very good chance of
succeeding and making IT's job much easier.

~~~
ghshephard
Completely off topic, but regarding SSH over a high latency connection - it's
actually remarkably good as long you don't have loss on your link.

I'm currently working with a client in Singapore that requires that I connect
to their data center through a B2B L2L IPSec tunnel that is sourced in
California. So, From Singapore, I connect to the VPN concentrator in
California, and then from there, connect to the clients site in Singapore.

So, every keystroke that goes to a server approximately 100 meters from me,
Starts off in Singapore, crosses the ocean to California, comes back to
Singapore, returns back to California, Comes back to Singapore again.

I do this for about 8-10 hours a day - completely workable.

Oh, and the Connection to the internet that my VPN connection rides on is a 3G
modem, no less.

~~~
mjallday
I've done this before too (even down to it being a SG -> CA link!).

I think the best practise is to automate. Waiting on individual key presses to
be echoed back when there is latency is incredibly frustrating, a slight delay
while a shell script runs is completely unnoticeable.

~~~
mikeash
I think a lot depends on how good of a typist you are. If you can confidently
type fast, it's no problem. If you're prone to typos, latency can be
unbelievably aggravating.

------
sker
If you could spin up an instance for an hour, this would be useful to those
who want to buy from US stores that block by IP ( _cough Nexus 5 cough_ ), but
don't want to go the VPN route.

~~~
thematt
You can already do that with normal EC2 and for a lot cheaper too because you
could use a spot instance.

------
fintler
I remember building something similar for a class project as part of my
undergrad degree. It was basically a website where you could sign up for a
virtual desktop and use the nx protocol
([https://www.nomachine.com/](https://www.nomachine.com/)) web browser plugin
(it felt like there was no latency) to view the remote desktop. We supported
Ubuntu Gutsy and Windows XP SP2. It worked great on those little Eee things
that were popular at the time -- access to a desktop environment with a quad
core on an Eee.

This was around 2007-2008 or so, so it's tough to find anything that still
remains from the project -- we sucked at marketing and didn't really get a
userbase, so it died off.

Here's a few docs from it that still remain online:
[http://www.cis.temple.edu/~wolfgang/c4339s08/WebDesc/](http://www.cis.temple.edu/~wolfgang/c4339s08/WebDesc/)

------
iaskwhy
Seems like a competitor to Citrix, isn't it?

~~~
stefek99
Ex-Citrix employee here... Sounds exactly like Citrix unless it is a
partnership: [http://aws.amazon.com/solutions/global-solution-
providers/ci...](http://aws.amazon.com/solutions/global-solution-
providers/citrix/)

"As an extension of its ongoing collaboration with Amazon, Citrix is now
delivering its innovative networking and desktop virtualization solutions from
AWS."

------
ojiikun
Interesting. I already use an EC2 instance for exactly this (running Debian)
and it has been a great way to work. My laptop only needs to be powerful
enough to run an ssh client and X server and then the instance does all the
heavy lifting of running applications (in this case, mostly compiling code).
It is beyond cool being able to scale the hardware up/down depending on how
nasty my current project's build is. Even better is that I can ssh in and do
basic work from _any_ computer than has an ssh client. Emergency one-line
patch from my smartphone? Fuck yeah! Pricing of the new desktop instances
looks a little high compared to reserved instances of similar power, but I
imagine that is the MSFT tax at work.

~~~
jrmcauliffe
Looks pretty good compared to the 'On Demand' instances though, even including
the MS and (I assume) Teradici licensing. Somewhere in between On Demand on
Reserved. If you can script yo sh!t together, spot instances is where it's
at..

------
JoeAltmaier
Seems like a small range of performance. 1 vCPU? Does that mean one
hyperthread? What is that, a Pentium 4 or something? Where are the i7
instances?

I don't see a developer finding this useful at all.

~~~
jrmcauliffe
Facebook is the most resource hungry app in a lot of workplaces...

~~~
JoeAltmaier
They talk 'developer'. That's not screwing around of facebook.

------
ChuckMcM
This is an interesting counter to ChromeOS/Chromebooks. Basically Amazon has a
'what your are familiar with, except in the cloud' as opposed to 'this new
thing but it's cloud based.' The demerits for both are that you lose the cloud
and you're down, someone gains access and you are compromised. So many baked
in assumptions in IT about how the local workstation is local.

I wonder what it does to business internet prices too.

~~~
amalag
Well they can also make money by selling the thin client which the ChromeOS is
good for.

~~~
DonGateley
Huh? Does a ChromeOS client exist for Workspaces or is it just "good for" it
whatever that means?

~~~
amalag
I assumed it was RDP, but it is PCoIP. ChromeOS does not have that client
software right now.

------
wcchandler
Wow. These two announcements from Amazon today have been really interesting. I
work at a community college and we're constantly investigating VDI and vApp
solutions. With the heavy push towards a more cloud-ready infrastructure,
it'll be interesting to see how our upper management approaches this platform.

A lot of our initial hardware costs have to deal with planning for spikes in
usage. At any given time we may only see 10% use -- but come the end of the
semester -- that could very well jump to 10x our average load. And we have to
have the hardware allocated for that. It's a balancing act between how much we
can expect and how much we can feasibly budget.

I can see this being a huge win for education. We have a department that
oversees all IT related tasks. They also chip in occasionally to help
establish foundations for best practices and unite all the community colleges
on single platforms (email, learning management software, internet services,
etc.). This might be right up their alley.

------
frewsxcv
No desktop Linux options? :(

------
mikey_p
This looks awesome. I don't think latency will be much of an issue either.
Years ago I worked on a training system that allowed users to launch the
NXClient directly from a training website and run labs on EC2 instances and
even from the west coast I could write code on a US East instance very
comfortably, without any noticeable lag.

------
airencracken
Thin clients. Everything old is new again.

------
fra
Sunray, is that you?

~~~
fragmede
'cept Sunray is no more:

"In July 2013, reports circulated that Oracle was ending the development of
Sun Ray, and related products.[4] Scott McNealy (long-time CEO of Sun) tweeted
about this.[5] An official announcement was made August 1, 2013, with a last
order in February 2014.[2]"

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Ray#cite_ref-
eol_2-1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Ray#cite_ref-eol_2-1)

------
Keyframe
Thin Client v2. Just recently there was this:
[http://www.cgchannel.com/2013/11/new-autodesk-initiative-
put...](http://www.cgchannel.com/2013/11/new-autodesk-initiative-puts-max-and-
maya-in-your-browser/)

~~~
dharma1
i've been looking for something like this for a while. Have you tried it?
Octane renderer can produce some great results but wondering about the cloud
GPU rendering cost

~~~
Keyframe
I haven't tried it. I'm mostly interested in how does it (and other GPU
renderers) deal with larger scenes due to constrained GPU memory.

------
atmosx
Thing with Amazon is that when it enters a market segment, it drives the price
at a point where no competition can stand in the long run.

That said, that's a service I don't understand who would wanna use. There's no
place like 127.0.0.1 (or ::1)

------
xdd
Let's merge information,BI and decision strategy in Prism network, forever
backup.

------
mberning
They really seem to be pushing the corporate compliance / data security aspect
of this, but it feels like a roundabout way of solving that problem, and in
some cases, may even make it worse. Which is more dangerous? Having corporate
data on a thoroughly locked down laptop, or having corporate data on a
miserable cloud desktop which makes the user desperate to move the data local
(dropbox, email, etc.)

This is a very cool service, I just don't think the data security and
compliance argument is a very good one. Unless they have some way of making
sure that data can not possibly leave the virtual environment.

------
thrush
Please forgive what may sound like an ignorant comment:

What if we ignored the NSA and security issues to think about the potential
for new technology like this. If you never had to locally own your data, what
could be possible?

How light could laptops become? We would no longer need as big of a hard drive
and processor, and could probably reduce weight in lots of other ways.

And how many number of machines could you reduce to? Not only could two people
share the same machine really easily, but you could access your personal
workspace, work workspace, and any additional workspace with basically the
same machine.

------
ignostic
This would be a great option for the many individuals who use their computers
for nothing but productivity and browsing. You wouldn't need to buy Office and
a new computer up front, and theoretically you can stay up-to-date without
buying an entirely new laptop.

You'd just need to buy a lightweight device (similar to a Chromebook) with a
screen. Of course they don't even support Chrome right now (IE and FF only),
but the idea would be solid for almost anyone who doesn't game or need low-
latency computing.

~~~
lambada
Actually, the client for accessing these desktops is a standalone app, that
requires Windows, OSX, Android (incl. Kindle Fire) or iPad.

~~~
RockyMcNuts
hmmh... can't access from a client running Linux, ChromeOS, Android-X86?

largely defeats the purpose if you still need a PC, license.

------
kayoone
Recently with all the advancements in this space (PCoIP) i started wondering
if this is the future of personal computing ? Going back to mainframes and
just connecting a thin client to your desktop from wherever you are and
whatever device to find your desktop as you left it. And if wed have this,
would Web Applications still make sense ? This would kind of collide with the
concept and long term vision of something like ChromeOS for example. Id love
to see/have a discussion on this somehow.

------
ljosa
If these can be rented by the hour, it could be a good way to get Windows
machines for testing websites with various versions of Internet Explorer and
testing emails with various versions of Outlook.

I know that EC2 and Rackspace has Windows machines, but only with Windows
Server. When I have tried that, there is always something funny, such as IE
security settings that are different from those of desktop Windows installs.

For now, I have settled on having local Windows installs (free licenses
through BizSpark) in VirtualBox.

~~~
afandian
[http://www.modern.ie/en-us/virtualization-tools](http://www.modern.ie/en-
us/virtualization-tools)

~~~
ljosa
Wow, that is fantastic—both BrowserStack.com and the prepackaged virtual
machines.

------
robgough
For companies that trust giant corporations more than their employees.

Fortunately for amazon, I think there's probably plenty of those companies out
there.

------
tmsh
They should combine their delivery services and provide what I thought they
were providing (this is still pretty cool but just saying):

Provisioning and renting out multiple devices, controlled via the AWS console
(with some sort of address delivery form and ability to rent out devices,
installed with a particular image).

I.e., allowing auto-provisioning to extend truly to the consumer space.

------
kevrone
"All WorkSpaces Bundles provide the Windows 7 Experience to users (provided by
Windows Server 2008 R2)"

------
psaintla
I always hate reading about services like this because I work in the medical
industry and something like this would be unbelievably beneficial but will
never be implemented because no sane company would ever sign a business
associates agreement with the fines that they would get if there was a breach.

------
jebblue
This looks interesting, definitely going to look into it. $35 // month doesn't
sound too bad, just not sure why I wouldn't just fire up a VM on my local
machine which has 16 Gigs RAM. $15 would be more palatable for a 3.5 Gig VM.

------
gdulli
Is this the continuation of the beginning of the end of low-latency client
computing? It's bad enough already that my company is on Google Apps and I'm
forced to use Gmail and Docs instead of Outlook/Exchange and Word/Excel.

------
Harelin
Question: If someone runs a process on their Amazon WorkSpace and then
disconnects from it, does that process continue running? Does the WorkSpace
stay online (like a VPS) or is disconnecting equivalent to shutting your
computer down?

~~~
alleinstern
When you come back, you will see exactly the same screen as when you
disconnect it. Your process will continue running.

------
aheilbut
I use NX / Nomachine quite a bit, and while it generally works, the latency is
still annoying.

It'd be nice if there was a better way to transparently synchronize an entire
VM and run things locally, since CPU and storage are so cheap.

------
thatthatis
If they had a version of this where I could rent photoshop by the hour I'd be
elated. (I know these are billed monthly, I saw that, I'm wishing for two
changes simultaneously)

------
spitfire
So what's the over under on them creating a Ubuntu workspaces sooner or later?

That coupled with EC2 based infrastructure could make for a very compelling
platform.

------
sdnguyen90
Any info on the bandwidth? Looks like it might be a good alternative for
businesses in areas without a great selection of telco providers

------
alinspired
Very interesting if amazon will drive Cloud Desktop, DaaS and virtual desktop
to wider adoption or prove it's not quite needed today

------
runewell
This is nice, finally a company large enough to push out a heavy adoption of
thin clients.

------
noir_lord
Feel like your company isn't giving enough data to the NSA/GCHQ?

Introducing Amazon WorkSpaces.

~~~
octo_t
Am I the only one who is getting annoyed at these zero effort sky is falling
NSA comments?

Every single damn submission on the front page has some meaningless hand
wringing over the exact same issue and it is 100% unproductive.

~~~
nisa
It may be unproductive but it highlights a paradigm change.

If you host your Desktop in the cloud at Amazon your data is completely at the
mercy of Amazon. This can be an issue for health-related data or customer
data.

It is a fact now that there are secret courts in the US that disallow Amazon
from telling you that someone else accessed your data. I'm not sure about law
enforcement but they can probably gain access to that data you stored there
too.

As a business from a foreign country you lost control over your data. Some
businesses can afford that - a lot can't.

~~~
res0nat0r
There have always been worries about hosting your data with a 3rd party NSA
hyperbole or not. This is why you follow HIPPA standards if they are
applicable, or ensure AWS is compliant with a standard you need to adhere to:
[http://aws.amazon.com/compliance/](http://aws.amazon.com/compliance/)

Your company will always have to value the risk/reward tradeoff of hosting
with a 3rd party and it has nothing to do with secret courts or any other
silly end of the world predictions, and has to do with the fact that your data
is outside of your direct control.

~~~
nisa
> NSA hyperbole

Where is the hyperbole? [http://www.theguardian.com/world/the-nsa-
files](http://www.theguardian.com/world/the-nsa-files)

> secret courts or any other silly end of the world predictions

As far as I know this is unfortunately not a prediction:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intellige...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Court)

You may have no problems with these things. I'm not a US citizen and these
things do matter in my decision to host my data in the US. These problems are
not new. The US never had a strong privacy law.

Taken all this into account it's hard sell for any business outside of the US
to use US based cloud services. That's all I wanted to illustrate.

~~~
res0nat0r
Yes there are FISA warrants. If you are this paranoid that your data is this
sensitive you shouldn't even be thinking about keeping your data anywhere else
besides your locked down datacenter that you alone have access to.

What I am stating above is, NSA revelations or not hosting your data with a
3rd party is an obviously inherent risk.

------
lectrick
Amazon _Windows_ Workspaces

------
qhien1000
It looks like the combination of TeamViewer and Virtual Machine.

------
anoncowherd
I've learned to ignore all new tech offerings from Amazon - they're all US-
only anyway. It's like the rest of the world doesn't exist to them.

------
sseveran
The really big news. Excel. On. The. iPad.

------
aet
Can someone give some use cases?

------
zengr
Looks like an exciting product with endless possibilities! This literally
makes chromeOS redundant.

~~~
amaks
Actually, it's the opposite - users can buy cheap chromebooks and access
virtual desktops running in AWS from them instead of buying more expensive
Windows laptops.

------
outside1234
how do I use it on my plane ride to Seattle?

or honestly, even in just the hotel?

------
dmead
nice try, nsa

------
blahbl4hblahtoo
I know that some of you guys have some issues with hosting data in US
datacenters...but I have to tell you...I'm so fed up with IT. I'm actually
sitting on hold with a major "all hands" issue with our IT department...

I've done this for years...maybe 20 years at this point. I can tell you
this..."We" (meaning everyone in IT) don't do desktop management well AT ALL.
I can't remember the last time I used a corporate baseline. They take 10
minutes to SHUTDOWN. (That's private industry...government is worse.) I don't
know why users put up with it and it makes me realize why everyone hates
Windows. (The average baseline literally forces it to stink like a rotting
fish.) Couple that with networking guys that are useless at telling you
anything other than "its up"...ITS ALWAYS THE FIREWALL.

Almost everyone that I work with just doesn't get how precarious their
position actually is...if people don't want to use the sh!t that you work on
you just might find yourself screwed at some point.

I work in IT and I would use something like this in a HEARTBEAT if it meant
getting better boot times and less "what port is open" bs.

It seems to me that most people in IT actually think that the servers are more
important than the people using them.

Thanks for putting up with this little rant...

~~~
parennoob
What the f--k is a "corporate baseline"? If it's some sort of pre-done
corporatized software stack using some nonsense like IBM Tivoli ("provides
Integrated Service Management software to help manage business value of your
IT infrastructure" \-- sounds like something generated by
[http://cbsg.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/live](http://cbsg.sourceforge.net/cgi-
bin/live)), that's where most of your problems lie. These are a pain in the
ass for everyone -- people who have to use them and people who have to support
them.

Trust your users. If you can't, educate them. If you _still_ can't, get rid of
them and hire smart people you can trust. Now you don't need fancy "desktop
management".

~~~
pavel_lishin
> If you still can't, get rid of them and hire smart people you can trust.

It's hard to believe, but IT is typically not in charge of hiring and firing
the rest of the company.

------
jdmitch
at 12 seconds in the video:

 _" How come these virtual desktops are about as common as bacon in a vegan
sunday brunch"_

ha ha!

~~~
ocfx
I love bacon!

