Thin Client connection brokering (VDI)

[Bob Doolittle]

Let's think about building a SPICE-based thin client for a moment. What 
minimum set of basic capabilities would it require (i.e. how thin could 
it be) in order to get an experience similar to the User Portal:
- authenticate
- allocate a new VM from a Pool
- select from existing VMs

and then of course connect to the VM in question.

It would clearly need more than just the SPICE protocol, since that's 
all about talking to the VM once it is running. What else?

Most VDI models (e.g. VMware, Citrix, Sun Ray, etc) call this Connection 
Brokering or Session Brokering. They might have a simple GUI in the 
client to authenticate the user using some protocol to communicate to an 
authentication manager of some sort, and then they communicate via a 
protocol to the Broker to discover and finally connect to VMs. What's 
the model for a SPICE client?

Thanks,
    Bob

On 10/15/2013 05:02 PM, Itamar Heim wrote:
> On 10/13/2013 02:49 PM, Bob wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I'm exploring thin client connections to oVirt in a VDI context, and
>> after having read the overviews I've found I still have some questions,
>> and hope you can point me to the right place for more information.
>>
>> It appears that oVirt supports a VDI model where thin client sessions
>> can be load balanced to a set of VMs, or directed to VMs with existing
>> sessions for the user. Is this correct?
>
> they can get a VM from a pool or a specific VM.
>
>>
>> At what level of the architecture does the connection brokering take
>> place (i.e. where is it determined which VM a thin client should be
>> connected to, and what pieces of the system are involved)? Can it work
>> for both VNC and SPICE based clients?
>
> vnc, spice or rdp.
> rdp is to the guest.
> vnc and spice to the host, or for spice via a proxy, or for 
> novnc/spice.html5 via a websocket proxy.
>
>>
>> If a developer were interested in adding support for connection
>> brokering of new thin client protocols, where would they start looking?
>
> can you elaborate on which protocol? is it to the host (qemu), or to 
> the guest?
>
>>
>> Pointers to relevant documentation or mailing lists would be much
>> appreciated. Is this more of an engine or a node question (or does it
>> span both)?
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> -Bob Doolittle
>>
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>