Poll: Supporting Windows Software

[denmoff]

I'm curious to know how others deal with users that wish to use a Mac and run Mac OS, but want to be able to run certain Windows only software. I see four main options:
A. Load bootcamp and run Windows as a second OS
B. Run a VM that runs Windows
C. Run a windows emulator like Codeweavers
D. Don't allow any of this. Have a policy that prohibits running Windows on a Mac.

I'm probably most curious to know how many people go with option D. I, personally, like going above and beyond to meet the needs of my users, but option A and B introduce the issue of running a second OS that needs to be kept up to date with patches and have antivirus running. Not to mention data backup. For those reasons, my organization already has a policy against doing A and B unless the user is a developer.

I have limited experience with Codeweavers, but the little i do have does not leave me with a lot of confidence that it will even work at all.

So, if you support a medium(50-150) to large number of Macs, which option/s do you use for your users?

[CasperSally]

We use VMWare Fusion for the few that need it, mostly administrators. We manage it like any other PC with our PC Management Suite (Symantec 7.5), so it gets patches and antivirus like anything else.

No real issues, but it does take additional setup time versus a straight OSX build. Data backup is the responsibility of the user for us.

[emily]

What ends up happening in our environment is MacBooks are issued to our Developers who often need Visual Studio for code and compiling. About 80% of the time we build them out a VM in VMware Fusion that is administered by SCCM with McAfee. The other 20% of the time we'll build them out a stable desktop with Windows that they can remote into with RDP that runs their Windows-specific junk.

[Chris]

We're running VDI (VMWare Horizon) and Windows Terminal Services

[ernstcs]

During consulting with a customer when purchasing a new computer we try to determine what their needs are. The comment I made the other day was that you should purchase hardware that supports your primary business case needs and not just your personal preference. This is becoming increasingly more important when our budgets are getting slashed.

If you tell me that you want a Mac and need to do XYZ that's Windows only, you're likely going to get denied a Mac, if we have any say in the matter. Sure I too want to go above and beyond, but they cost more. Realistically here there are very few use cases that absolutely require a Mac and way more things that require Windows. In the end though we are not the ultimate decision maker.

So the answer is D whenever possible, but in the not so common exceptions we use B in VMWare Fusion. Sometimes we don't need to do that though since we have a virtual Windows lab environment as well.

[davidacland]

Hi, my take on each of these is:

A. Load bootcamp and run Windows as a second OS - Doesn't work well in reality. It's too much effort for users to reboot each time.

B. Run a VM that runs Windows - This works ok but is a bit of a support burden supporting PCs in addition to Macs, particularly if thats not the normal skill set of the IT guys

C. Run a windows emulator like Codeweavers - Tried this several times over there years. Total disaster.

D. Don't allow any of this. Have a policy that prohibits running Windows on a Mac. - Have done this in a few cases when someone says "I must have a Mac", then a month later says "I don't like Outlook on a Mac". In these cases you can offer them their old PC back. If its for another genuine reason then a solution must be found.

The other route, and generally our preference, is the same as @Chris. Essentially remote desktop for the Mac users to get access to the PC apps. I've seen one client heavily using Microsoft Azure and Azure apps with the new version of Remote Desktop for Mac and it was very slick. Personally I think this is the way more apps are heading, either run in a web browser or via a terminal services session. Its the return of the mainframes!

[Kedgar]

VMWare View all the way... it doesn't make sense for most users to have both a Windows PC and a Mac... physical or locally virutalized. VMWare Fusion/Parallels/VirtualBox VM's are difficult to keep up to date and managed. Similar with BootCamp, however it also introduces a new pain to the end-user by having to reboot to switch. Wine/CodeWeavers is a non-option, just totally unsupported and it will have issues inherently.

If you don't have a View/VDE environment available, I'd suggest a two machine rule, or just force them to use a PC.

As a Unix Admin, I have both... A 27" iMac, and a Surface Pro 3.

[frozenarse]

Similar to the above post, if a user's job needs them to use an application that is only available in Windows that is the machine they will get on their desk. Works in the opposite direction too...

We do have a Citrix environment that works fine for 'occasional' use windows apps, but best performance/experience is to use the OS that natively runs your required apps.

[htse]

As a poor man's solution, I've got Windows clients in Virtual Machines on a Virtual Machine Server elsewhere, and use Microsoft Remote Desktop to connect to them via RDP. As they're running on the virtual machine server all the time, Windows, it still has high availability to update and maintain.

[denmoff]

Wow! Really great insight from everyone! Thank you. I'm glad i asked.

I really like the RDP option. I think this would work best for this current situation. The user wants to run a scientific program called OpenLab.

[Kaltsas]

We have a combination of commonly used apps in Citrix with some users having VMs for one off software that isn't worth the effort of placing in citrix for one person. This also allows secure access to resources and applications from home Macs/PCs. Really that is the primary reason it is in place, application access for Mac users is sort of auxiliary.

[Chris_Hafner]

Just to jump on the pile here with my favorite answer "It depends!" Most of our users don't have any need for Windows. However, on the occasion they do Parallels or now, VMWare Fusion is a good bet. Bootcamp has performance benefits but not usually enough to get folks to reboot time and time again. We did play with using Parallels to operate the Bootcamp partition when a user didn't want to restart but that was a little messy as well. As for Codeweavers Crossover and WINE... I've got one and only one installation where it's worked perfectly. Otherwise, it's a struggle.

Regardless, it all depends on your environment and your users. Besides, it sounds like RDC is going to help sort you out on this one.