Citrix DesktopPlayer for Mac

White Paper

Maximizing
Flexibility and
Productivity for
Mobile MacBook
Users
Windows virtual desktops to go
for corporate and BYO Macs

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Executive Overview
The popularity of Apple products among consumers,
along with their increased usage on corporate
networks, is helping drive the need to support BringYour-Own (BYO) devices within work environments.
In addition to allowing employees to choose
their own personal devices to access businesscritical applications and files, BYO with the right
management capabilities can also offer many
benefits to enterprises, including improved employee
morale and end user productivity as well as reduced
IT costs.
With many executives, field employees and
contractors preferring MacBooks and the
convenience to use just one device for both
corporate and personal apps, enterprises can keep
these end-user segments happy and productive by
providing them with a BYO Mac environment. As
such, MacBooks present a particularly beneficial
BYO opportunity for enterprises.
But they also create a big challenge for IT. Moreover,
given that some corporate apps only run within a
Windows environment, IT must also find a way to
efficiently deliver Windows onto the MacBooks while
also ensuring corporate assets remain protected.
This white paper examines the benefits and
challenges of creating a BYO environment for
MacBook users and how many enterprises address
the need by deploying local Windows virtual

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desktops to manage and support their employees

with Macs. The paper also explores the key
considerations for deploying corporate Windows
virtual desktops to BYO Macs and how Citrix
helps address the challenges while maintaining the
benefits.
The Growth of BYO and MacBook Popularity
The use of Apple laptops, desktops and smartphones on corporate networks
continues to grow. The trend is especially evident within companies adopting BYO
environments, where employees can use their own personal devices for accessing
and interacting with corporate applications and data.
For many enterprises, the adoption of BYO is driven by executives, senior
managers and IT pros. They dont want to carry clunky business computers, and
they worry about the security of their personal apps saved on corporate-owned
devices. They also dont want to give up their own slick personal MacBooks, which
lets them access business and personal apps, in exchange for a corporate-issued
laptop. Given that business and personal activities now overlap during and after
business hours, executives and senior managers want to engage in both activities
from a single laptopand increasingly, their laptop of choice is a MacBook.
Many executives prefer MacBook Airs and MacBook Pros not only for the
advanced hardware but also for the Mac operating system and the personal
desktop environment they have spent setting up on that machine. The trend has
prompted many enterprises to allow at least some of their employees to bring in
their own MacBooks.
Such a BYO environment not only addresses the preferences of executives, senior
managers, IT pros and others such as sales and field service personnel, but it also
generates the following benefits for the enterprise:
Lower Hardware Cost: By giving employees the option of using their personal
MacBooks for business purposes, enterprises reduce device capital expenditures
(CapEx) since fewer devices need to be purchased. Macs have also consistently
rated highly for overall product quality. However, BYO programs can have a
negative impact on operating costs. When employees are confused about how
to use a corporate application, it may be more difficult for IT to determine whats
happening because each user has set up his Mac desktop environment differently.
Some companies implement VDI solutions to help with this problem because
they allow IT to deliver a centrally-hosted, corporate virtual desktop to BYO users.
VDI solutions also work great when the user is connected to the network. Many
organizations are looking for solutions that can bring down their operating costs
with centrally-managed virtual desktops that can operate regardless of whether
the user is on the corporate network, an inconsistent network on the road, or no
network at all.

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Improved Employee Morale: Giving employees the freedom to bring their

own MacBooks gives them more control over their computing environment and
acknowledges that business life and personal life both may need attention on
a 24x7 basis. In addition to keeping current employees happy, a BYO program
serves as an effective recruitment and retention tool for companies working to
attract the best and brightest professionals and younger recruits entering the
workforce.
Improved Productivity: Employees can now use their corporate applications
whenever and wherever they areregardless of whether they are in the office
or on the road. Using familiar hardware also enhances employee productivity.
Moreover, with a centrally-managed corporate virtual desktop, employees that
need help with particular corporate applications can quickly get help because
the support team does not have to try to decipher how their MacBook is setup
instead they are providing support for the standardized Windows virtual desktop
and the approved business apps provisioned.
A BYO program enables organizations to give users a computing experience they
enjoywithout interfering with their personal appsand helps them become more
productive while on the go. Empowering employees to choose their preferred
device for work also creates a more satisfying work experience and helps
organizations recruit and retain the best employees. By shifting device ownership
to employees and contractors, and by maintaining centralized management of
corporate virtual desktops, organizations can reduce both capital and operational
costs.
The next key consideration: Creating an environment that keeps business data
and apps secure and which IT can manage and adapt to in a simple, controlled
manner.

Developing an Infrastructure to Accommodate BYO

Businesses that embrace BYO must deal with many different new devices on
their networks that need some level of management. Administrators in large
organizations might find themselves supporting thousands of endpoints and losing
control as the number of devices on the network grows rapidly.
To take on this challenge, many organizations virtualize their desktop environment,
which helps improve productivity by allowing end users to work from anywhere
using a device of their choice. Virtualizing the desktop environment also makes
it much easier for IT to manage all devices and maintain control over PCs from
different manufacturers with many different operating environments.
One way to virtualize the desktop environment is a hosted virtual desktop
infrastructure (VDI), which combines storage and server hardware with a
hypervisor to deliver individual desktop instances from a datacenter. This enables
fast and easy access from anywhere on any device such as a PC, laptop, tablet or
smartphone.
Virtual desktops can also be rolled out more quickly on a network than native
desktops that rely upon traditional deployment methods and PC management
tools. Using VDI solutions, such as Citrix XenDesktop, administrators can automate
the way virtual desktops are created rather than deploying a unique image to a
new device.

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In addition, virtual desktops require less support as IT can control the desktop
environment centrally from a datacenter. Administrators only need to apply patches
or upgrades once for every desktop, and user data is protected and backed up at
the datacenter. Thus, if a device gets lost or stolen, user data isnt lost with it.

Local Virtual Desktops Extend the Benefits of VDI

To extend the benefits of a hosted virtual desktop, many enterprises have
discovered the benefits of deploying a local virtual desktop solution, which runs
the OS and apps directly on endpointsjust like native PCs. This is a critical
capability since every mobile user experiences conditions where they cant
connect to the corporate network or cant access a high-speed network. Reality
sets in when they find themselves in an area or on a wireless network with latency
or connectivity issues. The cost associated with data transfer is a separate issue
to also consider when employees try to connect remotely on wireless/cellular
networks.
But with a local virtual desktop, laptop users can work regardless of the quality of
the network connection, or even offline, so they can always access their critical
applications and data to keep performing their jobs.
Local virtual desktops also work well in conjunction with VDI to provide a big boost
to user productivity. For example, users that plan to head home but not bring
their laptop can use their hosted virtual desktop to leave a session running and
then access the session from their home computer, tablet or smartphone. Thus,
business executives as well as sales professionals, IT pros, field technicians and
other mobile workers who spend a great amount of time on the road can all benefit
from laptops enabled for local and hosted virtual desktops. The switch between
environments is seamless.
For corporate laptops, local virtual desktops also offer a better way for IT to
manage the mobile devices with the ability to administer the entire laptop
management lifecycle centrallyincluding provisioning, patching, image
management, migration, and device wipe. IT thus eliminates the multiple tools
traditional PC management requires. For BYO laptops, IT can manage the
corporate virtual desktop running on the users laptop without interfering with the
personal environment.

Key Considerations for Providing Windows Virtual Desktops to

MacBooks
When rolling out a BYO program, enterprises should take into consideration the
three key stakeholder groups:
IT Adminthis group needs the ability to easily manage and support the
personal MacBooks that users bring onto the corporate network. IT can also
assign virtual desktops to contractors or contingent staff for a specific period
of time, as well as remote wiping the virtual desktop at the end of a project.
In addition to controlling the virtual desktop environment, IT needs to deliver
the applications that run only within a Windows environment and is looking to
provide a greater level of security by running these inside a virtual machine.

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End Usersthis group includes employees and contractors who work in the
office or from remote locations. They want the convenience of using both their
personal apps and business apps on one laptop. Theyre willing to use their
personal device to conduct company business, but just as IT needs to protect
the corporate environment, users want to isolate their personal environment and
keep it separate from the corporate environment. And they need to be able to
access their corporate Windows desktop and apps easily, regardless of network
connectivity.
Managementwhen giving BYO privileges to executives, senior managers and
other highly-mobile employees (such as sales and field service), the company
wants to ensure end users can work easily within the desktop environment
so the business can gain the full benefits of the BYO programimproved
morale, reduced mobile-device TCO, and increased employee productivity.
The organization needs both an environment that offers the user flexibility while
maintaining security and control for IT.
A primary challenge in supporting MacBooks in a BYO environment is that some
corporate apps (such as Visio, Microsoft Project and Internet Explorer to name a
few) can only be accessed within the Windows desktop. Although the Microsoft
Office suite is customized to run on Mac OS X, the experience is often not as
productive or as seamless as it is within a Windows environment, as evident from
user experience with Microsoft Outlook. In fact, certain plug-ins that are available
for Microsoft Outlook on Windows are not available for Outlook on Mac OS X.
Spreadsheets, presentations, and documents created using Microsoft Office
products often contain sensitive company information. As such, IT typically does
not want to install Office applications on BYO Macs for the potential risk exposure.
Compatibility issues are another reason. But by containerizing and virtualizing
the apps within a local virtual desktop environment that runs Windows on
MacBooksthat are encrypted and follow security best practicesthe corporate
apps and data remain secure.
To deliver Windows virtual desktops on Macs, many enterprises deploy a Type-2
hypervisor running on top of the Mac OS rather than a Type-1 hypervisor. Type-1
hypervisors install under the OS on bare metal, which is ideal for corporate-issued
laptops but requires reimaging the machinesand most users wont want their
personal environment altered or their machine reimaged.

DesktopPlayer for Mac from Citrix

As a client virtualization solution for the Mac platform, Citrix DesktopPlayer
for Mac allows users to run Windows virtual desktops on their MacBooks. The
solution leverages client virtualization technology thats installed on top of Mac OS
X, which is ideal for BYO environments since this does not infringe upon personal
apps or alter the Mac environment in any way.
DesktopPlayer for Mac addresses the BYO challenge of securely delivering
Windows apps and data to employees and contractors using their MacBook as
their primary computing device. Mac users thus gain the flexibility and convenience
to run Windows desktops and apps on the same devicewhether working online,
offline, or when experiencing slow or intermittent network connections.

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While other point solutions only enable individual MacBook users to run Windows
locally, DesktopPlayer for Mac also gives IT full centralized management and
control while providing security for both the data and the virtual desktops. The
Synchronizer management server provisions and manages Windows virtual
machines with policies deployed to each virtual desktop on the MacBooks. This
feature contrasts with the many standalone consumer-based client virtualization
software products. These standalone utilities allow virtual machines to be created
on top of the Mac platform but lack truly-integrated provisioning, control and policy
management capabilities from a central point in the datacenter.
With the Synchronizer, the base image of the Windows virtual desktop is
guaranteed to be consistent, significantly increasing patch and update success
rates over traditional agent-based PC management tools. Moreover, with the
Synchronizer, the updates are done at the hypervisor layer, so even if theres a
problem in the guest virtual machine that corrupts the Windows OSrendering
traditional PCLM tools ineffectivethe Synchronizer can still successfully update
the base image.
DesktopPlayer for Mac also enables IT to test and manage a Windows virtual
desktop golden image and then push that same image out to any number of
Mac devices. Moreover, DesktopPlayer is a part of the broad Citrix desktop
virtualization solution portfolio, enabling enterprises to address all of the use cases
within their organizations.

DesktopPlayer for MacKey Benefits for End Users

Allows users to work on local Windows virtual desktops regardless of networkconnection quality or even while not connected.
Enables mobile employees to use their personal or corporate-issued MacBook
for accessing and interacting with Windows applications and data, while keeping
personal and corporate data separate and secure on the same device.
Synchronizes data across local and hosted virtual desktops for a seamless,
personalized experience when combined with Citrix XenDesktop and Citrix
ShareFile.
Eliminates reboots when switching between Windows/business and Mac/
personal workspaces.
Allows users to continue accessing personal content without interfering with
personal apps installed on the Mac.

DesktopPlayer for MacKey Benefits for IT

Runs key business apps in a self-contained and isolated environment on top of
the Mac host by delivering a managed and secured corporate virtual desktop
with policy-driven control.
Enables central management of local Windows desktops with a console for
deploying, updating, managing and securing virtual desktops.
Protects corporate data with virtual desktop lease, lockout and remote kill
features and policies that can be activated from the management interface in
the case of loss, theft or when an employee leaves the company or a contractor
completes a term assignment.
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Creates a golden image of a Windows virtual desktop that can be pushed to

any number of MacBooks to eliminate the need to physically visit machines for
support, updates and patches.
Deploys the same Windows virtual desktop image to BYO MacBooks
and corporate-owned MacBooks as well as Windows PCs with XenClient
Enterpriseenabling efficient management of all laptops by using the same
virtual desktop image library.

The Role of DesktopPlayer for Mac within Citrix FlexCast

Todays business demands an IT infrastructure that can support the fast-changing
app, desktop, and data access needs of increasingly-mobile workers while
ensuring control and data security. In traditional business environments, workers
can suffer from productivity loss during PC refreshes, replacements, malware,
corruption, or conflicts during software patches and updates. Application and
desktop virtualization centralizes the management of apps and desktops in
the datacenter while also delivering them to users on demand, to any device,
anywhere.

Citrix XenDesktop
Citrix XenDesktop with FlexCast technology adjusts to the needs of each business,
from mobilizing Windows apps to PC refreshes to securing BYO laptops and
tablets. XenDesktop also enables enterprise IT to deliver Windows-as-a-Service
with a single infrastructure for a variety of use cases. From simple VDI to advanced
app delivery, XenDesktop makes it easy to start with a few use-case scenarios
and extend to others at a pace that makes sense for enterprises.
One use case that is steadily growing is senior executives demanding the freedom
to leverage MacBooks within a BYO environment for projects that require the use
of Windows apps and corporate data. They tend to work on-the-go quite often
whether bouncing around corporate offices or remotely at home, at customer
locations and while traveling.
XenDesktop is the perfect solution for executives when they have access to the
companys corporate network. But if they work from home or another remote
location where network access is limited or impossible, the Windows apps and
data they need to get work done isnt accessible.
Thats where DesktopPlayer for Maca XenDesktop add-on solutioncomes in.
IT can deliver a secure Windows virtual desktop to Mac-based executives who can
work online, offline or over slow or intermittent connections.

Creating Seamless Windows Virtual Desktops for MacBook Users

Todays enterprise IT teams need to address the convergence of BYO
environments playing an increasingly important role in the way companies
function and the popularity of MacBooks among business professionals. The
key is to enable executives and other mobile workers to use their MacBook Pro
or MacBook Air for both business and personal applications in a way that allows
them to function efficientlyonline and offlinewith centralized management and
control for the corporate desktop.

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Citrix DesktopPlayer for Mac solves this challenge by giving MacBook users
the ability to access corporate applications from within a local Windows virtual
desktop environment while also ensuring personal applications are not disrupted.
At the same time, DesktopPlayer for Mac provides IT with an easy way to centrally
manage virtual desktops by leveraging a golden virtual desktop image that can be
automatically pushed to all users.
DesktopPlayer for Mac is the only virtual desktop solution that provides all the key
capabilities:
Local virtual desktop access with no network dependency
Full centralized management and control for IT
BYO security for both data and virtual desktops
FlexCast technology (as an add-on to XenDesktop)
Using DesktopPlayer for Mac in conjunction with Citrix XenDesktop enables users
to switch between local and hosted virtual machines. This allows users to work on
their MacBook and then seamlessly switch to any other workspaces or devices
to access their hosted virtual desktop. Add Citrix ShareFile and users can also
securely synchronize data across all of their devices seamlessly.
With the Synchronizer, Citrix customers can also deploy the same Windows virtual
desktop image to their MacBooks as they do to their corporate PC users. This
enables companies to manage all corporate laptops, including BYO MacBooks,
using the same virtual desktop image library and management infrastructure.
For more information on how Citrix DesktopPlayer for Mac can enhance and
expand your organizations BYO program, visit www.citrix.com/desktopplayer.

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About Citrix
Citrix (NASDAQ:CTXS) is the cloud company that enables mobile workstylesempowering people to work and collaborate from anywhere, easily
and securely. With market-leading solutions for mobility, desktop virtualization, cloud networking, cloud platforms, collaboration and data sharing,
Citrix helps organizations achieve the speed and agility necessary to succeed in a mobile and dynamic world. Citrix products are in use at more
than 260,000 organizations and by over 100 million users globally. Annual revenue in 2012 was $2.59 billion. Learn more at www.citrix.com.
Copyright 2014 Citrix Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Citrix, XenDesktop, XenClient, and DesktopPlayer are trademarks of Citrix Systems,
Inc. and/or one of its subsidiaries, and may be registered in the U.S. and other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein
may be trademarks of their respective companies.

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