After being tasked with creating a “product” SKU around Virtual Desktop, I came up with a VDI Questionnaire for potential VDI customers starting with 200 users. Understanding that its difficult to get all of the customer details clearly defined from a list of questions, I think we cover the majority of the key components.

I would love to hear your feedback

Preliminary List

1. Is this going to be a hosted or on premise solution?
2. What services are we expected to provide as part of this quote?

• Design
• Hosting
• Infrastructure Implementation
• Desktop Image Creation
• Monitoring and Patching
• Thin Client deployment

1. Are we expected to provide VDI aware antivirus or with it come from your current vendor?
2. Should Xendesktop Training for your staff be included in the quote
3. Assuming success with the first 200 desktops, are there plans to grow the environment larger?
4. Is adequate storage for shares in place for user files and user profile storage, or do you need NAS space quoted as well?
5. What applications are you expecting to see on the desktops?

 Infrastructure

1. Is this going to be a hosted or on premise solution?
2. Is Microsoft Active Directory present in the environment? What is the domain functional level?
3. Does the customer have an ELA which covers VDA pricing?
4. Are we going to be deploying XenApp along with the VDI deployment?
5. Is there a preferred storage vendor? Protocol?

Desktop Image

1. Is there any profile redirection or profile management in place?
2. Is Windows 7×32 or x64 going to be the desktop image?
3. As the virtual desktop is very different than traditional desktops, are you aware of specific security requirements that could affect the project timeline?
4. Are we expected to provide VDI aware antivirus or with it come from your current vendor?
5. Do you have a list of applications that the environment is expected to support?
6. Are you currently doing any application virtualization? If so, what vendor?
7. How many desktop images do you anticipate?
8. Is adequate storage for shares in place for user files and user profile storage, or do you need NAS space quoted as well?

Networking/Security

1. Is the customer looking to hand off at layer 2 or 3?
2. Is there a pair of 10GB uplinks that we will be able to connect the pod to?
3. Is two-factor authentication (RSA) a requirement?
4. Is there a local WAN? If so, can we see a Visio of the environment?
5. Is DHCP currently being used in the environment?
6. Can multiple dedicated subnets be allocated for the VDI environment, some of which have address capacity requirements?

Clients

1. Are iDevices and Android devices in scope for external user access?
2. Is any desktop equipment being reused?
3. Are we doing physical deployments, are there restrictions that could affect the deployment (ie. No work on user desks between 8 and 5)?
4. Are there any existing Thin-Clients in place? What models?

Operations/Growth

1. What type and level of training would you like for your staff?
2. Assuming success with the first 200 desktops, are there plans to grow the environment larger?
3. What services are we expected to provide as part of this quote?

• Design
• Hosting
• Infrastructure Implementation
• Desktop Image Creation
• Monitoring and Patching
• Thin Client deployment

Tags: Citrix, VDI, XenDesktop, XenServer