We recently sat down with IGEL Community member and IGEL INSIDER Tobias Lienhard to discuss his experiences working with IGEL's products and solutions.
Can you tell us a bit about yourself, your role in IT, etc., and maybe something fun about you?
I've been a Sysadmin for over 15 years. I was mostly supporting Windows environments, although I occasionally got some Linux contracts for specialized use-cases. The most fun case I had was water damage on a laptop put in the fridge because it got too hot.
How long have you been working with IGEL technologies?
I have been working with IGEL for 2.5 years so far. At first, I was assigned the topic but became hooked after my first visit to the IGEL DISRUPT conference in 2019.
Was IGEL your first experience with 'thin clients'?
No, I already worked with Wyse (before Dell) and then Dell/Wyse Thin clients before being turned on to IGEL solutions.
How do you see IGEL solutions compare and contrast to your other experiences?
It is the first truly managed Thin Client solution I've worked with. Before, I was only working with stand-alone Thin-Clients. Therefore I very much enjoy the abilities of the centralized manageability that IGEL brings.
How has Covid-19 affected how your company supports its end-users?
As a service provider/supplier, we noticed a massive rise in our clients' home office requirements, and IGEL has been able to help.
Was IGEL able to help? If so, how?
Yes, one of our larger clients decided to move on with an ICG to provide the users with IGEL to use at home. Initially, they started with preconfiguring IGELs in the office with the external address for their Horizon environment. However, they soon figured out that no configuration changes or firmware updates could be applied without a VPN connection to the user taking the device back to the office. Hence they chose to start with ICG to be more flexible during the whole deployment and fully enabling home office.
Do you see the world moving back to working from an office? If not, do you think it will happen again soon or ever?
In Switzerland, this is due to our cultural mindset. For international companies, I see less of an issue with staying with more home office.
What do you feel the most significant challenges relating to working with IGEL have been and where you can work around these issues?
From my point of view, most challenges are generated by using converted Desktop clients. This is due to IGEL OS being a Linux based OS, which leads to issues with more exotic hardware configurations. However, there are fewer and fewer of them.
What is your favorite aspect of working with IGEL software?
Although the IGEL UMS might look quite complicated and overwhelming at first, it is structured and logically built. With the release of the new IGEL UMS Web App, we can now do simple tasks quickly, with even less training.
Can you share your experience as a member of the IGEL Community?
Inside the IGEL Community, I've been able to find answers to all my questions. Plus, having direct touch with the IGEL engineers and developers has helped me by getting a more in-depth insight into how everything works.
If you had one wish for IGEL, what would it be?
As of now, I only hope that after that whole virus crisis, we get to have another in-person IGEL DISRUPT conference.
Special thanks to Tobias Lienhard for taking the time for this interview. We truly appreciated it!
