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This is how IT worked 40+ years ago: a central server hosting everything (applications+data) surrounded by dumb terminals that would turn into doorstops if the

This is how IT worked 40+ years ago: a central server hosting everything (applications+data) surrounded by dumb terminals that would turn into doorstops if the network connection with the server failed for any reason. This approach made sense back then because of the enormous cost of hardware, but technology advancement and reduction in prices soon allowed more modern models like the personal computer which uses the network connection when available but it's not dependent on it, giving the user a lot more freedom. Then corporate greed discovered they can turn everything into a pay per use model to maximize profits, which of course mean they must lock both apps and users data then ask for money to open them, until of course they go out of business, the server is hacked or they simply decide to raise prices. The cloud based SaaS approach is how corporations are throwing down the toilet decades of advancement in the IT just because of greed. Just say no.

justsomehnguy 3y ago
> This is how IT worked 40+ years ago: It is also how it worked 20-10 years ago: it was called Terminal Services. And then it was neglected because next shiny thing: VDI. The thing is, one big server for a hundred office users doesn't cost much, because they are sharing the RAM. But with VDI you need at least 100 x 4Gb memory and that means you need way more than one server. And some SAN, because only SAN with fast drive can survive the morning boot storm. Oh, by the way, here are two FC SAN switches for your HA storage fabric, because you really want paths to the SAN be redundant. But anyway, local installs are not bringing revenue constantly. But renting the services do. This was perfectly clear with AzureAD and Exchange 365.
- ChainOfFools 3y ago
  Not dead yet, my consulting business is almost entirely built around provisioning terminal servers as small private cloud managed systems for companies with niche business requirements. Not sure how much longer the model is going to work because eventually I suspect Microsoft will simply kill off on-prem terminal services all together or make it completely uncompetitive with their own azure / Office 365 combination. But the surfeit of stupendously powerful white box server platforms and the remarkably efficient way that a terminal server conserves memory usage across sessions compared to containers or vdi or anything else, absolutely outperforms almost every other solution in the SMB space, in terms of how each support engineer can scale to 100 or more end users across a half dozen completely unrelated organizations. I'm surprised how underrepresented this business model is these days.
  - justsomehnguy 3y ago
    > I'm surprised how underrepresented this business model is these days. VARs are living on %% of the sale. > Not dead yet Yep, but only yet.
- hinkley 3y ago
  This cycle of alternating didn’t start 40 years ago, which would be 1983. We have been cycling between decentralization and centralization since at least the 1970’s. Because they both suck, either side “winning” is worse than staying in the middle. But we only like pendulum swinging in this industry so nobody stops as the bottom of the arc.
rbanffy 3y ago
> dumb terminals that would turn into doorstops if the network connection with the server failed for any reason. OTOH, you could log off from one terminal and go to any other terminal (maybe in a different country) and continue to work right where you left. If the environment is designed for that, it's not only doable, but practical.
- kibwen 3y ago
  I'd personally rather achieve this by remoting into a machine that I already own, rather than paying rent to Microsoft in perpetuity.
- fauigerzigerk 3y ago
  True, but aren't there far more economical ways of doing it if you're an IT department? Running a full Windows VM with 4G to 8G of reserved memory seems incredibly wasteful if all you want to do is centralise the provisioning and management software and data. Why not Chromebooks + web apps if you need some client-side hardware anyway?
  - rbanffy 3y ago
    > Why not Chromebooks + web apps if you need some client-side hardware anyway? Some companies are married to Microsoft Office, Exchange, and ShamePoint.
- chrisandchris 3y ago
  That's true and one great advantage. But I don't get how to apply this advantage to personal computing. I have a laptop and I never ever wanted to randomly "log into my cloud workstation" from some other place. I can just open the lid of my laptop and continue working. What advantage does the requirement of a persistent network connection offer me? Seems like working on a train is not doable. I could see a use case where people don't want / can spend to much money on hardware. But even then, hardware is still required and I can't see where a subscription would help here.
  - 3y ago
riffic 3y ago
The centralization to decentralization pendulum swings again
ChiMan 3y ago
At some point, internet connections will be fast enough to make them indistinguishable form a local machine. Today, that is not true. In my own job, I straddle cloud-based and local machine-based software. Overwhelmingly, the cloud-based software is slow to the extent that it removes at least 40 points of IQ and offsets a decade of experience. The intellect and mental speed I have spent a lifetime building are simply washed away by latency that shuts my mind down, effectively turning me into a ninth-grader. Sure the company pays me as if I continue to generate output becoming of my generous salary. But I maintain the illusion simply by spending many hours on weekends with copious amounts of coffee and, at times, gin, doing work on cloud-based software that, on the "outdated" local software, used to take minutes. Cloud software is among the biggest frauds ever perpetrated on the American consumer.
- nomel 3y ago
  I play PC and VR games on ShadowPC. I can’t tell the difference with a controller, and the latency with a keyboard and mouse is like a cheap Bluetooth mouse. I think the key for these is relatively local data centers. Once ISPs cohost, or get in on the game themselves, we’re set!
- simfree 3y ago
  Having the database on the same server as the application significantly improves responsiveness of applications. Many of these cloud applications choose fragmentary architectures with data sprinkled across many discreet servers that are milliseconds or tens of milliseconds away from each other, resulting in significant delays compared to doing these blocking operations against a local database. Cloud native isn't always the right choice, sometimes CRUD apps should have a local database just for the responsiveness benefits.
  - nullindividual 3y ago
    Having databases on the same server as the application can also slow both down and introduce potential security issues.
- ffhhttt 3y ago
pjmlp 3y ago
During my summer trainship, accounting was run on an AS/400 used by dumb terminals on the harbour offices. At the university we had DG/UX, Solaris and eventually Red-Hat Linux, with a mix of classical phosphor and green terminals, PC and classical Macs (LC models). At Nokia and CERN we used to develop on UNIX (HP-UX, Solaris, Scientific Linux) servers, PC and Macs were only used for Office and as thin clients for the R&D servers. And then we moved into Citrix, RDP and Terminal Services for Windows development, so it has been with us all along.

justsomehnguy 3y ago

> This is how IT worked 40+ years ago: It is also how it worked 20-10 years ago: it was called Terminal Services. And then it was neglected because next shiny thing: VDI. The thing is, one big server for a hundred office users doesn't cost much, because they are sharing the RAM. But with VDI you need at least 100 x 4Gb memory and that means you need way more than one server. And some SAN, because only SAN with fast drive can survive the morning boot storm. Oh, by the way, here are two FC SAN switches for your HA storage fabric, because you really want paths to the SAN be redundant. But anyway, local installs are not bringing revenue constantly. But renting the services do. This was perfectly clear with AzureAD and Exchange 365.

ChainOfFools 3y ago
Not dead yet, my consulting business is almost entirely built around provisioning terminal servers as small private cloud managed systems for companies with niche business requirements. Not sure how much longer the model is going to work because eventually I suspect Microsoft will simply kill off on-prem terminal services all together or make it completely uncompetitive with their own azure / Office 365 combination. But the surfeit of stupendously powerful white box server platforms and the remarkably efficient way that a terminal server conserves memory usage across sessions compared to containers or vdi or anything else, absolutely outperforms almost every other solution in the SMB space, in terms of how each support engineer can scale to 100 or more end users across a half dozen completely unrelated organizations. I'm surprised how underrepresented this business model is these days.
- justsomehnguy 3y ago
  > I'm surprised how underrepresented this business model is these days. VARs are living on %% of the sale. > Not dead yet Yep, but only yet.
hinkley 3y ago
This cycle of alternating didn’t start 40 years ago, which would be 1983. We have been cycling between decentralization and centralization since at least the 1970’s. Because they both suck, either side “winning” is worse than staying in the middle. But we only like pendulum swinging in this industry so nobody stops as the bottom of the arc.

rbanffy 3y ago

> dumb terminals that would turn into doorstops if the network connection with the server failed for any reason. OTOH, you could log off from one terminal and go to any other terminal (maybe in a different country) and continue to work right where you left. If the environment is designed for that, it's not only doable, but practical.

kibwen 3y ago
I'd personally rather achieve this by remoting into a machine that I already own, rather than paying rent to Microsoft in perpetuity.
fauigerzigerk 3y ago
True, but aren't there far more economical ways of doing it if you're an IT department? Running a full Windows VM with 4G to 8G of reserved memory seems incredibly wasteful if all you want to do is centralise the provisioning and management software and data. Why not Chromebooks + web apps if you need some client-side hardware anyway?
- rbanffy 3y ago
  > Why not Chromebooks + web apps if you need some client-side hardware anyway? Some companies are married to Microsoft Office, Exchange, and ShamePoint.
chrisandchris 3y ago
That's true and one great advantage. But I don't get how to apply this advantage to personal computing. I have a laptop and I never ever wanted to randomly "log into my cloud workstation" from some other place. I can just open the lid of my laptop and continue working. What advantage does the requirement of a persistent network connection offer me? Seems like working on a train is not doable. I could see a use case where people don't want / can spend to much money on hardware. But even then, hardware is still required and I can't see where a subscription would help here.
- 3y ago

riffic 3y ago

The centralization to decentralization pendulum swings again

ChiMan 3y ago

At some point, internet connections will be fast enough to make them indistinguishable form a local machine. Today, that is not true. In my own job, I straddle cloud-based and local machine-based software. Overwhelmingly, the cloud-based software is slow to the extent that it removes at least 40 points of IQ and offsets a decade of experience. The intellect and mental speed I have spent a lifetime building are simply washed away by latency that shuts my mind down, effectively turning me into a ninth-grader. Sure the company pays me as if I continue to generate output becoming of my generous salary. But I maintain the illusion simply by spending many hours on weekends with copious amounts of coffee and, at times, gin, doing work on cloud-based software that, on the "outdated" local software, used to take minutes. Cloud software is among the biggest frauds ever perpetrated on the American consumer.

nomel 3y ago
I play PC and VR games on ShadowPC. I can’t tell the difference with a controller, and the latency with a keyboard and mouse is like a cheap Bluetooth mouse. I think the key for these is relatively local data centers. Once ISPs cohost, or get in on the game themselves, we’re set!
simfree 3y ago
Having the database on the same server as the application significantly improves responsiveness of applications. Many of these cloud applications choose fragmentary architectures with data sprinkled across many discreet servers that are milliseconds or tens of milliseconds away from each other, resulting in significant delays compared to doing these blocking operations against a local database. Cloud native isn't always the right choice, sometimes CRUD apps should have a local database just for the responsiveness benefits.
- nullindividual 3y ago
  Having databases on the same server as the application can also slow both down and introduce potential security issues.
ffhhttt 3y ago

pjmlp 3y ago

During my summer trainship, accounting was run on an AS/400 used by dumb terminals on the harbour offices. At the university we had DG/UX, Solaris and eventually Red-Hat Linux, with a mix of classical phosphor and green terminals, PC and classical Macs (LC models). At Nokia and CERN we used to develop on UNIX (HP-UX, Solaris, Scientific Linux) servers, PC and Macs were only used for Office and as thin clients for the R&D servers. And then we moved into Citrix, RDP and Terminal Services for Windows development, so it has been with us all along.