When a recent survey asked Geographic Information Systems (GIS) professionals which tools have the most potential for improving workflow, mobile GIS applications came in first with 39 percent and cloud-based GIS Applications/Web Portals came in second at 29 percent. It is clear today’s GIS professionals require access to their applications and data on the go. With many users accessing their work from various locations and multiple devices, there is an increasing expectation that GIS software should work well across those environments.
For years, Dell has worked closely with various partners to bring GIS users the solutions they need to address geospatial analysis and mapping challenges. Now, in a collaborative effort between Dell, Esri, NVIDIA and VMware, we are thrilled to announce that the ArcGIS for Desktop Virtualization Appliance based on Dell hardware technology is available from Esri.
In order to address the growing needs for mobility, flexibility and real-time collaboration among GIS professionals, many organizations are turning to desktop virtualization as a means to deliver data-intensive workloads in a secure, manageable and cost effective manner. With this in mind, the ArcGIS for Desktop Virtualization Appliance is built on the Dell Precision Appliance for Wyse, a 2U pre-configured version of the Dell Precision Rack 7910, and takes advantage of NVIDIA GRID vGPU technology, the hardware sharing of the GPU, to achieve greater user density and high performance graphics acceleration. The appliance is designed, tested and optimized to virtualize ArcGIS for Desktop, providing up to 16 users with new levels of performance, mobility, security, scalability and manageability. You can learn more about it in my product unboxing post on the Dell4Enterprise blog.
The ArcGIS for Desktop Virtualization Appliance greatly simplifies the delivery and deployment of ArcGIS for Desktop, including ArcGIS Pro, in a virtualized environment. The appliance also addresses the ArcGIS Pro requirement for high performance graphics through shareable Graphics Processing Units (GPU); this means that GIS users can now benefit from rich graphical experiences in a virtualized environment when using ArcGIS Pro with 2D and 3D data.
Lastly, the appliance eliminates much of the complexity and need for in-house expertise traditionally required by many virtualization solutions. The appliance can be deployed in three easy steps in a matter of minutes rather than days or weeks, while delivering an end user experience that is equivalent to a standalone desktop machine.
Learn how the ArcGIS for Desktop Virtualization Appliance, available through Esri, can deliver a rich user experience from anywhere, across almost any device. You can also find more details on the new appliance by visiting the joint NVIDIA VMware Community (NVC).
