neurons firing from a keyboard

Computing is expensive. Desktops and laptops cost lots of money. Printers cost even more money. (Printers are really funny, actually; buying one or two isn’t so bad, but once you’re managing tens or hundreds or more laser printers and printing hundreds or thousands of pages per day, the cost of toner/ink and repair skyrocket like a SpaceX shuttle.) Desks cost even more money. Accessories cost even more money. The list goes on and on,infinitum ad nauseum.

Now that we live in an age where downloading high-def movies takes less time than starting up your car, leveraging the cloud and having people bring in their own devices has become a highly lucrative alternative. The bring-your-own-device, or BYOD, movement has picked up a lot of steam over the years, so much so that Gartner expects for “half of the world’s companies” to enact it. Over a billion devices are expected to be using BYOD by 2018, and as more and larger companies begin to take advantage of cloud computing, this trend will only accelerate.

I’ll spend the next three posts talking about three key components of most BYOD environment:

1. Virtual desktops,
2. Laptops and desktops, and
3. Mobile phones and tablets

I’ll explain who the major players involved with each component are, their importance in BYOD and some things to watch out for during considerations.