Most Managed Service Providers (MSPs) – whether they host customer services on-premise, or resell value-added feature on top of a cloud-based IaaS platform like AWS or Windows Azure – are always looking for more tools to assist with reporting and monitoring of their customers’ assets.
Unfortunately, many MSP monitoring tools stop a the water’s edge, only looking at basic things like End User Monitoring, Port/Service Monitoring, and basic server uptime reports.
However, for an MSP that offers Remote Desktop or Citrix XenApp access to virtualized Microsoft Windows servers and workstations, that’s just not enough. MSPs with this sort of configuration need the ability to dive much deeper and do actual user session monitoring to see how users are interacting with Citrix/RDS to gauge license use, the trending of session growth over time, when peak concurrent sessions are taking place, bandwidth use attributable to specific user sessions, track telework activity for management, and much more.
Let’s take more of an in-depth look at how Remote Desktop Reporter aids MSPs in several of these use cases:
License Assessments
Most MSPs utilize subscription-based license programs, like Microsoft’s SPLA or Citrix’s CSP programs. These programs help MSPs avoid massive capital expenditures by allowing them to simply “rent” licensing for operating system use, application use (like Office), and RDS/XenApp access licenses on a month-to-month basis. However, the monthly reporting requirements in these programs can be quite onerous, and not tracking license use or not accurately reporting license use could cause major problems down the road in the case of an audit.
Remote Desktop Reporter has several configurable reports that track distinct, named users of both RDS access licenses and specific applications. By setting up routine, monthly tracking, MSPs can prune or deny access to user accounts that no longer need access to these types of licenses and services going forward, reducing their monthly overhead.
Teleworker User Activity
As an MSP, you’ve undoubtedly heard from clients and potential clients about how they can track the activity of their employees and admins who connect to the virtual machines you host and maintain.
When you implement Remote Desktop Reporter in your network, you can immediately start scheduling customer-specific reports for management that show detailed data on when users are connecting and disconnecting to Remote Desktop sessions, as well as how much time they’re actually “active” (e.g. working) in their sessions. Management loves these sorts of reports – why shouldn’t you be able to add them to your core offering to deliver more value to your customers?
Performance and Bandwidth Metrics
Let’s face it – Remote Desktop has the ability to utilize a lot of bandwidth – bandwidth that ultimately you as the MSP are responsible for. Wouldn’t it be nice to find out what customers and what users (down to the individual session) are using the most RDS bandwidth? With Remote Desktop Reporter, you can.
Bandwidth isn’t the only sort of metric worth measuring though. Here are a few other examples of specific reports that can help you assess performance trends over time:
- Peak Session Counts
- Currently Disconnected Users
- Thin Client Utilization By Client Name
- Avg. Number of Sessions and Disconnected Sessions
- Uptime By Server
- Avg. Raw Session Capacity by Server
- RDP/ICA Availability Via Port Monitoring
MSPs Can License Remote Desktop Reporter Via Named User Monthly Recurring Subscription
Ready to get started? If you’re an MSP and would like to find out more about how to license Remote Desktop Reporter for your network on a very affordable named user subscription basis, reach out now.
You can give us a call at 1-855-738-8457 (if you’re inside the US) or at 1-702-749-4325 (if you’re outside the US). We can tell you more about terms and pricing.
Or, if you’d like to start your evaluation first, download the free trial software today.
