As far as most people are concerned, Provision Networks really came onto the scene at VMworld in 2006 when they released their first VDI Connection Broker. Truth be told, the history goes back to the 1990s when our CTO (Peter Ghostine) teamed up with his brother, and Provision Networks Division VP & General Manager (Paul Ghostine), starting a company called Emergent Online (EOL). EOL delivered Citrix Training, opened an Application Service Provider and quickly became the premier Citrix Channel Partner in the Americas.
It became evident that there were technology gaps in Citrix WinFrame/MetaFrame, so Peter began creating add-on tools that EOL could sell to their customers. Below is a summarized timeline of the product releases and milestones the now Provision Networks Division of Quest Software:
October 2000 - EOL THINssentials Software Suite released. Thinssentials included:
- EOL AppPortal™ - provides single-point access to Terminal Server and Citrix MetaFrame hosted applications via an intuitive Microsoft Outlook-style listbar. Administrators can configure folders and applications for individual users and groups. When users log on to the server farm, they receive a listbar populated with just the applications that they were granted permission to access. Multi-server replication and auto-refresh capabilities are inherent to the product.
- EOL Printer Driver Services™ - Enables Citrix MetaFrame and Terminal Server administrators to disseminate printer driver packages to one or more WTS/MetaFrame servers simultaneously. Pre-installing printer drivers on WTS/MetaFrame servers is absolutely necessary in order to support client printer auto-creation over Citrix ICA and Microsoft RDP connections. This product helps to significantly reduce the administration time required to disseminate printer drivers to multiple servers in an application farm
- EOL ICA Session Watchdog™ – Runs as a true NT service and provides a hands-off solution to common Terminal Server and Citrix MetaFrame related problems such as: 1) ICA client-side printers not auto-deleting when users log off, 2) Stuck print jobs, and 3) ICA connections going “down” inexplicably. This product helps to keep your Citrix MetaFrame and Terminal servers in optimum condition, significantly increasing availability and reliability of client-side printing over Citrix ICA and Microsoft RDP connections.
- EOL ListDrivers™ - Allows an administrator to enumerate all installed printer drivers and associated details, as well as delete drivers on any target MetaFrame or Terminal Server in the application server farm. The administrator can also generate a “dependency report” outlining what other drivers rely on the same files used by the driver the administrator intends to delete.
- EOL SessionMeter™ - Limits the number of concurrent sessions allowed by users in a WTS/MetaFrame application server farm. An administrator can, for example, restrict users from logging on to more than one session at a time.
- EOL Secure Desktop Services™ - Pre-configures and locks down your users’ server-based desktops as easily as pointing and clicking, without the need for using NT profiles and policies or cost-prohibitive third-party products. An administrator can specify the application shortcuts, folders, color backgrounds, and various other desktop settings on a per-user or group basis. Multi-server replication capabilities are inherent to the product.
- EOL Managed Printer Services™ - Pre-configures client-side and network printer resources on a per-user or per-group basis. Multi-server replication capabilities are inherent to the product.
- EOL CleanProfiles™ - Runs as true NT service and deletes “orphaned” copies of cached profiles.
- EOL SetPassword™ - Permits users to easily change their own passwords and administrators to change anyone’s password.
- EOL SetPrinter™ - Allows users to choose their default printer and manually connect to client-side and network printers.
November 2000 - recognized as the number one Citrix Channel Partner in the Americas
January 2001 - EOL Time Zones™ released
February 2001 - EOL Universal Printer™ released and THINssentials™ now includes:
- EOL AppPortal™
- EOL Printer Driver Services™
- EOL Watchdog Services™
- EOL Time Zones™
- EOL Universal Printer™
- EOL Profile Sweeper™
- EOL ListDrivers™
- EOL SetPassword™
- EOL SetPrinter™
November 2002 - EOL Universal Printer 3.0 Released and added to Wyse and NetX Thin Client Terminals
November 2002 - EOL Desktop Manager Released allowing administrators to control:
- Desktop shortcuts
- Start Menu shortcuts
- Start Menu > Programs shortcuts
- Start Menu > Programs > Startup shortcuts
- Quick Launch shortcuts
- Color Scheme
- Wallpaper
- Application Permissions
- Policy Packages
- Drive Mappings
- Printer Management
- Logon Scripts
- Environment Variables
- Registry Entries
- Other Restrictions
(Note: If one looks at the current DB Schema of the Provision Database, the tables are prefixed with “dm”, for Desktop Manager)
June 2003 - Softricity Partners with EOL
December 2004 - EOL transfers intellectual property to Provision Networks, co-founded by Peter & Paul Ghostine. THINssentials Suite transferred to Provision Management Framework. Provision Networks focused completely on Software Development, while EOL continued to sell software and services.
November 2005 - Provision Management Framework 5.5 Released adding the following features to the already deep feature list brought over from THINssentials:
- Load Balancing for Terminal Services or Citrix Presentation Server
- Web Portal
- SSL Reverse Proxy
- Seamless Windows RDP Client
- Application Publishing for Windows Terminal Services
April 2006 - Provision Networks VIP Summit held before BriForum in Washington DC. In attendance were (to the best of my memory):
- Peter & Paul Ghostine - Co-Founders of Provision Networks (now Quest Software)
- Dr. Ulrich (Rick) Mack - Commander Austrailia (now Quest Software)
- Patrick Rouse - Session Computing Solutions, LLC (now Quest Software)
- Wilco Van Bragt - Van Bragt Consulting
- Dr. Bernhard (Benny) Tritsch - visionApp GMBH (now Login Consultants)
- Jim Kenzig - Founder of the Thinlist
August 2006 - Provision Management Framework 5.6 Released
November 2006 - Virtual Access Suite for VMware VDI released at VMworld in Los Angeles.
April 2007 - Virtual Access Suite 5.8 Enterprise, Desktop Services, Standard Editions Released
November 2007 - Quest Software Acquires Provision Networks
December 2007 - Virtual Access Suite 5.9 Released including integration with Virtual Iron
May 2008 - Virtual Access Suite 5.10 Released including integration with Microsoft Hyper-V, task scheduling framework, MSI Package Deployment, Managed Desktop Group Auto-Expansion, Enable/Disable Desktop or Desktop Group and the following Experience Optimization Pack (EOP) Features:
- Windows Media Redirection (to the Client CODEC)
- Latency Masking for Typing (Local Text Echo)
- Microphone Redirection (bi-directional audio)
So as one can see see, Provision Networks is NOT some new company that came about with the VDI Buzz in the past two years, but rather a company that’s been making great tools for Citrix and Terminal Services for the past ~ 10 years and is (in many eyes) the market leading Connection Broker for VDI, Terminal Services and Physical Desktops.
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June 20th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Let me take you back way further than this. Back in the days of Winframe and this was around November 1996, I ran a site called the Unofficial Citrix Winframe Site which later became thethin.net and finally thin.net and is now owned by MSTerminalservices.org. This backround info is important.
I started corresponding back and forth with Peter Ghostine and we started discussing an issue with the Winframe ICA listener service being unstable and the service stopping unexpectedly when printer spooler would hang making it so no one could connect. Peter wrote a little utility for me, one of the first Ctirix related ones I believe he did that was called Smonitor and also said I could host the file on my website. Smonitor monitored the ica service and restarted it if it got messed up (the original description of the utility still exists here http://www.msterminalservices.org/smonitor.cfm ) Here is a link to the original page about Smonitor from May of 1999. http://web.archive.org/web/20000304190208/http://www.thethin.net/smonitor.cfm
Over the years smonitor was improved and turned into a product called ICA Watchdog, then EOL Sessions Watchdog then just EOL Watchdog(where it was expanded to watch other services) and now it exists as Provision Watchdog. Emergent online was the very 1st sponsor on the Thin.net. I helped Peter beta test and my site was the first site using Printer driver services for which the product was written for in 1999 to get our wyse winterminals to be able to print properly. It didn’t stop there though, Peter wrote the Universal printer driver so our fat clients could also easily print. We also were one of the first at the library here to use AppPortal which indeed was the first product and still one of the best to provide seamless RDP applications.
Over the last 10 years the products from EOL were instrumental in making our Citrix environment work. I’ve supported them for a long time. Provision and Quest have greatly improved the offerings and they now can be conisdered a cornerstone in the industry. They got that way by listening to the customer and modifying their software to address the needs of the community They have always done it right and done it well.
Quest made a very smart acquisition indeed.
So you see, Peter Ghostine and Emergent/EOL/Provision really got started some time back in the fall of 1996. Much earlier than your timeline!
Jim Kenzig.