Remote access to corporate data is considered a right by many employees. It encourages work flexibility, provides faster responses to customers and colleagues and can be a huge benefit to both the individual and the organization. Now that users and their management expect to be able to work from anywhere at any time, they are demanding higher performance with faster services. IT is struggling to keep up with the user needs. What is driving the demand for performance and what can CIOs do to address this problem?

Remote access users have multiple needs: connectivity, security, wide availability and performance. However, in a similar way to Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, the higher needs are not demanded until the lower needs are met. As the lower needs have been achieved for many of us, the highest need – performance – is what we are now demanding.

I started business travel over 20 years ago. I remember carrying around various plugs for different telephone systems (and more than one for many countries), along with a screwdriver and a pair of crocodile clips when the only way to gain access to corporate information (usually just email in those days) was to take the hotel’s telephone apart and wire the PC straight in. The game in those days was being able to shriek, whistle and hiss to start the modem …didn’t we have fun back then!

In the meantime, standardization on the RJ-11 plug and jack in most hotel rooms, the increase in bandwidth, the reduction in pricing, data over mobile and built-in wi-fi in laptops and the almost ubiquitous wi-fi networks have eased the problem of connectivity.

When connectivity was difficult (or sometimes impossible), the user didn’t worry about security; there are no security issues for a system that’s unconnected. But with the rise of connectivity, so came the growth in viruses, the problems of spyware and phishing, and the waste of time caused by spam and other threats to networked systems.

Fortunately, the industry has come up with many desktop security applications, such as anti-virus software, portable web filtering, locking down of PCs to prevent malicious applications from installing and disk encryption in case a laptop is mislaid or stolen. Most users now trust that their work systems are configured to resist most attacks, so even those that were unsure about the safety of connecting remotely are logging in when traveling.

This is where the third need appears. We are not just happy with connectivity and security; now we want availability. Availability can be seen in two dimensions: worldwide 24x7 availability and the availability of applications. The growth in wi-fi networks has made the first almost a given, from the rural bar with one waitress that announces “free wi-fi here” on its blackboard to the wealth of options in cities. I was in Shanghai last year and from my hotel room I had a choice of around 40 wi-fi links, most of them open and free. Availability of applications has been driven by users. Just accessing email is not enough; we see no reason why the applications we use in the office are not available to us outside. Personally, I can access our Oracle system, CRM, all of our shared servers and every other key application wherever I am and whenever I want it.

So here we are at the highest level: performance. “Why is access so slow when I am out of the office?” is the cry from the sales manager. “Do you know how expensive my sales people are?” They forget that just a year or two ago, even accessing the sales application was impossible. Now they want it remotely just as fast as in the office “or faster, if you can” they will add with a smile.

Luckily, the industry is coming to our rescue again. Vendors of WAN optimization technology make devices that accelerate data to regional and remote offices. These companies usually sell appliances that remove repeated requests from the network and optimize the protocols to reduce unnecessary data round-trips from the WAN.

A number of these companies have announced, and a few are shipping, client software to extend that benefit to the traveling user. This is delivered as a small application on the remote PC that caches email and file server traffic, hides the inefficient protocols of TCP, CIFS and MAPI and compresses the traffic before transmission. It thus accelerates data to the remote user and saves WAN bandwidth in the process.

As always with new technologies, there will be a rush to add more features and some initial offerings will be fairly basic. Some will not work with SSL VPNs; some will not be able to accelerate SSL data; and perhaps specific applications (such as Citrix) will fool others. In addition, the organization needs to be able to centrally manage acceleration policies and distribution and installation/updates of the applications. In addition, as organizations want few client applications on the PCs, customers have been requesting the integration of acceleration and security. Only some vendors are likely to achieve that level of integration.

CIOs should consider this type of technology to help their traveling users be more productive when out of the office. But it’s also necessary to have a clear set of requirements to ensure that the application supports the organization’s key business functions.

Nigel Hawthorne is VP, EMEA Marketing,
Blue Coat Systems, +44 1252 554651;
email: nigel.hawthorn@bluecoat.com;
web: www.bluecoat.com.