Comprehensive Session Management Capability

Fast User Switching on Shared Computing Resources

Fast user switching and session management are vital requirements in many industries such as manufacturing, healthcare, warehousing, retail and education. As organizations deploy an increasing number of shared workstations and kiosks, a large number of users can roam and access information from anywhere without having to return to their personal PCs.

But shared and roaming scenarios also pose severe security threats as users walk away without logging off from shared workstations, potentially exposing confidential information to unauthorized access. Any attempt to button up security, enforce unique user logins and comply with regulations leads to users being locked out of workstations, which results in a loss of efficiency.

With Encentuate, organizations can increase user convenience and improve information security via the most comprehensive choice of session management and fast user switching capabilities to meet the access needs of various user groups. Multiple users can share a computer simultaneously and switch across users without the need to log out or face any risk of getting locked out. Users who want their desktops to "follow them" can use Encentuate's roaming desktop support. Also, users can maintain their private desktops while sharing workstations with co-workers – they can secure their desktops when they leave and return to resume their work exactly from where they left off.

If a user walks away from a session without logging out, Encentuate can be configured to enforce inactivity timeout policies such as configurable screen locks, application logout policies, graceful logoff of all applications, and more. Encentuate also supports hybrid desktops where organizations may combine different session management capabilities to meet the needs of their user community.

Session Management is an integral component of Encentuate's Identity and Access Management Suite, combined with other functionalities such as strong authentication, single sign-on, workflow automation, auditing and user provisioning.

Deployments can be tailored area-by-area to streamline workflow on shared workstations. Various options for session management and fast user switching include:

• Fast user switching on shared desktops
  • Uses one generic Windows desktop per workstation
  • Users can quickly sign-on and sign-off to a shared kiosk without the lengthy Windows domain login process
• Fast user switching on private desktops
  • Maintains multiple unique user desktops per workstation
  • Preserves user's applications, documents, and network drive mappings
  • Supports single instance applications
• Fast user switching on roaming desktops
  • Provides unique user desktops that "roam" across workstations - leverages Windows Terminal Server or Citrix
  • Preserves user's applications, documents, and network drive mappings