Nowadays, operators can access only a certain part of the required information from their workplace, forcing them to physically change between different positions, having on each of them with one or more keyboards and mice to be able to control different systems and equipment. These changes that adapt and normalize over the time significantly reduce effectiveness of the operator causing delays in the evaluation of a situation and potencially, making bad decisions.
At all places, an attempt is always made to identify the area or areas for improvement and to select process improvement actions with the objective of achieving high efficiency and productivity. This is something that every company wants, since it allow them to achieve the best results.
Why to invest in dynamic KVM in the control center?
The same happens in control centers, where the amount of information they manage and that they need to display or operate to make decisions is unimaginable; open or close a valve, correctly detect an instruction or equipment without connection or signal, display an alarm for a system, etc. Everything is critical, important and crucial. Therefore, operators need more dynamic, ergonomic, flexible and collaborative solutions that allow them to have an absolute control of all situations that may arise and that are healthy.
State-of-the-art dynamic KVM systems on the market today offer a more flexible display to manage and control equipmens and information sources with a sigle keyboard and mouse. Technology must enable integration between operator, supervisor, crisis room and display systems, as well as interaction with physical and virtual meeting rooms.
DeskWall is one of this dynamic KVM that we have mentioned and that integrates much more flexible display functions to manage and control the different types of informations signal and systems with the aim of achieving a graphical control interface with the ability to display, manage and share several images from different sources with a single keyboard and mouse, thus optimizing the performance of operator and better situational control in up to 12K display space.
Also, it offers the possibility of differentiate access rights for system operators and the ability to create scenarios for demo and quick editing.
Instant access to feeds makes easy to organize all their apps, programms, web services, streaming feeds, remote sources, virtual machines and widgets or social media feeds. This allows the operator to react faster to critical situations by customizing their work area for maximum efficiency. For example, they can put essential sources in front and supporting information on their peripheral view.
A clear example of flexibility, adaptability and efficiency is the “Follow Me” function, which loads the permissions, accesses and workspaces wherever the operator logs in. These permissions and accesses are transferred to the work position that the operator is and is not tied to working in a specific place. So, all his preferred apps and signals will be loaded in his predefined locations.
Summing up, DeskWall allows them to have an inmediate loading personal workspace that allows the operator to be more efficient by offering a canvas where they can create a personal workspace and customize the grids according to display needs and type of sources.
In which dynamic KVM rely?
The market offer is varied both in terms of quality and prices, so once you have decided to invest in a dynamic KVM for managing the information sources of the control center, how do you know what to look for to make the decision? Next, we leave some aspects to consider:
- It offers a truly intuitive and task-oriented work environment, thus increasing the efficiency of the operator.
- It avoids switching between screens, computers, mice and keyboards to see specific information: everything is available within the same pixel space.
- The operator only has to click to activate the necessary information or source allowing a quick decision-making.
- There should be no limit to information sources, and adding sources or systems must be a quick and intuitive process.
- It must be a 100% secure system and offering secure access to any app through security networks.
We can not stopp recommending the implementation of DeskWall in the control room, since it has all the necessary measures to guarantee the most demanding security policies, as it is a closed system. Running on a secure system and a Linux sealed version, it is much more secure than Windows-based thin client systems, even though it is designed to run 24/7. In addition, being based on a distributed database system that can be used to reduce the configuration to a single computer, it will automatically and instantly synchronize this configuration with each unit in the group.
Being able to create user roles, opertator profiles, supervisor, managers, log accesses or records makes the possibilities of managing and administering access to information sources infinite, thus controlling access, viewing and control of these. All these users can share any of their windows with another user or group of users instantly or even give permission to others to interact remotely with it.
Success in the implementation of avant-garde dynamic KVM in control centers
An avant-gard dynamic KVM gives to operations analysts in Network Operations (NOC) o Centros de Operaciones de Seguridad (SOC) with an ergonomically optimized and integrated workspace with multiple information sources throughout several locations and systems.
As an analyst in a corporate operations center, it is needed to be able to monitor and control several dynamic sources of information such as network status, links, web apps, network services, control of remote computers from different operating systems, control servers, asset data, access control, security systems, and more.
The way this information is presented to you is crucial to knowing how well situational awareness is maintained, incidents managed and timely response support provided, plus it can prevent poor quality and stability of operations. communications in different communities, states or cities.
Slowly accessible information and a non-ergonomic workspace can make it difficult to respond accurately and efficiently, resulting in a lower quality of decision support. That’s why having a workflow that provides operations center operators with a single, customized interface to easily view and access disparate applications and networks, remote desktops, and video streams from different sites is critical. Thus, all the relevant information can be consulted and manipulated within a single workspace, with all the systems within easy reach.
Another example is the operator of a public security command and control center, who needs maximum knowledge of the situation to make decisions at any time, involving communications, systems of inforamtion, surveillance and collaboration. However, the quality and efficiency of their decisions depends on the ease and security in which information can be easily accessed and biased access to the situation can easily result in inaccurate decisions or, even worse, in a failed mission.
With a KVM like DeskWall, the operator can regain control over critical information from different information and communication sources by offering a single and personalized view and secure access to apps and sources of information.
An important point in these environments is the control and access to information by permission levels, since the user level ensures that only those who have authorization and is relevant to their mission see the information, avoiding unauthorized access to sensitive information. As mentioned before, DeskWall meets high cibersecurity standards and has been proven reliable in various industry and government accepted vulnerability scans, thus making it easy to organize permissions and access.
As a summary of all the aforementioned, the key and important points that a dynamic KVM must have:
- Have dynamic posistions that allow the development of custom designs to the needs of the information managed by each user.
- Offer maximum agility and efficiency.
- Give priority to information security.
- Guarantee the highest security and redundancy levels in all operational positions in a 24/7 service.
- Increase the comfort and ergonomics of all control positions.
- Drastically reduce the equipment and installed peripheral, since each operator should be able to manage several information sources on a multi-canvas made up of one or various monitors of different sizes and resolutions with a single keyboard and mouse.