[ReignOfError]

Where I worked, each employee got a what was essentially a dumb terminal that provided a virtual Windows environment on a central server. The processes were shared, so only as many instances of Windows were created as happened to be logged on. You were assigned a certain amount of disk space on central storage.

Virtualization is a big part of the move to BYOD, and to giving users their choice of hardware platforms. A lot of companies put their core business apps and documents in a virtual machine, and leave things like messaging, e-mail and Web browsing -- and things like social networking in downtime, which isn't central to business, but keeps morale up -- local. That is where choice of platform becomes mostly irrelevant to the company, and user preference can be indulged (again, good for morale).

I used to work at a Web publisher that had its CMS in a virtual machine and things like Photoshop -- which would put a lot of strain on server resources and network speed to make it usably responsive -- local to the user.

[proxy_user]

At many places, that would not be allowed. I know that stockbrokers are not even supposed to possess a cell phone at their workplace, because they might have conversations with clients that are not recorded.