A
personal computer or
workstation
which has neither a
hard disk nor
floppy disk drive and
which performs all file access via a
local area network
connection to a
file server. The lowest level
bootstrap
code is stored in
non-volatile storage. This uses a simple
protocol such as
BOOTP to request and
download more
sophisticated boot code and eventually, the
operating system.
The archtypal product was the
3Station developed by Bob
Metcalfe at
3Com. Another example was the
Sun 3/50.
Diskless workstations are ideal when many users are running
the same application. They are small, quiet, more reliable
than products with disks, and help prevent both the theft of
data and the introduction of viruses since the software and
data available on them is controlled by the network
administrator or system administrator. They do however rely
on a server which becomes a disadvantage if it is heavily
loaded or
down.
See also
breath-of-life packet.