Cucumbers and Thin Clients

...seki a le kama o kukama

Chances are that if you follow a health professional/nutritionist who advocates vegetables and fruits - like lemon cucumbers - as some of the most effective foods that assure weight loss and health, you will most likely end up being thin. Hence a “thin client”.
Today at work I was snacking on lemon cucumbers (picture) and it brought back memories of one of my Dad’s favorites - oka kukama (briny cucumber slices). And became one of mine too.
To the best of my recollection there were no lemon cucumbers in Samoa when I was growing up (even today maybe). There were only the regular tubular ones.  My Dad would pare the skin in stripe pattern and lengthwise (so some skin is left unpeeled), then with a fork scrape the full length (to date I still don’t why...lol) slice it round, then put the slices in a bowl of salted water and let it stand for several minutes.

So at work, this sweet lady brings lemon cucumbers from her garden (Yay, Ooorrrganic!) and shares them with fellow office employees.  And so for someone who had started eating cucumbers as a little boy, I just couldn't wait to savor these fresh organic ones - like in Samoa.  But instead of salt water, as my Dad had done, I just sprinkle salt on the slices and eat them. Fortunately, we have all the kitchen utensils and supplies in our office so I didn't have to wait to get home to pare and eat these saporous kukama ...seki a le 'kama! lol...

And now to a different but real thin client.  The computer!  What? Yes that’s a computer (the small/thin black box above)... had it for a year now.  For many big companies/corporations with hundreds or thousands of employees and with offices world-wide, they already have or will certainly migrate to a thin client computing system, as opposed to the desktop PC system.  I’ve seen some Wal-Mart stores already using thin clients.  Below is a brief description from the Devon IT website - a company that makes thin clients (hardware and software):

a typical thin client setup

A thin client is a stateless, fanless desktop terminal that has no hard drive. All features typically found on the desktop PC, including applications, sensitive data, memory, etc., are stored back in the data center when using a thin client.
A thin client running Remote Desktop Protocols (RDP), like Citrix ICA and Windows Terminal Services, and/or virtualization software, accesses hard drives in the data center stored on servers, blades, etc. Thin clients, software services, and backend hardware make up thin client computing, a virtual desktop computing model.
Thin clients are used as a PC replacement technology to help customers immediately access any virtual desktop or virtualized application. Thin clients provide businesses a cost-effective way to create a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). Thin clients are utilized in various industries and enterprises worldwide that all have different requirements but share common goals. The cost, security, manageability, and scalability benefits of thin clients are all reasons that IT personnel are exploring –and switching– to thin clients.
Cost-wise, the price per seat of a thin client deployment has dropped to the point where it is more cost effective than regular PCs. This has been a claim that many in the thin client industry have made in the past, but the fact is that the technology that has been developed within the past year has made it a definitive reality.

So if you work for a big company or corporation, a thin client is coming soon to a desktop near you - if it’s not already there...sans the cucumbers though :)

Note: If you want to save some files “locally” you’d have to use a USB flash/thumb drive, or if on a CD, you need an external CD-ROM drive.