Why shouldn't firms deploy their softphones or ConnectSmart Desktop on their Virtual Desktop?

Whilst softphones will generally run just fine in any Virtual Desktop environment, VoIP is a real time application, and thus is very sensitive to network delays. Sending VoIP packets from the end user’s desktop\headset to a cloud-based server in a remote location (sometimes 100s or 1000s of kilometers away) can result in significant latency.

Can I use ConnectSmart Desktop on my Office desktop when working remotely via Remote Desktop (RDP) or similar remote access tools?

No it is not recommended.  Whilst you could control the ConnectSmart Desktop software remotely, the audio of the call will not pass through the RDP connection reliably.

Installing ConnectSmart Desktop on your laptop or Home desktop will provide a better experience.

We also recommend reading the Internet & Call Quality article when looking at working remotely.

Do major telephony vendors support Virtual Desktop environments?

Yes, leading UC vendors such as Microsoft, Cisco and Avaya have developed their own softphone clients that are optimized for use with Virtual Desktop environments.

However, most of these clients typically require the softphone to be installed on both the Virtual Desktop and the users local desktop to avoid the network latency issue described above.

Microsoft Teams running in AVD, for example, requires Teams to be installed in the AVD environment along with a number of customizations including a webrtc redirector which tells Teams that the Audio/Video is to be handled by the locally installed version of Teams whilst Call Management can be handled via Teams installed in AVD.