What is Thin Client?
A thin client machine is going to communicate with a central processing server, meaning there is little hardware and software installed on the user's machine. At times, thin may be defined as simply not needing the software or operating system installed on the user machine. This allows all end user's systems to be centrally managed and software deployed on a central server location as opposed to installed on each individual system.
Thin clients are really best-suited to environments in which the same information is going to be accessed by the clients, making it a better solution for public environments. For this reason, thin clients are often deployed in hotels and airports, where installing software to all systems wouldn't make sense. It would be a massive headache for IT to both deploy and maintain.
When using thin clients, compared to a feature-rich desktop PCs today, they often tend to look a bit primitive and outdated. Since many thin clients run on very little hardware, it is impossible to incorporate rich graphical user interfaces. To use the client, an input device (keyboard) and viewing device (display) is usually the basic requirements. Some may not even require a mouse.
What is Thick/Fat Client?
In contrast, a thick client will provide users with more features, graphics and choices making the applications more customizable. Unlike thin clients, thick clients do not rely on a central processing server because the processing is done locally on the user system, and the server is accessed primarily for storage purposes. For that reason, thick clients often are not well-suited for public environments. To maintain a thick client, IT needs to maintain all systems for software deployment and upgrades, rather than just maintaining the applications on the server. Additionally, thick clients often require operating specific applications, again posing more work and limitations for deployment. The trade-off is a more robust and local computing environment.
What is Smart/Rich Client?
An Internet-connected device that allows the user's local applications to interact with server-based applications through the use of Web services. For example, a smart client running a word processing application can interface with a remote database over the Internet in order to collect data from the database to be used in the word processing document. Smart clients are distinguished by key characteristics:
They support work offline ?? smart clients can work with data even when they are not connected to the Internet (which distinguishes them from browser-based applications, which do not work when the device is not connected to the Internet).
Smart client applications have the ability to be deployed and updated in real time over the network from a centralized server.
Smart client applications support multiple platforms and languages because they are built on Web services.
Smart client applications can run on almost any device that has Internet connectivity, including desktops, workstations, notebooks, tablet PCs, PDAs, and mobile phones.
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