Virtual Architect

Quest released Quest vWorkspace 7.1. In this new release it introduces WAN acceleration (EOP Xtream) a piece of (patented) technology to accelerate RDP and EOP traffic on WAN links. This feature is enabled with RDP-pass-through mode by default (port 3389) so no extra firewall configuration is required.

Other enhancements in this version are:

• advanced integration with Microsoft Remote Desktop Services
• Support for Microsoft differencing disks (SCVMM integration)
• Workload evaluators for Hyper-V Hosts
  You can now load balance between multiple host servers in one desktop group, using customized workload evaluators.
• Expanded Sysprep support
  • The ability to Sysprep an SCVMM virtual computer using the
  vWorkspace Sysprep Customization wizard has been added with
  this release.
  • The Sysprep process for Microsoft Windows 7, Microsoft Vista,
  and Microsoft Windows Server 2008 computers can now be
  completed by the Sysprep Customizations wizard, no longer
  requiring you to alter and import an unattend.xml file.
  • The alternative method for initiating Sysprep on VMware
  computers has been added to the Sysprep Customization wizard
  as the Execution Mode setting
• RemoteApp support
  Microsoft RemoteApp support for Hyper-V virtual desktops and RD
  Session Hosts/Terminal Servers has been added enabling the
  publishing of individual applications using Microsoft’s RemoteApp
  technology on access devices.
• Flash redirection (improved)
• USB redirection (now also for x64 versions of MS Windows)
• vWorkspace Connector for Java (new name, added graphic acceleration)
• vWorkspace Management Console (several improvements)
• Deferred Authentication
  Pass-through enabled for specific windows/applications when not authenticated to allow a user to change it’s password when it becomes expired
• Optional One-Session-Per-User within a Farm
  This feature is important in healthcare for moving between stations
  without disconnecting the session.
• Support for Microsoft Application Virtualization
  Microsoft Application Virtualization APP-V 4.6 is now supported
• Internet Explorer Redirection (Experimental)
  Redirects IE-traffic from the server to the client (PNtools have to be installed + a couple of reg-entries)

Watch a demo of the new EOP Xtream here (click picture):

On Wednesday april 7th I joined 1000 other people at the combined Partner Exchange and Solution Seminar by Citrix Benelux in Bussum (NL).

The seminar was focused on desktop virtualization and unfortunately for abroad readers all sessions where in Dutch (NL).

All the sessions where recorded and are available for playback at http://www.citrixpartnerexchange.com/Downloads

The sessions I attended:

1. Keynote ‘Rethink the desktop’ by Peter van Leest (video pdf)

2. What’s next for XenApp and beyond by Andreas van Wingerden (video | pdf )

3. Synergy Berlin by Ed Bezooijen (video)

4. Migrating you XenApp implementation to a virtual desktop architecture – the easy way! by Jan Christoffels (video | powerpoint)

5. XenDesktop: Delivery of pooled and assigned virtual desktops including advanced Desktop Group Management by Martijn Bosschaart and Albert Kramer (video | powerpoint)

6. Take you virtual desktops with you – XenClient makes XenDesktop mobile by Stefan Pieters and Martijn Bosschaart (powerpoint)

There was a fuzz on the release date which was mentioned. This presentation is the only session not available on video, luckily I brought my Flip Mino . Below is the piece about the release date:

7. Making IT as easy as iTunes by Andreas van Wingerden (video)
In this presentation there was quite some time reserved for a demo with the Citrix Receiver for iPad and XenDesktop see pictures below (XP on iPad).
 

It was a useful day and nice to meet some peers!

 

Last week I did a post on the Teradici PCoIP Management Console where I mentioned the management console being restricted to only Firefox as browser.

Yesterday I got a comment on that post from the Andrew Naiberg, Management Console Product Manager at Teradici. In his comment he pointed out that the latest version of the Management Console (1.2.2) supports Internet Explorer 7 and 8 in addition to Firefox 3.0 and 3.5.

Nice I thought, so I went to the Wyse download page to see if this new version arrived already. No luck at Wyse, so fired up google to see if the mentioned version was available somewhere else on the web. Unfortunately the only version I could find was the version I already downloaded and tried.

After the Easter holidays (today), I resumed my laptop and was closing all the open internet explorer sessions I left open since my last activity on my laptop. Suddenly I came across the download page from Wyse and without any expectations and just out of curiosity I hit the F5 button to see if the new version was available.

Guess what? The new version of both the P20 firmware and the Teradici PCoIP Management Console are available with a date of availability set on the 5th of April.

Besides a new Management Console version also a new version of the P20 firmware is available. Reading through the release notes of the P20 firmware I want to share some of the new features and fixes that are available with the new firmware.

Important new features in conjunction with VMware View:

• Added support for Windows® 7
• Added experimental support for pre-session secure user authentication via smart card (CAC only). This feature may only be used in conjunction with VMware View™ 4.5 and above. <- Nice!
• Add local cursor/keyboard support. This feature allows users to operate PCoIP sessions over a long latency network connection. The software package is available for Windows 7, Windows Vista® and Windows® XP 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems.
• Increased the maximum number of domains displayed when connecting to a VMware View Connection Server from 5 to 100.
• Added support for a large number of European keyboard layouts

Bug fixes:

• Fixed problem that prevents the zero client from establishing an RDP session with a Windows 7 desktop.
• Fixed problem that prevents zero clients from completing the SSL handshake process with VMware View Connection Servers using extended validation certificates.
• Fixed problem that prevents zero clients from connecting with VMware View Connection Servers that have optionally enabled smart cards.
• Fixed problem where the network loss overlay was sometimes not displayed on zero client devices loaded with firmware release 3.0.
• Added support for configuring the following setting via the CMI interface, which is used by the PCoIP Management Console.
  • Session encryption type
  • Host Driver Function

The biggest change in the PCoIP Management Console is the ability to use Internet Explorer 7 and 8 browsers in addition to Firefox 3 and 3.5. Besides that the changes and updates to the management console are minimal, so here are some minimal highlights. Because the firmware version numbering is now changed to a three digit version number, all version numbers including the older ones are now in three digits. Besides the digits, devices now have a colour code attached, devices are shown in green when online and in red when offline.

The user manual of the management console now contains a section on how to run the MC on ESX, it tells you to use vCenter Converter. Standard the MC is delivered as an VMware player Virtual Machine.

Reading the post from Andrew Sharrock about the Wyse P20 and the management of it, I came across the Teradici PCoIP Management Console provided by Wyse.

Maybe I’m duplicating some of Andrew’s post, but these are the steps I made (and screenshots from my environment) when I configured the client with the Teradici PCoIP Management Console.

First I downloaded the management console: a zip file containing vmware virtual machine files (vmx & vmdk). Next I imported the prepped virtual machine (, using the vCenter converter plugin. The conversion is needed because they assume that you will run the VM with VMware Player.

The import is very straight forward and after turning it on you will see a basic menu in the console stating that you can access the web interface at a given ip-adress. You can also alter things like the hostname, IP (dhcp=standard), the password for the web interface (which is blank by default) and more…

Next I fired up my IE8-browser and typed the web interface adress into the adress bar of IE8. To my surprise I got the message my browser was not supported. It even tells me what browser to use: Firefox 3

Google Chrome also does not work, changed to another machine and started up Firefox (3.5.5) from there and it worked. The first thing the web interface comes up with is a license agreement you will have to agree to.

When the you agree to the license agreement the web console does appear, which has a nice design and looks very usable at first sight.

I noticed that it had discovered my client (portal) right away when I first looked at the web interface. The other thing I noticed was the option to use SRV records for the Management Console and the Connection Broker, i’ll take a look at that another time maybe.

On the DEVICES tab I clicked the device and it gives you all the options you can set and save in a profile to manage groups of thin/zero PCoIP clients.

Browsing through the settings I noticed that it detected the hardware connected to the PCoIP terminal e.g. mouse and monitor.

The first thing to configure will be the View Manager Server (connection broker), to do this you first have to create a (device) group (or use default group) with a profile and add the device to it. The groups profile can then be modified to contain the setting for the View Manager Server. After modifying the profile apply the profile to the device or all devices and your settings are effective.

Back to the start screen of the device management tab you can see that the device is not belonging to a group yet.

Select the device and choose a group from the drop down box and hit “Add”, this adds the device to the chosen group. Next is the profile.

Now a profile has to be created and assigned to the default group, to do that click on the profile tab and click “add new”.

When the profile is ready click on “Set Properties” to be able to enter the settings for the device like the IP/hostname for the View Manager etc.

Now you’ve set the right properties, the group has to be configured to use this profile.

When the group change is saved the group properties (profile application status) show whether the profile is applied or not, if necessary click “apply profile”.

After applying the profile to the group the thin client configured, you can tell the device or group of devices to reset in order to try to connect with the new settings using the POWER tab from the management console.