Expert Insights

Here is a quick blog around migrating Citrix Session Recording Databases to a new SQL server. This is only a single instance and it's not load balanced. It's a very basic configuration and I wanted to go into the CTX article a bit more. 1. Stop the Services on your recording server. 2. Take a full backup of existing Session Recording databases (SessionRecording and SessionRecordingLogging).   3. Copy backed up databased to the new SQL server.   4. Restore Session recording ...

As many of you know from my recent blogs, I am using Nutanix AOS/AHV for my Citrix environment. Before, I used VMware 100% for all workloads, including XenApp (Virtual Apps) and VDI (Virtual desktops). However, I needed to move the delivery controllers, Storefront, and all the Citrix Infrastructure pieces that make Citrix work to the Nutanix Cluster. At the time, I wasn't sure how to go about this. Good thing for me, Nutanix already accounted for this and has a product called Nutanix Move. Nutanix ...

Sustainable Citrix Implementations Watch Now: "Best Practices for Sustainable Citrix Implementation" with Owen Reynolds.   I recently returned as a consultant for a client that I was working for in 2020, and it's inspired this piece. The reason being, I realized I'd left some items in place that should have been removed and had confused the local staff. This is a common scenario; where you are the trusted expert for an implementation as an SME, but don't fully hand off to other people ...

Create a Start Menu for RDSH Users - Part I   You all know the challenge on a RDSH Windows Server 2019 to turn the start menu into a suitable start menu for the users. Without making any changes, users get a start menu that is fine for administrators, but not for normal users. Unfortunately, Microsoft only offers a few options for making changes to the start menu with standard tools like group policies. In this post, I will show you how to create a start menu for your RDSH users. Part II deals ...

How to Check the MS Teams Optimization State The situation   Many of us now use MS Teams on Citrix desktops (also because of Covid-19). For MS Teams to run satisfactorily, the “Citrix Teams optimization” should always be active. This isn’t always the case, often the client is not ready for the optimization or requirements are missing, especially on Linux clients. It is very difficult for the user to recognize whether MS Teams is running optimally, the normal way would be this:     ...

About three years ago, I posted a blog about how to perform an unattended installation and configuration of Citrix StoreFront with Ivanti Automation. It did the installation, the creation of a new store and it added a second StoreFront server to the server group. Since most organizations are stepping away from (still awesome) tools like Ivanti Automation and are moving towards solutions like Puppet , Ansible , Chocolatey , Packer , plain PowerShell, etc., I wanted to create a PowerShell script ...

In this article, I would like to show you how easy it is to deploy applications from the Citrix Cloud using Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops Service based on Windows Virtual Desktop. While I will only cover basic deployment in my article, I think it gives a very good impression that Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops service even simplifies Windows Virtual Desktop deployment for both desktops and apps. In preparation for this article, I have already created a Tenant in Citrix Cloud and installed a ...

Intro I have been working with Citrix deployments for many years, and the primary aspect of these environments is change. You could add a new software package to thousands of users or fresh your server hardware. Collecting and tracking performance metrics over time helps you to understand how these changes affect your user capacity and user experience. In this post, we will discuss how to record and display daily unique users and sessions accessing your Citrix environment. We will query the Citrix ...

Citrix Microapps service launched in 2019 and saw a realization of the value brought by the acquisition of Sapho in late 2018. Microapps help to reduce complexity involved with everyday processes in order to drive productivity gains. If you’re not familiar, it is well worth checking out the overview from Citrix. In this post, we will focus on one of the latest continuous innovations added from the Microapps team to the cloud service – the general availability of the Connector Appliance for connecting ...

Citrix ADC as RDS Gateway with RDS Broker You want to use Citrix ADC as RDS Gateway with an RDS Broker for your RDS Farm? In this article I will show you how to configure this. As a basis for this article you should read the following article if possible: https://www.mycugc.org/blogs/thomas-preischl1/2020/03/05/how-to-quickly-and-easily-provide-home-office-work In this article, you will learn how to set up the Citrix ADC for use as a proxy for Remote Desktop Services. This configuration ...

Intro I have been working with Citrix deployments for many years, and the primary aspect of these environments is change. You could add a new software package to thousands of users or refresh your server hardware. Collecting and tracking performance metrics over time helps you to understand how these changes affect your user capacity and user experience. In this post, we'll discuss how to record and display new users connecting to your Citrix environment. Unlike the other articles in this series, ...

A few years ago, I was thinking about which path I should take in my IT career. My key competencies had been clear for some time. During and after my apprenticeship at my employer ANAXCO GmbH , I was on several instructor-led Citrix classroom courses. One of my main tasks in our company is the design and configuration of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops Sites (formerly XenApp & XenDesktop farms) for the provisioning of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 / 2012 / 365. There is a reason our company's name ...

Intro I have been working with Citrix deployments for many years, and the primary aspect of these environments is change. You could add a new software package to thousands of users or refresh your server hardware. Collecting and tracking performance metrics over time helps you to understand how these changes affect your user capacity and user experience. In this post, we'll discuss Application Launches ( specifically, hosted application usage ). Note: This post assumes you are running Citrix ...

A macro scale of organisations are now in a situation of enabling remote (flexible) working styles at pace with the outbreak of COVID-19 throughout Europe. As a Londoner, I have noticed a huge difference in the volume of people’s movement, starting last week Monday. Employees are shifting to a new workplace operating model at home and, are likely to be at home until the start of the Spring time frame (maybe longer–though I hope NOT). Even organisations who must abide by regulatory compliance frameworks ...

Intro I have been working with Citrix deployments for many years, and the primary aspect of these environments is change. You could add a new software package to thousands of users or fresh your server hardware. Collecting and tracking performance metrics over time helps you to understand how these changes affect your user capacity and user experience. In this post, we'll discuss Logon Performance. Note: This post assumes you are running Citrix Director (pics are from ver 7.15 and have access ...

As a result of increasing projects, here is a small How To with the following points: SAML Authentication (Azure AD as IdP & Citrix Gateway as SP) Citrix Federated Authentication Service (FAS) Microsoft Azure Multi-Factor-Authentication with Conditional Access Requirements Fully working Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktop Environment (StoreFront & DDC Minimum Version 7.9) Citrix ADC with successful base configuration & activated Enterprise ...

Intro I have been working with Citrix environments for many years, and the primary aspect of these environments is change. You could add a new software package for thousands of users or refresh your server hardware. Collecting and tracking performance metrics over time helps you to understand how these changes affect your user capacity and user experience. In this post, we'll discuss Concurrent Sessions. Note: This post assumes you are running Citrix Director (pics are from verSION 7.15 and have ...

Important Info: The scheduled update ( ADV190023 ), regarding LDAP Signing and Channel Binding for new and existing domain controllers, scheduled for March 10, 2020, has been postponed to the second half of calendar year 2020. The March 2020 update will only provide additional auditing capabilities to identify and configure LDAP systems before they become inaccessible with the later update. The later update results in no more connections to the domain controller, via unsigned / Clear Text ...

Everyone is currently talking about COVID-19. In view of the current rapid spread and the danger of infection, many companies are reacting. They want to protect their employees, customers and partners. The most obvious solution in this case is to provide employees with access to their workplace from home. But how is it possible to do this in a simple and fast way without a comprehensive project or a virtual desktop environment?  A simple and very effective way is to give users access via a Citrix ...

The Future of Work is Today NOT Tomorrow Part 3: Keeping Productive in a Modern World Hi folks, this is the third post in my blog series on “The Future of Work is Today NOT tomorrow.” My first two posts are available at The Future of Work is Today NOT Tomorrow Part 1  and  The Future of Work is Today NOT Tomorrow Part 2 . I spoke in my previous post about my new way of flexible working in 2019, which has two primary personas. The "creator" persona accounts for up to 12-17% of my workspace on ...