Southwest Florida Water Management District is one of many Citrix XenApp customers using SpeedScreen Progressive Display to give remote users an excellent user experience when accessing a highly graphical application. On August 28th, Marc Versley (Lead System Administrator) and Axel Griner (Senior GIS Analyst) of Southwest Florida Water Management District will share insights into how they have configured their XenApp PS 4.5 system to deliver ESRI ArcGIS, an integrated system for authoring, serving and using geographic information. I'm really looking forward to this webinar as Marc and Axel are planning to give us an in-depth demonstration from both an admin and end user perspective, and share some valuable tips and tricks. So if you're interested in graphical application virtualization, I encourage you to register for this webinar, scheduled for August 28th at 2pm Eastern / 11am Pacific, and learn about this topic straight from a customer who has this technology running in their production environment.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

SpeedScreen Progressive Display, introduced in XenApp PS 4.5 and also included in XenDesktop 2.0, has really "moved the needle" when it comes to remote delivery of 2D and lightweight 3D graphics. I just saw the results of a recent Citrix Customer Satisfaction Survey and was impressed to learn that 37% of our XenApp Platinum Edition customers are now using this technology! 

Compared to PS 4.0, SpeedScreen Progressive Display speeds up graphics performance by up to 15 times (see the Tolly Group's report). You've probably seen the demo on our web site which illustrates the user experience. And SpeedScreen Progressive Display lowers the cost of delivering graphics applications by dramatically reducing bandwidth consumption (up to 93%) and allowing access from low cost endpoints.   

If you're using this new graphics technology, please send me an email and let me know which applications you use with it and how big an impact you are seeing. Also, let me know if you have any suggestions for future enhancements. Based on customer input, we recently introduced an enhancement to allow users to control the compression level by means of a toolbar (see picture below); this is available as hotfix PSE450R02W2K3037 (32-bit) or PSE450R02W2K3X64012 (64-bit) for XenApp PS 4.5 HRP02. Now the Apollo multimedia virtualization team is looking at other potential enhancements to SpeedScreen Progressive Display as we integrate this feature into Apollo Accelerated Bitmap Remoting for 3D professional graphics, so we welcome your feedback and suggestions.

 
 
Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Adam Jacques gave a brilliant demonstration of project Apollo Accelerated Bitmap Remoting at Citrix's Application Delivery Conference in Melbourne, Australia. Take a look at this 5-minute video on YouTube.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Sit back and listen in as I speak with Doug Brown, Citrix Technology Professional and Microsoft MVP, about the Citrix Multimedia Virtualization Initiative and the new technologies being developed by the project Apollo team in this DABCC Radio podcast...

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Back in April we ran a poll here on The Citrix Blog to get your feedback on the quality of the audio in a sample recording. We didn't provide much background at the time, since we didn't want to bias the results. But now I'd like to tell you what this was all about.

What you were listening to was an audio sample being delivered at the Medium Quality setting in XenApp, representative of audio as it sounds without the benefit of the RAVE (Remote Audio and Video Extension) technology used in our SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration feature for DirectShow/DMO/MF streaming media playback (and currently being adapted for Flash). For most non-RAVE use cases, the Medium Quality setting provides the best balance between sound quality and bandwidth efficiency. We also offer a High Quality setting which leaves the audio uncompressed (bandwidth consumption is high) and a Low Quality setting -- which I really think we should have called "Low Bandwidth" since no one really asks for low quality -- so that anyone still on a dial-up connection can at least hear something even though the sound quality leaves a lot to be desired.

The results of the April survey are summarized in this chart:

I'm no statistician, but the distribution of ratings strikes me as unusual; not what I'd call a bell curve or "normal distribution". There were roughly equal votes cast for each possible rating.

We asked the members of our Citrix Customer Advisory Community to evaluate the same audio sample. The distribution of results was a bit different (I don't know why):

I think the good news from these two surveys is that at least 50% of listeners consider the audio quality at the Medium setting to be either acceptable or great. But of course the bad news is that for anywhere from 9% to 25% of us, Medium Quality is not usable.

So, what can you do with this information?

For one thing, now that you know that this is a sample of audio at Medium Quality, you can use this recording as a reference if you're not quite sure whether you have Medium Quality audio properly configured on your system. Accessing the blog post from a locally installed browser, you can listen to the sample and use it as a reference to compare against the audio quality on your own XenApp system.

This information is also of interest if you're thinking ahead to delivering VoIP-over-ICA. With the new audio mixing capabilities of Windows Server 2008, you may be considering publishing a softphone on XenApp and delivering VoIP-over-ICA using XenApp's bidirectional audio capability. As the various softphone ISVs achieve Windows Server 2008 Terminal Services compatibility, it should be possible to deliver VoIP-over-ICA to users on the same LAN as the XenApp server (ICA does not yet support UDP so over a WAN or Internet connection packet loss could gum up real-time voice transmission). If you can't spare the bandwidth for uncompressed High Quality bidirectional audio (roughly 1 Mbps), Medium Quality provides a good balance between sound quality and bandwidth efficiency (it uses about 40 kbps in each direction).

Remember, our audio codec doesn't even come into play if you are watching a video or listening to streaming audio using the RAVE technology in SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration. With RAVE, no decoding is done on the server; the native compressed media stream is redirected to the client and decoded there. So with RAVE you can even deliver full HD audio, with much lower bandwidth consumption than uncompressed High Quality audio.

Do you have use cases where your users would really value higher quality audio but the bandwidth consumption of the current High Quality audio setting is too high? Then I'd like to hear your feedback on the research work we've done exploring a new audio codec technology -- see my blog on Project Ulysses. Your input will help us gauge the priority of bringing that to market.  

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Did you miss the Apollo Accelerated Bitmap Remoting demo at Synergy in Houston? Click here to view a brief video recorded by Vishal Ganeriwala, featuring "yours truly" and Daniel L'Hommedieu from our Engineering team.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

The Project Apollo multimedia virtualization team has just released the first Technology Preview of Accelerated Bitmap Remoting, a new technology that leverages graphics processor hardware acceleration to efficiently deliver high end 3D professional graphics and imaging. Although most customers' graphics needs are already well met by SpeedScreen Progressive Display (a revolutionary technology introduced in XenApp Presentation Server 4.5 and also included in XenDesktop), working with large 3D graphics models often demands the added computational power of a graphics processing unit (GPU). Project Apollo follows in the footsteps of Project Pictor which developed the technology behind Citrix's new Virtual Design Studio product for applications built on the popular OpenGL graphics API. Since many software vendors are now introducing applications using DirectX, the Apollo team has been busy researching new techniques for supporting the full range of Windows-compatible 3D graphics technologies. The Apollo technology also delivers Microsoft Windows Vista Aero desktops with full "glass" effects and Flip 3D animation.

This Tech Preview release marks the completion of phase one of project Apollo, focused on verifying the ability of this technology to efficiently capture graphics from a very wide range of professional graphics applications. Optimizations to reduce network bandwidth consumption, including enabling SpeedScreen Progressive Display to work along with Accelerated Bitmap Remoting, are in the works for the next phase of the project.

If you'd like to nominate your organization to evaluate this Tech Preview release, please visit www.citrix.com/apollo and complete the application form. The Apollo web site also provides answers to frequently asked questions and information on technical prerequisites.  

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

A new Hotfix Rollup Pack for Citrix Presentation Server 4.0 has just been released that includes enhanced Flash version support. HRP05 for PS 4.0 for Windows Server 2003 (see http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX116264) has a new generic method of handling new Flash versions. HRP05 for PS 4.0 for Windows 2000 Server (see http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX116259) supports up to Flash 9f.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

I've been spending quite a bit of time digging into the topic of how to optimize the performance of Adobe Flash content (animations and videos) when using a web browser hosted on Citrix XenApp (see Parts 1, 2, 3 and 4 of this series). Here's a secret for optimizing Flash performance that will seem totally counterintuitive. Actually, this one took me by complete surprise...

From my blog post on SpeedScreen Browser Acceleration ("SpeedBrowse" for short), you might have picked up on the fact that there is an incompatibility between this feature and Flash content. Delving into this, I recently learned that if Internet Explorer running on XenApp will be used to access a web app or web site(s) with Flash content, it is best to turn SpeedBrowse off. Why?

When Internet Explorer encounters Flash content, it switches to an off-screen rendering and compositing mode. In this mode, SpeedBrowse is prevented from tracking how images get drawn onto the off-screen surface and then to the real display surface (bit block transfers). From then on, JPEG and non-transparent GIF images will be sent over the wire twice; over the SpeedBrowse virtual channel (but never used) and over ThinWire to draw them. As a result, more bandwidth is consumed than necessary.

To avoid this interaction issue, I recommend that you review how your organization uses Internet Explorer on XenApp. On servers where IE is used only to access specific web apps that don't utilize Flash, you'll want to keep SpeedBrowse enabled. But if you're publishing Internet Explorer for general web browsing or to access web applications with Flash content, I recommend turning SpeedBrowse off. This can be done at the server or farm level.

As you would expect, a mitigating hotfix is now in the works (in fact, it has already been incorporated into XenDesktop 2.0). I'll keep you posted as we make further progress on this issue.

Another option to consider (dare I go there?) is to turn Flash off. Again, you'll want to carefully consider how Internet Explorer is used in your organization before making this choice. If IE on XenApp is intended to be used just to access specific web sites, you may determine that the Flash content on those sites is not particularly important. Or, like MSN.com, the site may be designed to provide alternative content if Flash isn't available. You could then choose to turn Flash off in order to maintain the benefits of SpeedScreen Browser Acceleration. There is an article in the Citrix Knowledge Center that provides instructions for disabling Flash (document ID CTX110407).

If you have any feedback on this blog post or the others in this series, please share your comments! If you are able to measure a change in bandwidth consumption after following my recommendations above, please share your results. And I'd love to hear your views on the importance of further optimizing Flash performance and your use cases for published web browsers.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

The Apollo team is busy developing several new technologies for multimedia virtualization. Details of the upcoming Tech Preview release of Apollo Accelerated Bitmap Remoting have now been posted on the Citrix.com web site. This technology expands Citrix's capabilities for high-end professional graphics and 3D medical imaging beyond OpenGL. This video demonstrates Accelerated Bitmap Remoting delivering Autodesk Inventor, Autodesk Revit Architecture and Google Earth over ICA, leveraging the graphics processor on a Windows Vista host.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

A key part of my job as Product Strategist for Multimedia Virtualization is to stay tuned in with the evolving needs of our customers for graphics and multimedia technologies. Citrix has many different ways of collecting such market input, and your comments on my blog posts are one source that I particularly appreciate. Another highly valuable source of input is the Citrix Customer Advisory Community, a global group of customers who provide their perspectives and opinions in an online community forum. What are they saying about their needs around graphics and video?

The technology referred to most frequently in a recent dialogue with the Citrix Customer Advisory Community was streaming video. At least a third of respondents specifically mentioned Adobe Flash. Obviously - and this was no surprise - Flash has been widely adopted in the enterprise for employee training and corporate communications. And Flash content has become prevalent on the Web. Many Citrix customers are publishing a web browser or a complete Windows desktop to their users, so Flash support is becoming increasingly important to them. As I noted in my blog post Secrets for Optimizing Flash Performance - Part 2, significant improvements to Flash support were introduced in XenApp 4.5. And there's more to come. One of the priorities of the Citrix Multimedia Virtualization Initiative is to adapt our RAVE (Remote Audio and Video Extensions) technology to further optimize the delivery of Flash videos and animations while dramatically increasing server scalability. We are also looking ahead to Silverlight, an important new technology from Microsoft.

A wide variety of graphics-intensive applications were named by the Advisory Community. Several were OpenGL applications like Dassault CATIA, which will be well handled by Citrix's new Virtual Design Studio product based on our Pictor technology. Others were DirectX based applications such as Autodesk AutoCAD/Inventor and Bentley MicroStation, for which our new Apollo accelerated bitmap remoting technology will be very well suited. Customers in the Healthcare space mentioned 3D echocardiograms and high contrast CT scans that generate large graphics models requiring hardware acceleration, again a great opportunity for Apollo technology.

Customers running 2D and lightweight 3D graphics applications commented on the excellent graphics performance of XenApp Presentation Server 4.5, thanks to the new SpeedScreen Progressive Display technology. Applications mentioned included SolidWorks eDrawings, Intergraph PDS and SmartPlant, AutoCAD Map 3D and ESRI ArcGIS. SpeedScreen Progressive Display is truly a needle-mover for the vast majority of graphics applications being used by our customers today.

Some customers are using client-side application virtualization (also known as "application streaming") to deliver graphics applications. They get the benefits of centralized management and application isolation while fully leveraging the capabilities of the user's PC.

Tickers that scroll horizontally were mentioned a couple of times. Today's SuperCaching algorithm is optimized for vertical scrolling, but we've been doing some research into an enhanced algorithm that will accommodate scrolling in any direction. It will be interesting to test out the new algorithm with applications like on-screen "readerboards" that display text in this way.

What are your priorities for multimedia virtualization, including graphics, streaming media and real-time communications? What experience have you had delivering graphics applications with SpeedScreen Progressive Display? What are your plans for adopting unified communications, voice chat or desktop video conferencing ? I look forward to your comments!

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Several hotfixes to support new versions of Adobe Flash when using SpeedScreen Flash Acceleration have recently been released in hotfix rollup packs. Here's a summary of the most current hotfixes, handling Flash versions up to 9d:

• HRP2 for XenApp Presentation Server 4.5 for Windows Server 2003 32-bit Edition: PSE450W2K3R02 (see KB article CTX116289)
• HRP2 for XenApp Presentation Server 4.5 for Windows Server 2003 64-bit Edition: PSE450W2K3X64R02 (KB article CTX116294)
• HRP4 for Presentation Server 4.0 for Windows Server 2003: PSE400W2K3R04 (KB article CTX113484)
• Limited release hotfix PSE400R04W2K012 for Presentation Server 4.0 for Windows 2000 Server (KB article CTX115555)

Support for Flash 9e is in the works (see Secrets for Optimizing Flash Performance - Part 3).

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

AutoCAD Map 3D, first introduced in the mid 1990s, has become the leading engineering platform for creating and managing geospatial information, bringing together the CAD and GIS worlds so that spatial data can easily be integrated with design drawings. The software is widely used by utilities, government agencies and industries dealing with natural resources.

Citrix and Autodesk have just completed extensive verification and field testing using XenApp Presentation Server 4.5 to provide on-demand access to AutoCAD Map 3D 2009, which has now been validated as Citrix Ready. This is a great example of how Citrix multimedia virtualization technologies such as SpeedScreen Progressive Display and SpeedScreen Image Acceleration optimize the ICA protocol to provide an excellent user experience with graphical applications while increasing security and dramatically reducing management and workstation costs.

To learn more about the Citrix and Autodesk partnership and this solution, check out today's press release and this new web site: http://www.citrixandautodesk.com/.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

As more and more people experience the recent beta release of XenDesktop, the value of Citrix's ICA protocol in delivering graphics is getting a lot of notice. ICA is shining in environments where network latency puts other protocols to shame.

Here are a couple of recent video blog posts that capture the performance advantages of ICA for graphical content. The first video (click here to view) shows the simple and common task of dragging an image across the screen, as you might do when editing a PowerPoint. The second video (click here to view) shows a CAD viewing and publishing application, eDrawings from SolidWorks. These are good examples of how ICA technologies such as SpeedScreen Image Acceleration and SpeedScreen Progressive Display optimize the user experience.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

As I noted in my first blog post about optimizing Flash performance on XenApp, SpeedScreen Flash Acceleration currently checks for specific binary file names such as flash8b.ocx or flash9.ocx. Therefore, new versions of Flash require the creation of hotfixes to accommodate different binary file names. After reviewing this issue, I challenged our Engineering team to come up with an improved design. They devised a creative new solution that they predict will gracefully handle Flash updates and thus eliminate the time lag between new releases of Flash and the development of new XenApp hotfixes. That enhancement is now working its way through development and test.

In the meantime, we still need hotfixes that will look for newer Flash file names. I previously highlighted that a limited release hotfix (PSE400R03W2K3091) is available for customers with active Preferred Support Services contracts who are running XenApp Presentation Server 4.0 on Windows Server 2003 (see KB article CTX115426, login with appropriate access privileges required). Subsequently, our Support department received requests for a solution for XenApp Presentation Server 4.0 on Windows Server 2000. In response, the Life Cycle Maintenance (LCM) team has created and released hotfix PSE400R04W2K012 for PS 4.0 with HRP04 on Windows Server 2000. This limited release hotfix adds support for Adobe Flash versions 7a, 8, 8b, 9, 9c and 9d. Customers with an approved support contract can obtain the Knowledge Base article describing this new hotfix by visiting our Support web site at http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX115555 (login required) or by searching for CTX115555.

Meanwhile, Adobe has released Flash 9e (9.0.115.0). I wish I could tell you that the new hotfix handles 9e but, as Aaron Parker has already identified in his blog post on stealthpuppy.com, it doesn't. However, the wheels are in motion to create a hotfix that will handle 9e. If all goes well, this might be the one that introduces Engineering's new generic solution that isn't tied to specific binary file names. Stay tuned to this blog for further updates.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Recently I published a video blog post about RAVE (Remote Audio & Video Extensions), the technology behind SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration. RAVE supports high quality playback of media streams that can be decoded by a media player that uses DirectShow or DirectX Media Objects (DMO). A question came in from the field asking how a customer can determine whether SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration is functioning. So here are some handy tips for verifying whether RAVE is working or not. In addition, you'll find a helpful troubleshooting article in our Knowledge Center.

The quick answer is that you can probably tell by the quality of the video playback since RAVE delivers a user experience on par with running the media player locally. But here are some other telltales. When RAVE is working, a black rectangle will quickly flash by as the video begins to play. Server CPU usage will be much lower than if the video were being rendered on the server (for comparison, you can disable SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration on the console and try playing the same video). Searching for "FilterInt" in ProcessExplorer will show that DLL loaded by the media player's process.

Are there any enhancements that you would like to see to make it easier to discover that an additional codec needs to be installed on the client (or even on the server to support server-side rendering as a fallback)? For example, one possible enhancement would be for SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration to record RAVE events in the Windows Event Log.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Scott Guthrie, a VP at Microsoft, recently blogged about a new release of Silverlight that will soon be ready for beta trial. Silverlight 1 introduced a new browser-based video player supporting a JavaScript/AJAX programming model. Silverlight 2 focuses on enabling the development of Rich Internet Applications (RIAs). An important point about RIAs is that they aren't just for the Internet. Silverlight 2 will enable "rich desktop Windows applications" for the enterprise, so it is of great interest to all of us involved with the Citrix Multimedia Virtualization Initiative. Although not offering the full 3D graphics capabilities of WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation), Silverlight is a strong subset of WPF that supports "2.5D" graphics effects including transparency. The UI framework provides support for animation, layout management, controls, data binding, and more.

Visual Studio 2008 will support Silverlight 2, as it does WPF, making it very easy for ISVs and other application developers -- even non-professionals -- to create rich client applications in their choice of programming language (C#, Visual Basic, JavaScript, etc.).

The beta release is just 4.3MB and installs in less than 10 seconds. Unlike WPF, Silverlight 2 does not require the .NET framework to be installed on the client. Silverlight applications run within a browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox or Safari) but can be migrated to standalone desktop applications using WPF and the .NET framework.

No doubt Silverlight 2 will be a big topic at Microsoft's upcoming sold-out MIX08 conference in Las Vegas!

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

You may have already seen the Tolly Group's report on how SpeedScreen Progressive Display enables delivery of PACS images to healthcare workers over a variety of network types. But for me it is even more exciting to hear from customers actually experiencing this technology in the field. Recently I learned of a hospital network using XenApp 4.5 (formerly known as Presentation Server) to delivery radiography images from their Agfa IMPAX 6.2 image and information management system. I haven't asked permission to publish the name of the customer but I can share their observations with you. Interestingly, IMPAX 6 is billed by Agfa as a web-deployable PACS system since it offers a Java plug-in for Internet Explorer, yet the hospital found that performance over their WAN is significantly better using XenApp to publish the IMPAX application (Win32). On Windows XP PCs with at least a Pentium III processor and 256 MB of RAM (the oldest production PCs still in service across the 7,000 PCs on their network), performance is "exceptional". In fact, XenApp has successfully delivered "cine loops" where a series of up to 300 splices of a CT scan is displayed at 27 frames per second -- a very challenging use case! These observations were made with the users situated 5 miles down the road from the hospital's data center, connected over a gigabit network and through a 10 Mbps switch.

Have you started using SpeedScreen Progressive Display in your business? If so, please post a comment or send me an email.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

Remember the great demo video of OpenGL graphics acceleration that Lee Laborczfalvi did for us at the iForum App Delivery Expo? Project Pictor has come a long way since. The Pictor technology has been incorporated into a new Citrix product called Virtual Design Studio. And the beta program for Virtual Design Studio has now been announced. Citrix is now inviting customers in the Manufacturing sector who use Dassault CATIA v5 to participate in our White Glove Beta Program, scheduled to run from April 15 through June 30, 2008. For details, check out the beta invitation on our corporate web site.

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

In recent years, we've seen widespread adoption of video streaming in the enterprise. Typical uses include employee training and corporate communications. In this 10-minute video, Citrix engineer Aureliano Lopez-Martin demonstrates SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration and explains how Citrix's RAVE (Remote Audio & Video Extensions) technology delivers video streaming with excellent quality -- including High Definition -- and very high server scalability.

To set the stage, consider the two basic alternative approaches to delivering streaming media from a centralized application or desktop delivery system. You can either render the video centrally and send it in a standardized compressed format to the client, or you can decode the native compressed media stream on the client device using the appropriate codec. Each approach has advantages and disadvantages.

Recently, I posted a video of Vista Aero Remoting, a technology currently being developed under project Apollo. The Apollo Vista Aero Remoting technology takes a generic approach to delivering whatever appears on the user's virtual desktop. The beauty of that approach is that it delivers a "full fidelity" user experience for whatever the user needs to view on the screen, whether it is a Flash or Windows Media video, a next-generation Windows application written in WPF or Silverlight, or any other application technology.

The RAVE technology behind SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration is an optimization specifically for streaming video and audio. It leverages client-side resources to increase server scalability (the number of concurrent users) and thereby reduce the cost per user. Take a look at this video and you'll learn about the advantages and requirements of the RAVE approach and get a glimpse into the future of this innovative technology. 

Derek Thorslund
Product Strategist, Multimedia Virtualization

(Click to hear Aureliano Lopez-Martin explain the RAVE technology behind SpeedScreen Multimedia Acceleration)