If you currently manage a Platinum appliance, or are considering migrating to this platform in the future, it is recommended that you take the next step towards optimal Web application delivery with advanced NetScaler training: CNS-300-1I Advanced Administration for Citrix NetScaler 9.0 Platinum Edition

Upon successful completion of this course, you will have the expert knowledge required to:

• Identify common Web attacks and vulnerabilities
• Write PERL compatible regular expressions
• Configure Citrix Application Firewall 9.0 to protect Web applications
• Troubleshoot Citrix Application Firewall 9.0
• Install and configure Citrix EdgeSight for NetScaler to monitor Web application performance
• Install, configure and use Citrix Command Center to manage NetScaler devices
• Configure and use additional advanced features of NetScaler 9.0 including NetScaler Web
• Logging, HTTP Callout and AAA authentication for Web applications

Register Now
Cost: $4,995 USD
Duration: 5 days
Upcoming Q4 2009 Dates: November 2-6 (San Francisco, CA); November 2-6 (Instructor-led Online); December 14-18 (Instructor-led Online)

Questions? Contact a Citrix Education training specialist at 866-714-1260 or e-mail americaseducation@citrix.com

With the release of Feature Pack 2, the EdgeSight team has made some updates to both EdgeSight and EdgeSight for Load Testing. The key updates include;

EdgeSight 5.2 (for XenApp, Endpoints, and Virtual Desktops):

• Additional support for XenDesktop - Farm-wide monitoring and troubleshooting of virtual and physical desktops
• Support for the latest Citrix Receiver - Service Monitoring plug-in
• Microsoft Systems Center Operation Manager (MS SCOM) Support - Management pack connector
• Additional Operating System support - Windows 7
• New summary reports - XenApp, XenDesktop

EdgeSight for Load Testing 3.6:

• Service-based architecture - Easier to manage and does not require logged-in users for running the launchers
• Enhanced application security - When replaying scripts, allows for a basic level of authentication
• Intelligent Load Control - Ability to sense script execution & delays, and adjust accordingly (Introduced in 3.5)
• Xen Counters - Exposure of performance issues when XenApp is running on XenServer (Introduced in 3.5)

I've recorded a short video which gives a little more detail and a few screenshots in regards to the new EdgeSight functionality which you can find at http://www.citrix.com/tv/#videos/1164. In addition, there is a short ESLT 3.5 video from a month or so ago detailing those new features which is available at http://www.citrix.com/tv/#videos/666

Learn more about Citrix XenApp 5 Feature Pack 2

• Official Press Release - http://citrix.com/English/NE/news/news.asp?newsID=1857726
• XenApp 5 Feature Pack 2 release Web Site - http://citrix.com/xenapp/featurepack2
• XenApp 5 Feature Pack 2 Executive Video - http://citrix.com/xenapp/fp2/video
• XenApp Expert Series videos for this release - http://citrix.com/xenapp/fp2/expertseries
• XenApp 5 Feature Pack 2 Blogs- http://community.citrix.com/blogs/tag/xa5fp2
• Download XenApp technology previews - http://citrix.com/xenapp/techpreviews
• XenApp Product Page - http://citrix.com/xenapp/

Follow XenApp on | | |

When Citrix XenDesktop is brought up in conversation, it is most often in reference to being deployed with a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solution. But XenDesktop is not limited to delivering only virtual desktops - XenDesktop delivers an exceptional user experience with physical desktops just as well. In fact, organizations still utilize physical desktops instead of virtual desktops for niche roles, such as for dedicated, resource-intensive applications like computer-aided design (CAD) and financial trading. Blade PC hardware is often chosen for its benefits in satisfying security requirements, providing desktop hardware consolidation and in serving as a dedicated, high-performance machine. As we discuss in this post, XenDesktop is a perfect pairing for a Blade PC environment and our design considerations whitepaper provides information to IT professionals seeking a smooth deployment.

In this XenDesktop on Blade PCs Design Considerations whitepaper, we provide our experiences from implementing XenDesktop on HP Blade PC hardware within the Worldwide Consulting Solutions lab at Citrix headquarters in Ft. Lauderdale. Within the document, you will find topics such as: 

• The direct applicability of key components of XenDesktop Platinum to Blade PCs, including XenApp, Provisioning Services and EdgeSight for EndPoints.
• A high-level architecture describing the Provisioning Services streaming process to Blade PCs and user access to the XenDesktop environment.
• Setup considerations and configuration information for implementing each XenDesktop component, including the Desktop Delivery Controller, the various Citrix desktop clients, Provisioning Services vDisk creation, management of a Blade PC environment, and more.
• Other in-depth, technical tips for administrators setting up and working with XenDesktop on a Blade PC environment.

Citrix XenDesktop already comes with Blade PCs from vendors. Try out additional XenDesktop features on your Blade PCs and experience the clear benefits for your organization.

I'm pleased to announce that we have just released a new version of the Brief Troubleshooting Guide (BTG) via the Knowledge Center.
http://support.citrix.com/article/ctx106727

For those of you unaware, the Brief Troubleshooting Guide is intended as the first resource for Citrix Administrators/Engineers to troubleshooting technical issues for all Citrix products/technologies. The BTG gives guidance on where to start if a Citrix Administrator/Engineer is not very familiar with the product. The BTG is not in any way supposed to be comprehensive, but will help you gather the right information quickly, allowing YOU and Citrix Technical Support to resolve your issue promptly.

This release of the BTG is Bigger, Better and Bursting with new ways to help you troubleshoot all Citrix products.
All sections of the BTG were completely overhauled and lots of new products were added, for example:

• Citrix Offline App Plug-in
• Citrix Receiver for Windows
• Citrix XenServer
• Citrix Repeater Client
• Command Center
• EdgeSight for NetScaler
• EdgeSight for Load Testing
• Citrix User Profile Manager
• Citrix EasyCall
• Provisioning Services for Datacenters and Desktops
• Workflow Studio

Please download the latest BTG from http://support.citrix.com/article/ctx106727
For feedback, suggestions, corrections - BTG@citrix.com

David
Twitter: citrixreadiness

With Citrix Synergy fast approaching, it's time to get the word out on an exciting addition to the Citrix Booth.  This year we've carved out an area where attendees can go deep (very deep) with not only Citrix product architects and gurus, but industry experts from Intel, Marathon and Oracle.  Our experts have been prepped that no question on the topic of the hour is too technical; so bring your implementation questions, and we'll whiteboard up best practice solutions to get you moving toward a successful deployment. 

Our schedule runs whenever the Expo hall is open, so please come by and try to stump our experts.  As you can see, we have some meaty topics for your enjoyment.

~~~~~

Ask the Experts Schedule

Sunday May 3^rd

7:00 PM - To VPN or not to VPN

7:45 PM - Citrix XenServer on Intel® Server Products: Your recipe for Virtualization Success

8:30 PM - EdgeSight Scalability and Resiliency

9:15 PM - How XenDesktop Works

Monday May 4^th

7:00 PM - Supporting External Users with Smart Card Authentication

7:45 PM - HA Design Decisions in Virtualized Environments

8:30 PM - Considerations to Maximize XenDesktop Performance

9:15 PM - Real-World PVS Deployment Considerations

Tuesday May 5^th

12:30 PM - StorageLink Deployment Considerations

1:15 PM - Delivering Oracle Applications with Citrix XenApp and Citrix NetScaler

2:00 PM - Deploying Branch Repeater and Access Gateway Plugins

2:45 PM - XenApp Server Scalability

Wednesday May 6^th

12:30 PM - XenApp Application Streaming Deep Dive

1:15 PM - Fault Tolerant SAP Delivery with the Citrix Delivery Center

2:00 PM - Leveraging NetScaler for Disaster Recovery

2:45 PM - Deploying Branch Repeater for XenApp 

In this next two minute video screencast posted on UTipu, James Millington covers a great new feature of EdgeSight 5 - the user Troubleshooter.

James Millington has made a new video screencast on UTipu that outlines the changes in the user interface for EdgeSight 5. Watch the five minute screencast with James below.

In my eight and a half years at Citrix, one constant I have seen in successful large rollouts is extensive detailed testing both during a pilot and prior to final rollout. In my opinion, it is essential to test the applications running with actual work flow processes (including file transfers and printing) over the same networks as production (or a simulated network with the same characteristics).

Ideally, after a detailed pilot program is completed and a final architecture design is built, the entire load should be simulated prior to moving into production. This approach reduces the risks of a rollout by identifying the strengths and weaknesses of the design prior to putting real users on the system. In the past, many companies avoided this step because load simulation tools were often very expensive. In many cases the available tools were extremely difficult to script to work with applications running on Citrix XenApp.

EdgeSight for Load testing is designed to overcome these issues to allow you to reduce the risks of your production rollouts of XenApp. EdgeSight for Load Testing is built specifically for Citrix XenApp and simplifies the process to build workflow scripts with a wide variety of applications.

The presentation below gives you a brief overview of EdgeSight for Load Testing.

(click here to see the presentation in full screen)

You can find the EdgeSight for Load Testing Installation Guide here and the User Guide here. You can get troubleshooting help for EdgeSight for Load Testing at this link.

EdgeSight Monitoring for Citrix XenApp provides health and availability monitoring, problem diagnosis and trending analysis for your Citrix XenApp farm. This presentation gives you greater insight into how EdgeSight works and what it can do for you XenApp farms.

(click here to see the presentation in full screen)

You can get instructions on how to download the EdgeSight Evaluation Virtual Appliance here. Teh EdgeSight Install Guyide is here and the Admin Guide is here. You can also check out the EdgeSight Application Monitoring Guide here.

EdgeSight 5 for both XenApp and Endpoints was released last week with many changes, but for those of you who are already familiar with EdgeSight from it's 4.x days - you're probably wondering what those changes mean to you.  Today I'm going to cover what's changed; what's new; and give you a taste of some of the cool things you can now do with EdgeSight.

The first thing that will hit you when you access EdgeSight 5 are the UI changes.  Citrix has spent some serious time making their XenApp UI have a modern crisp feel, and EdgeSight is no different, but while dramatic, the new style is just the tip of the iceberg here.  EdgeSight 5 has thrown out the old navigation model in favor of a tab based approach which places the information you need right at your finger tips.  This navigation model is centered around common tasks such as monitoring performance, troubleshooting user problems and capacity planning.  While in EdgeSight 4.x you had the ability to access the detailed real-time information stored in the EdgeSight agent, doing so involved opening an Excel spreadsheet and working with the raw data.  While the Excel sheets remain for EdgeSight 5, most users will opt for the highly interactive Farm Monitor, User Troubleshooter and Device Troubleshooter. 

XenApp admins will find the Farm Monitor and User Troubleshooters particularly interesting.  The Farm Monitor provides a clear and concise view of all servers in the farm, follows the farm server hierarchy defined for the farm, and permits deep dives into exactly what is happening on the farm - in real-time.  Multiple farms are also no problem for the Farm Monitor as it seamlessly integrates all monitored farms into a single view.  The Farm Monitor is also where the EdgeSight 5 integration with the XenApp Health Check Agent occurs.  In contrast to previous EdgeSight versions, EdgeSight 5 ships with preconfigured alerts, and those alerts are tailored to the XenApp health check function.

Moving on to the User Troubleshooter, EdgeSight provides a simple report which provides access to every users' session; both for active and inactive sessions.  Working with this report couldn't be easier.  All that is required is the user name, the approximate time the session was created and optionally the application the user was accessing.  You enter the user name, and the report shows all the sessions for that user - independent of the server they are on, or their active status.  Simply select the session corresponding to when the session was created and begin your diagnosis.  In the event that multiple sessions were created at about the same time, the published application name is also shown.  From there you can access a wealth of information about the session including the ICA channel usage, startup experience and application performance.

Endpoint users should not feel left out with this release as they too gain a troubleshooter with the Device Troubleshooter.  In order to use the device troubleshooter you need only the name of the device.  Once the device is selected, detailed real-time information about the device, the applications running on the device and the network experience are returned.  Endpoint users also see all real-time functionality present in EdgeSight 4.x moved front and center with both the Trace Route and Process List moved to peers of the troubleshooters.

Moving past real-time functionality and into the realm of trending and capacity planning, EdgeSight 5 sees what is likely to be the biggest change.  Gone is the list of over 300 reports, a list that many customers found daunting.  In its place is a report list found under the Browse tab which contains just over 120 reports.  While it may appear on the surface that there has been a reduction in reporting, nothing could be further from the truth.  The new EdgeSight 5 reports allow users to do much more than the equivalent EdgeSight 4 report.  There are new grouping options and a third layer of data analysis with many reports now containing optional parameters.  When combined, these new features yield historical reports which are both richer and more interactive.  In addition to the new report structure, new reports have also been introduced exposing the new ICA data collected in EdgeSight 5.

Lastly, if you have ever wanted more than just the passive monitoring EdgeSight provided, look no further than Active Application Monitoring.  Built on the EdgeSight for Load Test functionality, this new feature permits you to define a series of synthetic actions and perform them on a pre-defined schedule.  If the desired SLA isn't met, alerts can be fired.  Deploying Active Application Monitoring script launchers in key departments and branch offices permits visibility into performance degradations before users experience outages.

Want to get your hands on EdgeSight 5 today?  As always your solution advisor is a fantastic resource, but you can also take the EdgeSight 4.5 EVA and upgrade it in place to EdgeSight 5.  There is an EdgeSight 5 EVA in the works, so stay tuned.  If you're attending Interop New York, or are in the New York area and can attend Interop, I will be showing EdgeSight 5 at the Citrix booth.  Please stop by and check it out.

Delaware Release Preview now includes EdgeSight functionality. Customers and partners who have downloaded the Delaware Release Preview can now download just the EdgeSight update to evaluate enhancements to application performance monitoring. And this is the first release of EdgeSight that adds support for Windows Server 2008 platform. The Release Preview quick start guide has been updated to include step by step instructions of installing the EdgeSight components.

Key new features in this release are

• Active Application Monitoring - It lets administrators monitor the responsiveness and availability of production applications being by Citrix XenApp. Simple scripts can be recorded and replayed to interact with a live application just as a user would, monitoring the time taken to complete tasks and produce alerts if the application becomes unresponsive, or unavailable. We built this functionality using EdgeSight for Load Testing technology. Existing scripts can be imported from EdgeSight for Load Testing or new scripts can be recorded within the Active Application Monitoring console.

• New UI design for easier troubleshooting
  • Farm Monitor - View the status of farms, folders and servers using the same topology created in the Access Management Console.
  • User Trouble-shooter - Enter a users' name to identify their sessions and applications. All performance information is retrieved in the context of that session's start and stop time and resources used to simplify the identification of performance problems
  • Report Browser - Quickly find all reports related to a specific metric such a CPU, Memory or Network

• Enhanced XenApp integration
  • ICA Channel Instrumentation -  Enables an administrator to view the bandwidth being consumed by each of the virtual channels within ICA enabling the cause of high utilization to be identified.
  • Health Assistant Integration - All Health Assistant alerts are now displayed in the EdgeSight console

And XenApp Enterprise edition customers can use this release to evaluate the resource management functionality.

Resource Manager has been a feature of XenApp Enterprise edition since MetaFrame/WinFrame days. At a high level, it monitors your XenApp servers and farm and provides visibility into the health of your XenApp environment. With our acquisition of Reflectent, we now have EdgeSight technology that not only does server monitoring but also monitors the applications and the experience of the end users who are accessing the applications. The common question I heard when we acquired Reflectent was "What are you going to do with Resource Manager?". You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. So here is the long version of that answer.

Resource Manager on Windows Server 2008

For our upcoming XenApp on Windows Server 2008 release (Project Delaware), we will be re-architecting Resource Manager with EdgeSight technology. Instead of maintaining 2 different technology platforms for similar functionality, we are retiring the existing IMA based Resource Manager technology and replacing it with EdgeSight technology. This way Enterprise edition customers can retain their existing resource management functionality and get some additional functionality when they transition to the EdgeSight platform. Remember that Platinum customers still get the entire EdgeSight for XenApp functionality and resource management is just a subset of it (we will have the Enterprise vs. Platinum feature set comparison table when we release Delaware). Hence the same EdgeSight platform can enable resource management functionality or the full application performance monitoring functionality based on the XenApp license type.

Resource Manager on Windows Server 2003

Since there are thousands of customers using existing IMA based Resource Manager on Windows Server 2003, we will still be maintaining and supporting it but will not be adding new functionality. Since the upcoming EdgeSight release will support both 2003 & 2008 Windows platforms, XenApp Enterprise edition customers on Windows Server 2003 should plan to start migrating to the EdgeSight platform.

This is a continuation of an earlier post on XenApp Platinum related video interviews from Citrix Synergy.

As part of Synergy Underground project, we interviewed many of the people in the XenApp booth in the TechLab to talk about the different features and components of Citrix XenApp Platinum.

(Each of these videos were shot and streamed live to the Underground site via a Nokia N95 cell phone. The convenience and ability to stream live video directly to the net is the trade off for the lower audio and video quality. Read this post for an explanation of the process and a video on how the live streaming worked.)

Smart Auditor for Citrix XenApp with Kiran Kulkarni

Citrix Edgesight Monitoring for XenApp with Sean Connelly

Citrix EdgeSight for Load Testing with James Millington

POCs are an activity that sales engineers perform on a routine basis.  It's the best way to show the value of a product within a customer's environment.  I created this guide to help anyone (Citrites, partners, customers) who is interested in setting up a POC of EdgeSight 4.5.

Are my notes perfect?  It would be nice to be perfect, but I'm human.

Should you deploy this in a production environment?  Never

Can I contact Citrix Tech Support for assistance with this document?  Unofficial = Unsupported

If you have any questions, compliments, corrections, etc. about this document, please post a comment to the blog and I will respond.

Download the POC Guide here.

Watch this on-demand webniar where you can get a glimpse of the real number of users you can pack on your XenApp (Presentation Server) 
 
In this session you will learn how to:

• Identify performance bottlenecks before the system goes live
• Accurately forecast hardware capacity and scalability
• Ease regression testing and change management processes

Watch it here

A top request from most customers that I talk with is how to use EdgeSight to monitor the XenApp/Presentation Server environment. One thing that needs to be remembered about EdgeSight is that it monitors all applications that are launched on the device that is being monitored. This in turn includes the core applications that keep a XA/PS infrastructure up and running efficiently.

Here is a link to a fantanstic article on setting up Alerts in EdgeSight to monitor the necessary core apps.
EdgeSight Alerting for Citrix Presentation Server - CTX116449 - http://support.citrix.com/article/ctx116449

Below is a snippet taken from the document.

Infrastructure Health

There are many components that contribute to the overall health of a Presentation Server farm. By creating real-time alerts for the following processes as detailed below, an administrator can quickly determine the health of a particular server or the entire farm.

What to Monitor

How to Monitor

There are several recommended alert rules that can be created for each process, all of which are defined in the alert rules setup as Application Alerts. Each alert informs the administrator of a particular problem.

• High application resource usage

After setting the CPU time (percent) or Memory usage (Kbytes) values for the particular process, EdgeSight will fire an alert when it detects that the process has exceeded those configured values. Processes consuming a high amount of CPU or memory could impact the overall performance of the server and have a negative impact on the end user experience.

• Process fault

This alert will notify administrators when the process configured in the alert rule has faulted due to an unhandled exception within the process. The details collected by EdgeSight give a total picture of what was occurring on the server when the fault occurred without expending time and resources trying to reproduce the problem.

• Thrashing application

By configuring the thread queue length value for a process in this alert, administrators can quickly be notified if there are any processor bottlenecks that may be degrading server performance. Thread queue length is invaluable in determining applications that are bottlenecked on a system as the parameter indicates the number of CPU work items currently waiting for the threads of the application to process them.

The Citrix EdgeSight Team has released Service Pack 4 for the ES 4.5 platform. You can download the full installers from the following link http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX116690.

Some improvements and fixes that are addressed:

Agent Fixes and Enhancements
• Addressed a problem where, when attempting to run the PhotoshopElementsEditor.exe from Adobe Photoshop Elements 5.0, the following message appears: "Attempt to access invalid address."

• Addressed a problem that prevented processes from running when Imprivata was installed.

• Addressed an issue that caused Sentillion Context Management to crash.

• Addressed a problem where the user associated with an Event Log alert was not always displayed on the real-time alert pages and reports.

• Added support logging for diagnosing problems with the Terminal Services service.

• Corrected a problem where network Round-trip Time (RTT) and Delay were not captured correctly in some applications.

• Addressed an incompatibility with SoftGrid Virtual Application Server when launching the default application.

Server Fixes and Enhancements
• Addressed a run-time error in the Alert real-time report when displayed using Excel 2007.

• Addressed timeout errors in the User Group pages and reports.

• Addressed a problem where the user associated with an Event Log alert was not always displayed on the real-time alert pages and reports.

• Addressed a problem that occurred while grooming session data.

• Addressed a timeout error in the Presentation Server Session Wizard.

• Addressed a problem where the License State Hash could become corrupted immediately after an installation.

• Addressed a column labeling issue concerning units of measure in the Network Bandwidth reports (Devices > Network > ICA).

The following issue was discovered:
• Issue: There is an incompatibility with McAfee Host Intrusion Protection 7.0 and the EdgeSight Agent.

Workaround: Do not install the agent on devices where this McAfee firewall is running.

Many customers who use Citrix XenApp (formerly known as Citrix Presentation Server) have leveraged Resource Manager for performance metrics and reporting on the health of their Citrix XenApp environments. The capability of measuring end-user experience and having visibility into an application's availability, performance and functionality on Citrix XenApp is becoming increasingly important.

EdgeSight for XenApp enhances Resource Manager's capabilities by capturing, aggregating and reporting on end-user and application experience all in a single, easy-to-use interface. The end result is the ability to monitor and measure the successful delivery of an application to any user, over any network, to any device.

This white paper will provide a high-level overview on how to successfully transition your Citrix management architecture from Resource Manager to EdgeSight 4.5 for XenApp. The key areas of focus include:

• Overview of Resource Manager & EdgeSight Architecture
• Feature Comparison & EdgeSight Benefits
• EdgeSight Planning Considerations
• Transition Strategy and Key Points

To learn more and to read the entire article please refer to the rest of the article at its source: CTX116798 - Resource Manager to EdgeSight Migration

Gus Pinto - Technology Evangelist
Microsoft MVP | Citrix Technology Professional
gus.pinto@citrix.com