Resetting my Flat Black Rock.

If you have had an iPhone for a while, this one is probably pretty obvious but for some reason I didn’t think of it immediately when I needed it.

Here’s the back story:

The 6th worst snow storm in NY history and I’m out taking some pictures with my iPhone and without fail, drop it into the snow.  Luckily, I have a nice clear case which I purchased after letting beach sand get to it over the summer (view the awesome scratch).  Quickly pick it up and everything looks fine.  Phone is working, nothing TOO wet, no harm, no foul.  Fast forward to later in the evening after leaving the phone connected to the charger for a while and I discover it is completely dead.  No response from the screen or buttons.  Just a black screen.  Switch outlets, switch chargers, nothing.

This is where the beauty of the iPhone is also the source of my frustration.  The simple elegant design just transforms into a dead piece of metal if it ever becomes unresponsive.  There are no obvious screws to remove, batteries to replace, factory reset buttons to press with a crudely bent paper clip.  Nothing much on the hardware side that a DIYer like myself can really get into.  It’s just a flat black rock at that point.  So frustrating.

Of course, Google comes to the rescue and reminds me that I can hold down the POWER and HOME button for about 15 seconds and the phone magically reboots and preforms diagnostics on itself.  Fortunately, that did the trick and ended my moment of panic.

Sand: 1 Snow: 1 Wind: 0 Fire: 0

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Citrix PNAgent for the BlackBerry.

If you are running the Citrix Receiver on a Blackberry, try adding one of you applications to the Favorites list in the Receiver:

If your administrator has allowed it, it will add it to your Blackberry Favorites screen (see bottom three apps below)!

I think that’s pretty cool! Kind of reminds me of the old school Citrix Program Neighborhood Agent.

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2010 – A Look Back

So the end of the year is coming up quick so I figured I would start on the obligatory year-end review.  A chance to look back at the year that is now almost over and reflect and make some observations.  I guess.. 

From a work perspective, this year has felt like a much busier year than in recent years.  From a statistical point of view, it seems that I didn’t find as much time to publish as many posts as I did in 2009.  This year will end up at about 110 posts for the year with 147 posts going up last year.  Honestly though, I am not sure if it was the lack of time or the consistent type of work I had.  It felt like I had many more opportunities to work on diverse types of projects in 2009 in contrast to 2010 as this year seemed to be a more consistent blend of product and solutions.  With the past diversification came more posts possibly.  This year however felt like the year of VDI for me.  XenDesktop projects seemed to dominate the majority of my billable time.  Citrix XenDesktops with Provisioning servers all running on VMware vSphere 4 hypervisors.  That seemed to be the de facto standard solution for almost all of my clients this year.  There definitely were some VMware View implementations sprinkled in there but they were few and far between. 

On the hypervisor front, it was ALL VMware though.  No sign of Citrix XenServer anywhere and only a handful of half serious inquiries entertaining the idea of putting Microsoft’s Hyper-V into test environments.  I thought there would have been more interest in XenServer or Hyper-V as clients built out infrastructures for VDI but VMware was the only platform I touched this year for clients.  While there was definitely an uptick of Windows 2008 R2 servers going into production, they were all VMware virtual machines and not the hypervisor hosts I thought they might be.

EMC World 2010 in Boston was the big conference I attended this year but I got a healthy dose of EMC at clients year round.  Between RecoverPoint and SRM or vSphere and CX4s, the synergy between EMC and VMware seemed really apparent to me and stronger than ever. 

As I am preparing for 2011, I am hoping to dive back into the Data Center solutions and the virtualization infrastructure involved in that.  I am hoping to grow my storage skills a bunch more and round out my expertise to better help clients figure out this private cloud everyone is marketing to them.  I am confident I will continue to do VDI implementations for my clients but keeping the users and desktop applications an arm’s length away is probably my preference for now (like I wrote before though, a little diversification is necessary for growth so I’m still counting on some XD and View projects in 2011).   

Whichever way 2011 shakes out for me, I’d like to take a quick moment to thank everyone for reading and supporting the blog (especially those without AD-Blockers! Just kidding Google!). 

Here’s to a prosperous New Year ahead of us all.

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New RSA Soft Token for the iPhone is out.

If you have RSA in your environment, here is some cool news.  The new iPhone version of the RSA soft token can now accept standard .SDTID files as an email attachment to import a user’s token seed.  Users can add the token by double-clicking on the file on their iPhone/iPad (it opens a submenu with the option to “open in RSA SecurID”).  The Soft Token software needs to be installed first before the submenu will appear on the iOS device.  This should help speed deployment of user tokens whereas prior to the upgrade, a conversion tool and process had to be used to create special ‘Mobile’ tokens.  One email with the SDTID file as an attachment can now seed laptop, PC and mobile devices.  Users can visit the App Store for the upgraded Soft Token.

Thanks for the heads up Marcos and Eric!

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Mobile Version of VMwareInfo.com

Just in time for Christmas, Blogger (where I host VMwareInfo.com) has released their Mobile Templates.  They are in Beta now and pretty bare bones but they get the job done.  Slimmed down interface and a faster loading website is plenty good for me.  You will miss out on the comments and search but hopefully I can sort that out in the coming months.  Check out the screenshots from the Blackberry Torch and iPhone4.  Interestingly enough, Blogger didn’t recognize the Windows 7 phone as a Mobile Device.

At least for now, you can get quick access to some light reading while on the run. 

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Quick Tip : Windows Uptime

Here is a quick tip from Moshe Silber for Windows 7/2008 machines. 

You know sometimes you’re trying to find the uptime of a Windows machine and it’s a pain to find. If you launch Task Manager and go to performance, you can find it there.

Additionally, for those who don’t know, a super fast way to pull up the task manager on all flavors of Windows is CTRL-SHIFT-ESC.  Go ahead and try it now! It’s THAT easy.

This is also my last post before Christmas so Merry Christmas everyone!

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Microsoft Security Essentials 2.0 released.

I love Microsoft Security Essentials.  I love the integration, ease of updating, protection and the price! For an application as utilitarian as virus scanning, free is a great deal.

Aaron Silber made my day today when he sent over a note with a link to Windows Security Essentials 2.0! Get it free here.

Microsoft claims the updated anti-malware engine makes the software faster and smarter at detecting security hazards. The software now also ties in with the Windows Firewall, giving you the option of turning the firewall on or off.   The new version integrates with Internet Explorer to detect Web-based threats and can watch out for malware coming in through a network, though only for those running Windows Vista or Windows 7.

Businesses with up to 10 users can also install the product for free.  Larger business need to invest in the Enterprise ForeFront.

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Citrix Receiver 4.2.1 for iPad ; Lost settings after upgrading.

The new Citrix Receiver 4.2.1 was released last week.  The new client has a lot of new features including iOS 4.2 support, On Screen Track pad, Access Gateway 5 support and promises faster session support.  Sounds great but there is a catch.  If your users have already configured the receiver for the environment, upgrading the client will remove the profile settings forcing them to reenter all information in the receiver for access.  Definitely something you will want to users to know about before they start pressing the upgrade button in the App Store.  Not necessarily an unknown bug since this is noted at the bottom of the What’s New.

Note: This update requires reentering connection information. (Make note of your settings before upgrading).

I’m sure TONS of users will read that and heed its warning.  

After upgrading, the UI will also look different to users so if they are still having problems after upgrading their Receiver to the new version, you can always revert them back to the old version. 

To do so, Marcos Velez sent over the following steps:

1. Make sure you still have the previous version (Citrix 1.1.ipa) on your local drive.   
2. If you can’t find it, look for it in the Recycle Bin, or Trash.
3. Now, delete the new/current version from iTunes (right click on it and choose Delete)
4. Delete the new/current version from your iPad (press on its icon for three seconds and then click on the red x)
5. Once you have deleted the new version from both iTunes and your iPad, drag and drop the old version application file onto iTunes.
6. Sync your device

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How to Hide (or Show!) Applications and Folders in Web Interface 5.x

Written by Sam Jacobs:

Summary
This post explains how to hide or show applications and folders in Web Interface 5.x.

Background
It is sometimes useful to hide content, folders, or published applications from Web Interface. The advantage of hiding a folder is that you only have to place an application into the hidden folder and it is automatically hidden. It also allows you to hide the application without disabling it.

On the other hand, you may wish to only show certain applications, folders, or sub-folders. You may also choose to show only a subset of applications in a sub-folder.

Requirements
A working WI 5.x Web Interface site.

Procedure
Download and unzip the attached file FilteredResources.zip. It contains modified global.asax(.cs) files for Web Interface versions 5.0, 5.3 and 5.4. Make sure to use the correct one, otherwise compilation errors will occur. Instructions for manually modifying other WI 5.x versions are also included. To verify the version of Web Interface installed, you may either check under Add/Remove Programs (or Programs and Features) for the Citrix Web Interface component, or search the WebInterface.conf file for the Version= key.

Add the following lines to the C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\Citrix/xenApp/conf/WebInterface.conf file:

FilteredApps=app1,app2,\folderA\app3

(the last entry above would be used to show ONLY app3 in folderA (all others would be hidden)

FilteredFolders=\folder1,\folder2\sub-folderA (don't forget the initial slash)

(again, the last entry above would be used to show ONLY sub-folderA in folder2(all other apps/folders would be hidden)

FilteredAction= Hide (the default) or Show

Save the file and test.

Known Limitations
Do not specify a folder whose name is the beginning of another folder. For example, do not hide or show the folder \appfolder, if there exists another folder called \appFolder1.

Disclaimer
This code is provided “AS IS” with no representations, warranties or conditions of any kind. Please test this code before using on a production Web Interface site. While I will try my best to correct any issues that may be found, I cannot guarantee that I will have the time to do so.

Sam

 

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View all active sessions in XenDesktop

If you have a lot of different Desktop Groups, it can be a challenge to see all of the active sessions in your Farm.  Unlike the XenApp console, you can’t just simply click the higher level folder and see all users active in your farm.  Typically, you would have to select each desktop group and view the users in it separately.  Not good at all as the number of groups increase.

Another way to quickly view all the active sessions is to use the Advanced Search.  Click Advanced Search, Find Sessions By User and leave the name blank.  This will return a list of all active sessions across Desktop Groups.

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Citrix Provisioning/XenDesktop Bingo!

Where is the synergy?  A Citrix VDI solution consisting of XenDesktop VMs being provisioned by Citrix Provisioning Services.  Citrix has provided me with a Provisioning Services console and a Desktop Delivery Console and no easy way to see the complete solution.

I recently rolled out a new vDisk to a bunch of XenDesktop VMs and realized just what a pain in the ass these two interfaces present to the administrator as the environment grows.

From the Provisioning server console, I can assign new vDisks to the machines and see if they are running or not.  If a machine is running, it will need a bounce to begin using the new vDisk.  But wait, are anyone using them?  I can’t tell from here; Off to the Desktop Delivery Console with my list of machines that need rebooting.

From the Desktop Delivery Console, I can see that the machine is up and if it is in use or not.  If it is IDLE, I can bounce it and have it reboot cleanly with the new vDisk assignment.

Kind of annoying to me to have to go back and forth between consoles for a single vendor solution.  I wish there was an add-on for at least one of the two parts that would give me a more complete picture. (Something like below would be a great start. )

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Don’t be so eager to use ALL the products you own.

VMware vSphere with Citrix XenDesktop leveraging Citrix Provisioning Services.  It’s a familiar solution in my world these days and it works well.  I’ve grown accustomed to the convenience of provisioning out a vDisk to a bunch of Virtual Machines and plowing through business requests for pools of PCs to host business applications.   Making changes to the vDisk and then blasting it out to all the VMs in one fell swoop had me spoiled [and blinded me to some extent].  As user and business requests began to dictate different unique private images, I continued to stream them out using the familiar format as private vDisks. 

It dawned on me that when using private images, it doesn’t really make sense to use provisioning services for them.  I’d rather just keep it simple.  Leverage vCenter’s template facilities to clone out a desktop and then drop the XenDesktop agent on it.  No Provisioning services for this one.  I can crank out the VM just as fast and updating things like VMware Tools just became a whole lot easier.  Not to mention no other streaming issues to worry about.

There seems to be a lot of different components available to use to build solutions for our clients and users and I have to remember to Keep it Simple.

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Monitor Uptime/Downtime of your Website/Blog for Free!

Here’s an interesting service Aaron Silber sent over to me.  It’s a great cloud service to monitor your Websites.  The first site you monitor is free.  I  tried it out and was really pleased with the results (and price!) . ;)

You basically sign up for the monitoring service on PingDom and point it to a website under your control.  From there, you can set the frequency that it will monitor the site and the notification methods you would like to use.  I run a couple websites from the basement and occasionally due to power surges/brownouts,  the VMs reboot causing some downtime.  PingDom alerts me almost immediately!  It is very cool and slick. 

First I receive a quick email alert notifying me that the site is down :
Pingdom Alert DOWN:
Family WebSite (www.xxxx.com) is down since 11/17/2010 05:00:36PM.

I also installed the handy iPhone application which will give me a push notification right on the phone. Finally, the PingDom website gave me additional detail on the outage.

Once the site was back up and running, PingDom gave me an ALL Clear message.  Nice!

Definitely worth checking out and setting up if you are even remotely responsible for a website and it’s uptime.

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