At the recent Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Parallels announced that Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) supports Microsoft Azure. This blog post will show you this new support and what it now enables end users to do in Parallels RAS. A future post will discuss in some detail how IT admins configure Parallels RAS (and […]
We had a great time at ShowStoppers press event Mobile World Congress (MWC) at the University of Barcelona yesterday, on February 26, announcing to different journalists that Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) is now available at Microsoft Azure Marketplace. Parallels RAS on Azure was demonstrated at the event including hands-on demos of how simple it is to use […]
ZenApp, or did you mean Citrix XenApp? XenApp (not ZenApp, we know, it’s confusing!) is a virtual application delivery tool offered by Citrix. Gone are the days when employees have to stick to their desktops. With the advent of virtualization technology, employees are now able to access applications and resources from any device, anywhere and […]
CRN’s “Power 100: The Most Influential Women of the Channel 2016”, Why Smart IT Leaders Connect with Maria Dinallo and Parallels Maria Dinallo, Parallels’ Senior Director of Channel Sales has been honored in CRN’s “Power 100: The Most Influential Women of the Channel 2016”. CRN Power 100 honorees were selected on the basis of their […]
Citrix Server is a virtualization tool that enables businesses to centrally host applications and resources and deliver them to Windows clients, as well as non-Windows clients using Microsoft Terminal Services or RDSH and VDI. While there are multiple components involved in a Citrix virtualization infrastructure, it is available in two main editions, XenApp and XenDesktop. […]
Citrix XenApp Announced XenApp Windows Server 2008 R2 EOL — What’s Next? Citrix is a provider of virtualization solutions that has consolidated its market position over its 25 years of operation. Along with its brand reputation and reliability, Citrix is popularly known for three issues: its cost, complexity, and name-changing product portfolio. While many have […]
Members of the Parallels team will be attending and presenting at UCISA16 in Manchester from March 16–18. Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association (UCISA) is an organization designed to increase the value of education and educational initiatives by offering a more comprehensive way for students to learn, giving them access to a higher educational standard through […]
Citrix App Center – Where it comes from and what it’s become One of the main challenges in a virtualization environment is the management of the infrastructure. With thousands of VMs and users constantly being dynamically created and terminated, IT administrators have a tough time managing the network. In the early days, they had to […]
Citrix provides a range of products, including virtualization technology, and the company has been in the virtualization market for two decades. XenApp is Citrix’s flagship application delivery product with a large user base of over 100 million. XenApp allows businesses to install applications on central servers and securely publish applications and desktops to clients running […]
I recently attended the 2016 Citrix Partner Summit event in Las Vegas. I gathered what I felt were some of the most important notes provided by Citrix around what’s new with its core enterprise products. In this first post, I will review what’s new with XenApp and XenDesktop 7.7. In my next post, I’ll share what’s new with XenMobile 10.3. If you have questions around these announcements, please reach out.
Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop 7.7
Zones
Deployments that span widely-dispersed locations connected by a WAN can face challenges due to network latency and reliability. Configuring zones can help users in remote regions connect to local resources without forcing connections to traverse large segments of the WAN. Using zones allows effective Site management from a single Citrix Studio console, Citrix Director, and the Site database. This saves the costs of deploying, staffing, licensing, and maintaining additional Sites containing separate databases in remote locations. Zones can be helpful in deployments of all sizes. You can use zones to keep applications and desktops closer to end users, which improves performance. For more information, see the Zones article.
Improved database flow and configuration
When you configure the databases during Site creation, you can now specify separate locations for the Site, Logging, and Monitoring databases. Later, you can specify different locations for all three databases. In previous releases, all three databases were created at the same address, and you could not specify a different address for the Site database later. You can now add more Delivery Controllers when you create a Site, as well as later. In previous releases, you could add more Controllers only after you created the Site. For more information, see the Databases and Controllers articles.
Application limits
Configure application limits to help manage application use. For example, you can use application limits to manage the number of users accessing an application simultaneously. Similarly, application limits can be used to manage the number of simultaneous instances of resource-intensive applications, this can help maintain server performance and prevent deterioration in service. For more information, see the Manage applications article.
Multiple notifications before machine updates or scheduled restarts
You can now choose to repeat a notification message that is sent to affected machines before the following types of actions begin:
Updating machines in a Machine Catalog using a new master image
Restarting machines in a Delivery Group according to a configured schedule
If you indicate that the first message should be sent to each affected machine 15 minutes before the update or restart begins, you can also specify that the message be repeated every five minutes until the update/restart begins. For more information, see the Manage Machine Catalogs and Manage machines in Delivery Groups articles.
API support for managing session roaming
By default, sessions roam between client devices with the user. When the user launches a session and then moves to another device, the same session is used and applications are available on both devices. The applications follow, regardless of the device or whether current sessions exist. Similarly, printers and other resources assigned to the application follow. You can now use the PowerShell SDK to tailor session roaming. This was an experimental feature in the previous release. For more information, see the Sessions article.
API support for provisioning VMs from hypervisor templates
When using the PowerShell SDK to create or update a Machine Catalog, you can now select a template from other hypervisor connections. This is in addition to the currently-available choices of VM images and snapshots.
Support for new and additional platforms
See the System requirements article for full support information. Information about support for third-party product versions is updated periodically. By default, SQL Server 2012 Express SP2 is installed when you install the Delivery Controller. SP1 is no longer installed. The component installers now automatically deploy newer Microsoft Visual C++ runtime versions: 32-bit and 64-bit Microsoft Visual C++ 2013, 2010 SP1, and 2008 SP1. Visual C++ 2005 is no longer deployed. You can install Studio or VDAs for Windows Desktop OS on machines running Windows 10. You can create connections to Microsoft Azure virtualization resources.
Citrix Director – The Director version provided with this release contains the following new and enhanced features
Proactive monitoring and alerting
You can now configure proactive alerting and notifications when thresholds are reached. This enables quicker responses even when you are not viewing the monitoring console. For more information, see Alerts and notifications.
SCOM integration
Deployments that use Microsoft System Center 2012 – Operations Manager to monitor deployments can now view alerts provided by the Operations Manager on the Dashboard and in other high level views in Director. For example, if connections to supported hypervisors fail, the administrator can check Director for Operations Manager alerts. After reviewing alert details in Director, the administrator can then switch to the Operations Manager console for additional troubleshooting, if needed. For more information, see SCOM alerts.
Windows Authentication
Director now supports Integrated Windows Authentication. For single sign-on, a user’s Windows credentials are automatically used to access Director. This support allows users to log on to their machines using any credential provider and supporting hardware, and use that logged-on identity to access Director. For more information, see Use Director with Integrated Windows Authentication.
Desktop and Server OS usage
The Trends view now shows the usage of Desktop OS by Site and by Delivery group, and it shows the usage of Server OS by site, by Delivery group, and by Machine. This gives you a real-time view of your OS usage, enabling you to quickly assess your site’s capacity needs. For more information, see Monitor historical trends across a Site.
Application limits in Director
Application limits configured in Studio are shown in existing views and counts in Director. For example, the User Connection Failures on the Dashboard will indicate when a connection attempt fails because it would exceed an application limit. Citrix has also announced that they are going to release version 7.8 in the first quarter and is intended to enhanced application delivery and management.
Again, if you have any questions, feel free to reach out!