Aaron Parker » Virtualisation

App-V FAQ #23: How do I troubleshoot the App-V Management Server?

Aaron Parker — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 10:00:00 +0000

Common scenarios for troubleshooting the Management Server (or the Streaming Server) are connectivity issues between the client and server, opening the Management Console from a remote machine and upgrading the Management Server.

Before you Deploy

If you’re new to App-V I recommend reading the existing documentation on how to deploy the Management Server software to save you from having to troubleshoot issues later on. The Microsoft Application Virtualization Version 4.6 Trial Guide is available for download, or you can follow these articles available on TechNet:

Troubleshooting Tools

There are three tools that you should reach for when troubleshooting the Management Server or the Streaming Server:

The Application Event log on the server
The App-V Management Server log
The App-V Ping Tool

When viewing the Application event log, filter the log (right-click / Filter Current Log…) and use these Event sources – Application Virtualization and Application Virtualization Server.

The App-V Management Server event log is located in:

x86: C:\Program Files\Microsoft System Center App Virt Management Server\App Virt Management Server\logs
x64: C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft System Center App Virt Management Server\App Virt Management Server\logs

There are a couple of great posts on using the log files to troubleshoot issues with the log file: Troubleshooting App-V with log files and Getting to Grip with the App-V Server Log File (sft-server.log).

Although you can use Telnet to check connectivity issues, you should first reach for the App-V Ping Tool by Immidio. This command-line application comes as a part of the Immidio Resource Kit, which is free. I can’t speak highly enough of the App-V Ping Tool, it’s the fastest and easiest way to determine whether the Management Server is contactable.

Resources

The following articles and blog posts are excellent resources for troubleshooting the Management Server:

Knowledgebase Articles

The KB articles will help you solve specific issues that you may experience:

App-V FAQ #23: How do I troubleshoot the App-V Management Server? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #22: Do I need to backup the App-V Management Server?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 10:00:00 +0000

If you’ve deployed the native App-V infrastructure, you will have the following components in your environment:

App-V Management Server (and optionally the App-V Streaming Server)
Content share hosting the App-V packages
Management database hosted on SQL Server

Only two of these are critical – the Content share and the Management database.

Backing up the Content share

App-V packages are stored on the Content share and are generally available to both the App-V Management Server (and Streaming) servers and to users (to download ICO and OSD files). Because the packages are stored on the file system, you can backup the Content share using your standard backup tools. Restoring the Content share should just require restoring the files and folders for the App-V packages.

Often the Content share is replicated, either between multiple Management Servers or file servers in different locations. Replication can be accomplished with DFS-R built into Windows Server or the replication technologies built into your SAN. Replicating the Content share will give you another avenue for restoration if a replica still exists.

What if you lose the Content share completely?

There’s no excuse for no documentation – you are documenting your sequences aren’t you? Detailed documentation that includes step-by-step instructions for how the application was sequenced or scripts for performing the installation and configuration of the application during sequencing is an essential component of deploying applications via App-V (or any other application virtualisation product).

I have seen several instances where not enough emphasis has been placed on documentation – when it comes to recreating the package, the whole thing needs to be re-done from scratch.

Backing up the App-V Management database

I presume that most of us who deploy the App-V infrastructure are probably not SQL Server experts as well, but it does pay to have at least a basic understanding of the backup and restore requirements for SQL Server. My own SQL Server knowledge is a bit limited, so rather than attempt at giving you a complete overview of the backup and restore requirements for SQL Server, I’ll just say that if you haven’t considered backing up the Management Server database stop reading this and go and back it up now. I have included links to further reading on backup and restore in the resources below.

SQL Server mirroring is supported with the App-V 4.5 SP2 Management Server, so failover options are now available for App-V.

Recovery options for the App-V Management Server

The App-V Management Server (and the Streaming Server) is stateless so whether or not you back it up will depend on your own requirements; however you can implement an alternative approach to ensuring availability of the Management Server:

Deploy multiple Management Servers to provide load-balancing and redundancy
Configure an unattended deployment of Windows and the Management Server

Deploying multiple Management servers and load-balancing them with a hardware load-balancer or the Network Load Balancing feature built into Windows will allow you to recover a problematic server whilst maintaining service to App-V clients. A hardware load-balancer is the preferred method; however many smaller enterprises can offer adequate service with NLB instead. Additionally there are other ways to provide high availability that includes VMware’s Fault Tolerance and High Availability feature built into vSphere.

To get a server back up and running quickly or for deploying multiple Management Servers, you should consider an unattended deployment of Windows Server and the App-V Management Server software. An unattended deployment allows you to provide avoid spending time troubleshooting a server and just rebuild it and to ensure that every Management Server or Streaming Server has been configured exactly the same way.

If you aren’t currently deploying Windows via an unattended means, Microsoft provides the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit for doing just that. The Setup for the App-V Management Server or the Streaming Server can also be installed silently and is documented in this knowledgebase article: Supported command line options for the Microsoft App-V 4.5 Management Server installer.

Conclusion

Although you can backup the Management Server, it is the component in the native App-V infrastructure that can be recovered without requiring a backup and can probably be redeployed or rebuilt faster than you can restore from backup. Instead of spending resources creating and managing a backup, spend time on the alternatives I’ve outlined above to provide better service and recovery.

Resources

App-V FAQ #22: Do I need to backup the App-V Management Server? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled FAQs

Aaron Parker — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 10:00:00 +0000

I’m off in sunny Portugal, so there’s no App-V FAQs this week. Until next Tuesday, here’s what I’ve published so far:

FAQ #1: What is Application Virtualisation?
FAQ #2: What is Microsoft Application Virtualization
FAQ #3: How is App-V licensed?
FAQ #4: Where can I download App-V?
FAQ #5: What are the current versions of App-V?
FAQ #6: What are the system requirements for App-V?
FAQ #7: Is App-V an Application Compatibility solution?
FAQ #8: Can I use Application Compatibility Shims with App-V?
FAQ #9: Can App-V be used to run 16-bit applications on Windows x64?
FAQ #10: Does App-V allow me to run applications on Linux or Mac OS X?
FAQ #11: What are the dependencies of the App-V Client?
FAQ #12: How do I create a silent installation for the App-V Client?
FAQ #13: How do I configure the App-V Client in stand-alone mode?
FAQ #14: Can I configure the App-V Client via Group Policy?
FAQ #15: Where do I go to find out how the App-V Client works?
FAQ #16: Where can I find information on sequencing applications?
FAQ #17: Can I run an application on Windows 7 that was sequenced on Windows XP?
FAQ #18: Can I virtualise Internet Explorer with App-V?
FAQ #19: Does App-V replace Citrix XenApp or Remote Desktop Services?
FAQ #20: What are the deployment methods for App-V?
FAQ #21: Does the delivery method change how applications are sequenced?

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled FAQs is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #17: Can I run an application on Windows 7 that was sequenced on Windows XP?

Aaron Parker — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 10:00:00 +0000

As you should hopefully know by now App-V is not a compatibility solution, which means that you can’t use App-V to run applications that aren’t compatible with a specific version of Windows, you’ll need to use other means to do that.

The next question then is do you need to sequence an application on each of your target operating systems? This will, of course, be dependant on the application. If it’s a well behaved application that is compatible with each target OS, uses correct calls to find special folder paths, stores application settings in the registry and dependencies can be suitably managed (e.g. DLLs and runtimes), then there is a good chance that you can sequence once and deploy everywhere.

The basic process you should follow then, is sequence on the lowest common denominator, test on the target operating systems and re-sequence the application if you have issues on specific versions of Windows.

There are already plenty of articles and documents on this subject, a few of which I’ve listed here along with a pertinent quote:

Do I need to re-sequence my applications when I move to a new OS?

Here’s the current support statement for App-V from the product group and this statement supersedes all others.
It is often possible to sequence on one OS and run the virtualized app on a different OS, however this scenario is both app and OS dependent and is not guaranteed to work for all app/OS combinations since App-V is not a general purpose OS compatibility solution. If problems are encountered, the customer may be required to sequence on the same OS environment as the App-V client is running in order to resolve those problems

Microsoft Application Virtualization Sequencing Guide 4.6

Sequence on a machine that matches the operating system (OS) and configuration of the target clients. It is often possible to sequence on one OS and run the virtualized application on a different OS; however this scenario is both application- and OS-dependent and is not guaranteed to work for all application/OS combinations since App-V is not a general-purpose OS compatibility solution. If problems are encountered, the application may be required to be sequenced on the same OS environment that the App-V Client is running on order to resolve those problems.

Inside the Sequencer – Part 1

O/S – The most common question I have received over the years is “What Operating System should I use on my Sequencer Workstation?” The answer can be simple, or it can be less simple. What is your SoftGrid Client’s operating system? That should match the O/S of the Sequencing workstation with the proper level of patching.
Now, what do I do if I am in a hybrid environment? That answer is slightly less easy, but easy none the less. As a rule of thumb, always go with the “lowest common denominator”. If in an environment where your SoftGrid client could either be Windows 2000 Pro, Windows XP Pro, or Windows 2003 Terminal Services, you should always select the older, or Windows 200 Pro, as the O/S of the Sequencer workstation.

Why?
I am so glad you asked. Because there is a greater chance that the application being Sequenced will lay down the greatest number of files, registry entries, COM, etc. on the older O/S than the newer. As such, when it streams and runs in its SystemGuard it will have more of its own assets bundled with it and be more self sufficient and able to remain isolated.
Now, the next common question is: “Can I sequence on Windows XP Pro and stream to SoftGrid client running on a Windows 2003 Terminal Server? The answer is “Most Likely’. In fact, we have seen success where an application that would not even install on a T/S box was Sequenced on Windows 2000 Pro and streamed to and run successfully on a SoftGrid for Terminal Server client.

Microsoft SoftGrid Application Virtualization – MCS Sequencing Guidelines

Sequence on a machine that is the lowest common denominator for the target clients. If the target clients consist of Windows XP machines and Windows 2000 machines, Microsoft recommends sequencing on Windows 2000. Applications sequenced on Windows XP and executed on Windows 2000 will still have a high likelihood of functioning properly; however, the odds are better when sequencing on Windows 2000 and deploying to Windows XP.

Best practices to use for sequencing in Microsoft SoftGrid

Can I sequence an application on one operating system and then stream it to another operating system?
Yes, SoftGrid lets you sequence on one operating system and then stream it to another operating system. However, the application may not work correctly if it detects the operating system version when the application is installed. The application may select different components depending on that detection. This may cause problems depending on the component compatibility with other operating systems. Before you try to stream an application to another operating system, determine whether additional sequencings are required for each operating system. You may have to contact the application vendor.

App-V FAQ #17: Can I run an application on Windows 7 that was sequenced on Windows XP? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #16: Where can I find information on sequencing applications?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 10:00:00 +0000

Before you even attempt your first sequence with App-V, I strongly recommend reading the Microsoft Application Virtualization 4.6 Sequencing Guide. This document lays the ground work for creating a successful sequencing environment and describes the best practices you should follow when sequencing. An older knowledgebase article exists, but it is still worth referencing: Best practices to use for sequencing in Microsoft SoftGrid.

The Microsoft TechNet forums is the main source of information for community lead recipes and answers to sequencing questions:

Other locations include:

The Sequencing forum on AppVirtGuru.com
AppDeploy.com is a great resource for creating silent installs, plus it also includes details for virtualising many of those applications

I have compiled a list of recipes, documents and forum links here at stealthpuppy.com/AppVRecipes. This page draws from a list of App-V recipe bookmarks from my Delicious account which is updated regularly.

App-V FAQ #16: Where can I find information on sequencing applications? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #15: Where do I go to find out how the App-V Client works?

Aaron Parker — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 10:00:00 +0000

Microsoft has written an excellent white paper that explains in detail how the App-V Client and application publishing works. This is a 31 page Word document that is essential reading for anyone who is designing, implementing or administering App-V – App-V Application Publishing and Client Interaction White Paper

The App-V client performs many tasks to present virtual applications that appear to be locally installed to a user. Often, these tasks are not looked at with the detail that the server components receive. In order to effectively support virtual applications, an understanding of the processes performed by the client is imperative.

This document will explain the following topics:

Important file locations for storing App-V information and data
Client cache settings and behaviour
Publishing and delivery scenarios
Active upgrade
Package and data management
Client logging

App-V FAQ #15: Where do I go to find out how the App-V Client works? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #10: Does App-V allow me to run applications on Linux or Mac OS X?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 10:00:00 +0000

No, just like App-V does not allow you to run 16-bit applications on 64-bit Windows, it also does not provide you with the means to run Windows applications on non-Windows operating systems such as Linux or Mac OS X. There are two reasons for this:

1. App-V does not provide any additional layers that applications can utilise at runtime. Providing APIs and other dependencies necessary for running Windows applications is the job of Windows itself – if the feature that the application expects is not offered by Windows, then you’ll have issue attempting to run that application via application virtualisation solutions including App-V.

2. Like other application virtualisation products such as Symantec SVS (and unlike VMware ThinApp), App-V virtualised applications require the presence a client. The App-V Client contains some kernel mode components so installing it on other operating systems would certainly be a challenge.

If you are looking to run Windows applications on non-Windows operating systems, then consider hardware virtualisation solutions such as VMware Fusion or Workstation, Oracle VirtualBox or Parallels Desktop, which can be used to run a virtual instance of Windows (and thus the App-V Client) on top of the other OS. Or if you’re looking to run Windows applications directly on Linux, Solaris or Mac OS X, then WINE is the way to go.

App-V FAQ #10: Does App-V allow me to run applications on Linux or Mac OS X? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #9: Can App-V be used to run 16-bit applications on Windows x64?

Aaron Parker — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 10:00:00 +0000

No, App-V is not a compatibility solution. App-V does not provide any additional layers that applications can use when executing on different versions of Windows. If 64-bit Windows does not support 16-bit applications, then neither will App-V.

The lack of 16-bit application support in x64 Windows is documented in this Microsoft Knowledgebase Article: 64-bit versions of Windows do not support 16-bit components, 16-bit processes, or 16-bit applications:

The x64-based versions of the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 operating systems and Microsoft Windows XP Professional x64 Edition do not support 16-bit programs, 16-bit processes, or 16-bit components. However, these 64-bit versions of Windows may recognize some 16-bit installers and automatically convert the 16-bit installer to a 32-bit installer.

Resources

App-V FAQ #9: Can App-V be used to run 16-bit applications on Windows x64? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Someone on the Internet is wrong about Hyper-V and I must correct them

Aaron Parker — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 00:36:21 +0000

VirtualizationAdmin.com has a new article by David Davis titled: 5 things Microsoft must do to stay in the virtualization game. I think the article has some fairly weak arguments and certainly a couple of claims that are just wrong. VirtualizationAdmin doesn’t provide a way to comment on articles, so I’ll break this down in an article of my own.

Let me start out by stating I’m not an expert in either VMware vSphere or VMware View, I’m not attempting to defend Microsoft nor am I attacking David personally. I just think that article is a little sloppy and needs some corrections.

Consolidate the Remote Desktop product line

The first point takes issue with the various Remote Desktop features in Windows Server 2008 R2, specifically David writes:

Also in the Remote Desktop product line is:

Remote Desktop Connection Broker – for personal virtual desktops and desktop pools

Remote Desktop Gateway – formerly Terminal Services Gateway, allows remote users on the Internet to connect to their desktops securely using RDP over HTTPS

Remote Desktop Web Access – formerly Terminal Services Web Access, allows users to access remote desktops and apps through their web browser

Remote Desktop Virtualization Host – the piece that connects Hyper-V virtual machines to end users connecting through RD connection broker, providing that personal virtual desktop

And, the Remote Desktop product line goes on and on with a handful of other “Remote Desktop X, Y, and Z” products that are less important. My point in this, besides trying to educate you on the various Remote Desktop products from Microsoft, is that this Microsoft Remote Desktop product line is confusing. With VMware or Citrix there is View and XenDesktop, respectively. What’s the answer? Simplify it. If you want to do any kind of desktop or session virtualization, why can’t you just install Microsoft “Remote”? It’s one word and it could do it all.

I’ll agree that the naming is a mouthful, but then Microsoft has never been known for catchy product names – in fact products usually have cool names during beta but end up being given ridiculously unwieldy names at launch. I don’t know what the “handful of other Remote Desktop X, Y, and Z” products are because I can’t find them. Unless he’s referring to the client side components – Remote Desktop Connection client and the RemoteApp and Desktop Connections applet in Windows 7 (it would be great if Microsoft released this feature for Windows Vista and XP).

In regards to simplifying, David isn’t comparing apples with apples here, VMware View and Citrix XenDesktop are only one part of the full suites. With Citrix XenDesktop, you need to add XenApp, Web Interface, XenServer, Provisioning Services and Secure Gateway or Access Gateway to to the list. With VMware View, you need to add vSphere, VMware View Webinterface, View Manager and View Composer (as far as I can tell VMware doesn’t have an equivalent for RD Gateway).

Microsoft does have a simpler all encompassing name for these features – Remote Desktop Services. In true Microsoft style though, it’s not as simple as View or XenDesktop. You could also just call the product “Windows” as each is just a feature of Windows Server. However, changing the name of the product line won’t fix the real issue which is that the Microsoft offering is more difficult to configure than it needs to be.

As far as consolidation goes, if you’re deploying the Microsoft solution at scale, you’ll need to separate these roles on different hosts to provide performance. Consolidating these product is possible, but if that were forced it would limited its’ effectiveness.

Finally just on a technical point, Remote Desktop Connection Broker is also used to handle connections to RD Session Host for session desktops and RemoteApp.

Add more features to Hyper-V, SCVMM, and RD Connection Broker

David says of SCVMM:

System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2- while it isn’t a feature, again, Microsoft is killing me with names. A name with 7 words is just silly. VMware has vCenter and Xen has Essentials. Microsoft’s centralized virtualization manager needs a simple name like “HVmanager”.

Yeah, System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007 R2 is a pretty long name and could be simpler, but there’s plenty more to fix in or add to SCVMM before changing the name.

David also says:

RD Connection Broker – Microsoft’s desktop virtualization solution needs more features to even come close to the current version of VMware View. However, the next version of View will have even more features. To even try to keep pace, MS must attempt to match the current version with features like linked clones, greater pool flexibility, richer desktop protocols, and offline desktop.

It isn’t the role of the connection broker to have features such as linked clones, SCVMM or Hyper-V itself should offer this, though linked clones or thin provisioning is a feature that I would like to see Microsoft offer. [Update: Microsoft has differencing disks, but this isn't the same as linked clones]

How much of a richer protocol do you want? RDP is getting RemoteFX with Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7 Service Pack 1, of course it’s LAN only but so is PCoIP. I’ll take XenDesktop and ICA (or perhaps even vWorkspace and EOP Xtreme) over VMware View and PCoIP any day.

Offline desktop – Microsoft has this in a fashion with Windows Vista and above that are HAL independent (although a client hypervisor may come with Windows 8, but that’s some time off) – VMware doesn’t have offline desktop yet, in fact it looks like they’ve dropped the idea. Citrix does have a working client hypervisor though.

Use Hyper-V in the Cloud

On Windows Azure, David writes:

It has been reported that Microsoft’s Azure service doesn’t use their flagship virtualization product – Hyper-V. Instead, Azure is based on a modified version of Linux. How can Microsoft tout cloud computing and virtualization if they don’t “take their own medicine”? If Hyper-V is supposed to be good enough for the Fortune 5000 companies, then it should be good enough for Microsoft’s cloud computing platform.

Wow, a little research (even use Bing if you must) will show that this isn’t true and I can’t find an article that asserts that the Azure hypervisor is Linux based. The confusion here may stem from the fact that the hypervisor used by Windows Azure is not the Hyper-V used in Windows Server. Instead it’s a heavily customised version of Hyper-V from which features are ported into the mainstream Hyper-V product.

Here are a few articles that discuss the Azure Hypervisor:

Build a stronger community and create grass-roots excitement

On this, David says:

VMware’s VMworld conference is the model for any other virtualization conference in the world. VMware awarded 300 expert bloggers and experts the vExpert award. VMware’s communities and blogs are the best out there. These are examples of things that Microsoft needs to “match and raise” VMware on. They have to do better than “handing out poker chips” (at VMworld 2008), essentially bribing people to get their attention. Instead, how about delivering shocking new features and building a huge base of experts and bloggers that love the product? In other words – create a “vTechEd” for virtualization only and a “vMVP” for Microsoft virtualization pros only.

I think this is a matter of opinion rather than fact.

Microsoft has two main technical conferences in TechEd and MMS, both of which cover virtualisation. They also have 4000 MVPs in total with three dedicated virtualisation MVP tracks. I even used to work with one of the them, who was awarded MVP in virtual machines well before VMware created the vExpert award.

There are plenty of Microsoft virtualisation focused blogs and user groups too – a little confirmation bias will impact your perception of who has built the better community. Although, I did go to the London VMware User Group recently and it was top notch.

Make SCVMM Free

David writes:

Microsoft’s System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) is their centralized virtualization management solution. Microsoft already gives away Hyper-V standalone and VMware’s vCenter is already much more expensive. SCVMM is only $505 or $869, depending on how many Hyper-V servers you have.

So why should MS give away SCVMM? Because they can and VMware isn’t. By giving away SCVMM, it just makes Hyper-V look that much more appealing (something Microsoft desperately needs to do). Microsoft doesn’t need the extra $500 per SCVMM license. They need market share. Even if they only gave away the workgroup edition (limited to managing 5 Hyper-V servers), they are still providing a totally free virtualization platform – including centralized management (required for a number of Hyper-V features) – and that is something that no other virtualization vendor is doing.

This would be great, but with the hypervisor becoming a commodity, Microsoft along with VMware understand that the money is in management. I think Microsoft should keep delivering features into SCVMM and keep the price low.

Conclusion

Microsoft certainly has some work to do to catch up with VMware, but there are echoes of Microsoft vs. Novell in the mid to late 90’s and we know how that turned out. That’s not to say that VMware will lose to Microsoft, but clearly Microsoft doesn’t need a superior product to beat the competition. (I remember replacing plenty of NetWare 4.1 implementations with Windows NT 4 for Queensland Education back in the day even when NetWare was the better solution).

David, I enjoy reading your articles, but I think this one needs to go back to the drawing board.

Someone on the Internet is wrong about Hyper-V and I must correct them is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #7: Is App-V an Application Compatibility solution?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 10:00:00 +0000

The short answer to this question is No, when it comes to migrating to newer versions of Windows, the Application Compatibility Toolkit should be an essential component of your upgrade project. The longer answer is – it depends what you define as Application Compatibility.

Least Privilege

One of the most common issues with compatibility is running applications with least privilege. Often applications expect to be run with administrative access because they attempt to write to system protected areas such as HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE in the Registry or folders such as \Windows and \Program Files. App-V can assist with these types of applications by virtualising those locations and allowing the application to write to the virtual copies. The write action will then succeed but all changes are kept within the virtual environment. No changes are required to the physical system.

Remote Desktop Services

In some circumstances App-V can assist with applications that do no behave correctly in multi-user environments such as Terminal Server or Remote Desktop Services. By virtue of hosting the application in App-V, registry and file system virtualisation can benefit those applications that may store data or configurations in common locations such as HKLM in the Registry and the Program Files folder in the file system. If the application now has it’s own unique view of these locations, it should work when run under Remote Desktop Services (this includes add-on products such as Citrix XenApp or Quest vWorkspace).

Additionally, App-V helps in consolidating Remote Desktop Servers where application conflicts may have previously required creating silos of servers:

¹In Remote Desktop Services deployments, application conflicts can lead to silos of remote desktop session host servers. To avoid application conflicts, applications typically must undergo significant testing to determine which applications will collide and, therefore, must be separated and run on different session host silos—a time-consuming and costly process. Separating out multiple remote desktop session hosts to accommodate specific applications routinely results in servers being underutilized because each one is locked into a specific configuration, capable of serving only a limited set of non-conflicting applications. Often, 20 servers are required to support 1,000 users.

Microsoft Application Virtualization for Remote Desktop Services 4.6 helps consolidate remote desktop session host servers by offering the following features and benefits:
Reduce app-to-app and multi-user application conflicts and hence the need for regression testing
Accelerate application deployment by reducing the deployment risk
Simplify profile management
App-V for RDS 4.6 now supports 64-bit operating systems.

Application Versions and Conflicts

By virtualising applications, you can now run applications side by side that previously would be challenging when installing. This includes multiple versions of the same application (e.g. multiple versions of Microsoft Office) or applications that may conflict with each other because they expect different versions of the same DLL.

This also allows you to reduce regression testing because applications are now separated from the operating system and each other, so you can deploy new versions with far more confidence because conflict testing is greatly reduced.

Resources

¹Microsoft Application Virtualization for Remote Desktop Services 4.6
Making Applications Compatible with Windows 7 in a Virtualized Environment
Using Virtualization to Fix Compatibility Issues
Application Compatibility TechCentre on TechNet
Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.6
3rd Party application compatibility solutions that work with App-V include: App-DNA AppTitude and ChangeBase AOK
Accelerate your Windows 7 deployment with App-V

App-V FAQ #7: Is App-V an Application Compatibility solution? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #5: What are the current versions of App-V?

Aaron Parker — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 08:00:00 +0000

App-V Client

As of July 2010, there are two branches of the App-V Client available – App-V 4.5 and App-V 4.6. With the release of App-V 4.5 SP2, the only real difference to App-V 4.6 is 64-bit support, but you can now virtualise Office 2010 with 4.5. If you are moving forward with x64 machines, you will need to deploy the 4.6 client.

The current App-V client versions are shown in the table below:

Version	Desktop Client	Remote Desktop Services Client
App-V 4.5 SP2	4.5.3.19480	4.5.3.19480
App-V 4.6 English only	4.6.0.1523	4.6.0.1523
App-V 4.6 Languages release	4.6.0.20200	4.6.0.20200

App-V Management Server and Streaming Server

The current version of the App-V Management Server and the App-V Streaming Server is 4.5.3.19480. This is true for both the App-V 4.5 and 4.6 client – there are no server components currently at version 4.6.

App-V Sequencer

The current App-V Sequencer versions are shown in the table below:

Version	Sequencer Version
App-V 4.5 SP2	4.5.3.19480
App-V 4.6 English only	4.6.0.1523
App-V 4.6 Languages release	4.6.0.20200

Resources

Justin Zarb has a complete list of App-V Client versions maintained in a spreadsheet that you can download from here:App-V Versions.
Description of Microsoft Application Virtualization 4.5 Service Pack 2
Download Microsoft Application Virtualization 4.5 Service Pack 2
App-V 4.5 Service Pack 2 Release Notes and Known Issues
App-V 4.6 Release Notes and Known Issues

App-V FAQ #5: What are the current versions of App-V? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Specify a licensing server for Remote Desktop Virtualization Host and RemoteFX with PowerShell

Aaron Parker — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 13:26:07 +0000

If you’re configuring the Remote Desktop Virtualization Host (RDVH) and RemoteFX roles on a Hyper-V box, you may see the following message and will need to configure a license server:

Documentation on this is a little light at the moment, but given that Windows Server 2008 Service Pack 1 is still in beta this is to be expected. The component that requires licensing is RemoteFX, demonstrated by the RemoteFX Session Licensing service that is enabled with RemoteFX:

To configure the licensing mode and add a licensing server, you can use the Remote Desktop Services Provider for PowerShell. There’s a great post on the RDS Team blog that demonstrates how to use this provider to manage licensing – Manage Remote Desktop Licensing by using Windows PowerShell, so I’ll just add the commands required to configure the RDVH server.

To enable the RDS Provider in PowerShell, you can start PowerShell from the Windows PowerShell Modules shortcut, or import the RemoteDesktopServices module in an other (elevated) PowerShell window:

PS C:\> import-module RemoteDesktopServices

Once the module is loaded, you can then change to the RDS provider and configure the licensing type. The licensing type is the same as for standard RDS hosts – Per User and Per Device.

PS C:\> CD RDS:
PS C:\> CD RDVHConfiguration\LicensingSettings
PS C:\> Set-Item .\LicensingType -Value 4

The licensing type values can be 2 for Per Device and 4 for Per User. Next, specify the licensing server name. In this example I’ve added my Remote Desktop Licensing server, that I have upgraded to SP1, however I’m not sure if SP1 is requirement for the licensing server.

PS C:\> CD .\SpecifiedLicenseServers
PS C:\> New-Item -name deploy.domain.local

The final question then is, does this mean that RemoteFX will require it’s own CALs?

Specify a licensing server for Remote Desktop Virtualization Host and RemoteFX with PowerShell is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #4: Where can I download App-V?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 08:00:00 +0000

Depending on how you license App-V, you may need to download the ISO from different sources:

App-V for Desktops

To obtain the App-V for Desktops software, you must be a valid Software Assurance customer. App-V for Desktops is available in the Microsoft Desktop Optimisation Pack (MDOP) download:

Log into the Microsoft Volume Licensing Service Centre: http://licensing.microsoft.com
Navigate to the Software Downloads section
Find the Software Assurance section
Download the latest Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack for Software Assurance version (currently MDOP 2010 Refresh)
Extract the ISO to obtain the App-V components

App-V for RDS

App-V for RDS is available from the Microsoft Download Center. These downloads are available to anyone, but you must have valid RDS Client Access Licenses to run this software in production:

TechNet and MSDN Subscribers

If you have a TechNet or MSDN subscription you can download several versions of App-V:

Login into TechNet or MSDN with your Windows Live ID
Navigate to Downloads and Product Keys
App-V for RDS can be found under Servers / Application Virtualization. App-V version 4.1 and 4.5 can be found here, for 4.6 use the download links listed above.
App-V for Desktops be found under Servers / Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack. You will need to download the full MDOP ISO (currently Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack 2010 Refresh) to obtain the App-V components.

Is a trial version of App-V available?

Microsoft does not provide a trial version of App-V, there are a couple of ways that you can start testing App-V before deciding on whether it’s the right product for your environment. The App-V for RDS software is freely available on the Microsoft Download Center (although make sure you are licensed before you use it in production). Alternatively Microsoft provides a set of labs that you can use to become familiar with App-V:

App-V FAQ #4: Where can I download App-V? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #2: What is Microsoft Application Virtualization

Aaron Parker — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 08:00:00 +0000

Microsoft Application Virtualization (App-V) is Microsoft’s entry into the application virtualisation space. Originally developed by Softricity, who were bought by Microsoft in 2006, App-V is now an integral part of Microsoft application delivery offerings.

Microsoft Application Virtualization (App-V) can make applications available to end user computers without having to install the applications directly on those computers. This is made possible through a process known as sequencing the application, which enables each application to run in its own self-contained virtual environment on the client computer. The sequenced applications are isolated from each other. This eliminates application conflicts, but the applications can still interact with the client computer.¹

App-V enables applications to run without the need to visit a desktop, laptop, or Remote Desktop Server. Applications are no longer installed on the client—and there is minimal impact on the host operating system or other applications. Applications are rapidly delivered, when needed, to laptops, desktops, and Remote Desktop Servers. In most cases only a small percentage of the application is needed to launch the application.²

Additional components are delivered when transparently requested by the application. This results in faster delivery of the application when needed. Virtual Application deployments, patches, updates, and terminations are more easily managed via policies, and administered through the App-V console or via your ESD system.²

App-V Overview

If you are new to App-V, this video in a great introduction:

App-V Components

Microsoft App-V components include the App-V Sequencer, used to virtualise an application, the App-V client, installed on end points where App-V applications will execute, and the App-V Management Server and the App-V Streaming Server, used to deliver and stream applications to the App-V clients.

The image below gives you an overview of all of the App-V components (an actual implementation of App-V will generally include a subset of these components). Click for a larger view:

Sources and Links to more information about App-V:

¹ Application Virtualization Overview
² Microsoft Application Virtualization Technical Overview
Application Virtualization product page
Microsoft Application Virtualization Getting Started Guide
MDOP: Application Virtualization
Application Virtualization TechCentre on Microsoft TechNet
Microsoft Application Virtualization at Wikipedia
App-V 4.6 Release Q & A
Inside the Grid: Part 1

App-V FAQ #2: What is Microsoft Application Virtualization is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V FAQ #1: What is Application Virtualisation?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 09:44:52 +0000

Wikipedia describes Application Virtualization as:

Application virtualization is an umbrella term that describes software technologies that improve portability, manageability and compatibility of applications by encapsulating them from the underlying operating system on which they are executed. A fully virtualized application is not installed in the traditional sense[1], although it is still executed as if it is. The application is fooled at runtime into believing that it is directly interfacing with the original operating system and all the resources managed by it, when in reality it is not. In this context, the term “virtualization” refers to the artefact being encapsulated (application), which is quite different to its meaning in hardware virtualization, where it refers to the artefact being abstracted (physical hardware).

Application Virtualisation in Windows exists in several forms – these include the registry and file system redirection that is a feature of User Account Control in Windows Vista and Windows 7, the IniFileMappings feature introduced in Windows NT and application virtualisation solutions such as Microsoft App-V, VMware ThinApp and InstallFree Bridge. Application Virtualization in the context of this FAQ series, refers to those application virtualisation solutions that includes App-V.

Application Virtualisation allows you to deliver applications without having to install them to the operating system. This means that you can now turn applications into a service that can be delivered dynamically and instantly to users, rather than computers.

Application Virtualisation has a number of benefits over traditional method of application deployment ^1,2:

Uses fewer resources than running applications in a separate virtual machine or remotely from a Remote Desktop Server
Run incompatible applications side-by-side, at the same time and with minimal regression testing against one another
Implement the security principle of least privilege by removing the requirement for end-users to have Administrator privileges in order to run poorly written applications
Maintain a standard configuration in the underlying operating system across multiple computers in an organization, regardless of the applications being used
Accelerated application deployment, through on-demand application streaming
Fast application provisioning to the desktop based upon where the user is logging on from
Streams applications on demand to desktops, Remote Desktop Servers, and laptops
Automates and simplifies the application management lifecycle by significantly reducing regression and application interoperability testing
Reduces the end-user impacts associated with application upgrades, patching, and terminations – No reboots required, no waiting for applications to install, and no need to uninstall when retiring applications

How Application Virtualisation Works

(Note, this section is from the App-V product page, but the general concepts apply to all application virtualisation products) Virtualized application environments enable each application to bring its own set of configurations and run without any installation within a virtual run-time abstraction layer on the client, so dependencies or effects on the configuration of the operating system are minimized. However, since applications execute locally, they run with full performance, functionality, and access to local services—including cut and paste, OLE, printing, network drives, and attached devices.³

	Standard Operating System Environment: In standard OS environments, applications install their settings onto the host operating system, hard-coding the entire system to fit that application’s needs. Other applications’ settings can be overwritten, possibly causing them to malfunction or break.³
	The Virtual Application Environment: With application virtualization, each application brings down its own set of configurations on-demand, and executes in a way so that only it sees its own settings.³
	Side-by-Side Virtualization: Each virtual application brings down its own set of configurations and can run side by side without the settings conflicting with each other—or the host operating system. Despite this separation, inter-application communication with other virtual applications and those installed locally is preserved, allowing for cut and paste, OLE, and all other standard operations.³

Sources and Links to more information about application virtualisation:

¹Wikipedia’s article on Application Virtualization
²MDOP: Application Virtualization
³ Microsoft Application Virtualization Technical Overview
Ruben Spruijt’s Application Virtualization Solutions Overview and Feature Compare Matrix

App-V FAQ #1: What is Application Virtualisation? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V Frequently Asked Question Series

Aaron Parker — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 15:00:00 +0000

Starting tomorrow, I have a new blog post series – Microsoft App-V FAQs. There has been a SoftGrid FAQ blog on Microsoft TechNet in the past, but it’s now very out of date. You can find official FAQs such as the App-V 4.6 on TechNet and an App-V 4.5 SP2 FAQ document, but these are a bit limited in scope.

If you spend any time on the TechNet App-V forums or on AppVirtGuru.com you’ll notice that many questions have often been asked previously or are answered by existing documentation. I hope to make this series is an attempt at answering many of those common questions.

Keep an eye out every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday for new FAQs. (Fingers crossed, I’ve got about 12 weeks worth of content so far, let’s see how this goes ).

App-V Frequently Asked Question Series is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Virtualising Apple Safari 5

Aaron Parker — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 21:29:54 +0000

This post details virtualising Apple Safari 5.x with Microsoft Application Virtualization; however the same basic steps should apply to any application virtualisation product.

Virtualising Apple Safari is a two step process:

Extract the setup files from the download so that we can perform a custom installation of Safari
Capture the Safari 5 package and customise it for execution

Prerequisites

Other than Windows XP Service Pack 2 or above, there are no specific prerequisites for installing Safari.

Creating a custom installation of Safari

The default installation of Safari will install Apple Software Update so it’s important to prevent this from installing during sequencing so that the package is not automatically updated once deployed. Bonjour is also installed; however this is optional.

There are a few ways to extract the Safari installer, but I find this process is simplest – Download the Safari installer and execute it, but do not step through the installation. The setup files will be extracted to your Temp folder (%TEMP%), so grab a copy from there. The following files will be extracted:

AppleApplicationSupport.msi
AppleSoftwareUpdate.msi
Bonjour.msi
Bonjour64.msi
Safari.msi
SetupAdmin.exe

We don’t need AppleSoftwareUpdate.msi because automatic updates for this package will be disabled and we also don’t need SetupAdmin.exe. Using the remaining files, we can script an installation of Safari and its’ dependant components. The following script listing will automate the installation of Safari for sequencing with App-V:

@ECHO OFF
START /WAIT MSIEXEC /I AppleApplicationSupport.msi ALLUSERS=TRUE REBOOT=SUPRESS /QB
IF "%PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%"=="x86" START /WAIT MSIEXEC /I Bonjour.msi ALLUSERS=TRUE REBOOT=SUPRESS /QB
IF "%PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%"=="AMD64" START /WAIT MSIEXEC /I Bonjour64.msi ALLUSERS=TRUE REBOOT=SUPRESS /QB
START /WAIT Safari.MSI SCHEDULE_ASUW=0 DESKTOP_SHORTCUTS=0 INSTALLDIR=Q:\SAFARI5x.000\Safari ALLUSERS=TRUE REBOOT=SUPPRESS /QB

Virtualising (or Sequencing) Safari

Capturing the Safari package is very simple – no exclusions were added and the following steps should produce a successful package:

1. Start monitoring and install Safari using the sample script listed above

2. Before stopping the monitoring process, run Safari at least once

3. Safari will prompt you to make it the default browser, be sure answer Yes to this dialog box so that the registry keys that are set are captured by the Sequencer. This will ensure that those keys are not written to the real registry if the user attempts to set Safari as the default browser at execution time. If they were to do this, then Windows would be unable to launch the default browser (as it is now inside the bubble).

4. Configure options as you need them, such as displaying the status bar, changing tab options etc

5. Finally, delete the imported Internet Explorer Favourites (unless you specifically want to keep them):

6. Stop monitoring and move onto the detected applications. Two shortcuts will be listed Safari and About Bonjour. Remove About Bonjour, move onto creating FB1 and save the package.

Conclusion

Safari 5 will virtualise quite easily and you could combine it with QuickTime, as well as other plug-ins, into a single package. During testing, I should note that it loaded the installed version of Flash without having to bundle it into the same package.

Virtualising Apple Safari 5 is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Virtualising Paint.NET 3.x

Aaron Parker — Mon, 17 May 2010 19:09:42 +0000

This post details virtualising Paint.NET 3.x with Microsoft Application Virtualization; however the same basic steps should apply to any application virtualisation product.

Virtualising Paint.NET is a simple two step process:

Configure an unattended installation that installs Paint.NET to configure specific options, including disabling automatic update checks
Capture the Paint.NET package and customise it for execution

Prerequisites

Paint.NET requires Windows XP SP2 and above and the .NET Framework 3.5 or 4.0. The .NET Framework should be installed on your sequencing machine and be deployed to client computers before delivering Paint.NET.

Creating an unattended installation for Paint.NET

The Paint.NET documentation explains how to create an unattended installation. There are a number of options that are important when virtualising Paint.NET:

TARGETDIR – specify an installation folder on the virtual drive. This is not required and you can successfully sequence a VFS install of this application
CHECKFORUPDATES – it is important to set this value to 0 to disable prevent Paint.NET from automatically prompting users to update the package. Users will still be able to access the Utilities / Check for Updates menu item – Resource Hacker or other tools such as AppSense Environment Manager can be used to disable this menu item
CHECKFORBETAS – if CHECKFORUPDATES is set to 0 then this option should automatically be set to 0 as well; however I have set this option in my install script

Unfortunately the updater component is in process so it is difficult to remove from the installation. Additionally deleting files associated with the updater results in Paint.NET attempting to repair itself on start-up:

JPGPNGBMPEDITOR – if you want Paint.NET to be the default editor for JPG, PNG and BMP files, set this to 1
TGAEDITOR – if you want Paint.NET to be the default editor for TGA files, set this to 1
DESKTOPSHORTCUT – setting this to 0 will prevent setup from creating a desktop shortcut

I have included a sample script below, that shows the unattended options that I have used during sequencing:

Paint.NET install script for App-V

Virtualising (or Sequencing) Paint.NET

Before sequencing, ensure your sequencing image has been configured with the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 or 4.0 – if you are sequencing on Windows 7, version 3.5 is already included. Here’s what you should configure before sequencing:

Install or enable the .NET Framework – use the same version of the .NET Framework that is deployed to your client computers
Disable System Protection (or System Restore) – setup creates a restore point during install which we don’t want to capture
Add an exclusion for CSIDL_DESKTOP – if Paint.NET crashed during sequencing it will place a log file on the desktop which we don’t want to capture
Add an exclusion for CSIDL_Windows\Installer so that the cached MSI file is not captured in the package
Copy the installation script and the Paint.NET installer to a local path inside the sequencing machine

The sequencing process that should be followed will look like this:

Start monitoring
Install Paint.NET using the silent install script. Do not run Paint.NET at this point as it will crash on launch
Stop Monitoring to allow the sequencer to process the changes
Start Monitoring
Run Paint.NET and configure defaults if required. Check that automatic updates has been disabled.
Stop Monitoring and continue
Customise the shortcut and file type associations
Configure feature block 1 only if required

The Choose Defaults options are available from the Tool drop down button on the toolbar:

Conclusion

Virtualising Paint.NET should be very quick and can be sequenced on 32-bit and 64-bit Windows. Even if sequenced on 32-bit Windows, Paint.NET will execute as a 64-bit application under Windows x64 – no re-sequencing required.

One final item to fix up when creating the package is the file type icon that is extracted from the Paint.NET executable is only a 32×32 pixel icon. To make associated files look better under Windows Vista and Windows 7, you could replace this with an icon that includes a 256×256 pixel size image.

Virtualising Paint.NET 3.x is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Dynamic Suite Composition and short names

Nicke Källén — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 10:00:05 +0000

This is a guest post from Nicke Källén, an App-V MVP from Sweden. He posts as Znack on the TechNet Forums, where he’s consistently the most active answerer in App-V topics. You can find his blog here.

After looking for information in all my usual channels during the last few months and banging my head against the wall for not understanding why I always run into problems in specific scenarios I finally came to a breakthrough in solving an issue that had been bugging me since early 2009.

This started out with me deciding to really pinpoint the root cause of the issue where the application could not find a file in a linked package, something I wrote about this in my Swedish blog a while ago (available for translation if wanted) and continued discussing later while requesting assistance.

Now – lets focus on the background before digging any deeper.

During the last couple of years I have been involved in the building of a XenApp farm based on Windows 2003 and XenApp 4.5. The goal of the project was to be able to create an environment that would be able to satisfy all the application owners needs. To add further complications the company just bought a larger company and they were both in need of major infrastructure upgrades (the number 2000 was showing up to many times). Essentially this meant: we needed to support just about any application in the world!

So how do you handle all the needs of different Java , Oracle client, Office versions and the possible conflicts you can expect in an environment like that?

I did not make the design. I have been involved in the details, I have assisted with making things run smoother. I hope I have helped make the people involved in the project see it as a delight and not a burden in making their applications available to a new client – most certainly making some applications available even though the new Vista-client could not host them. The design was made by someone else who provided great insights and an understanding of business requirements and how-to adopt them to a technical platform. The first draft of the environment was based on Windows Server 2003 SP1, SoftGrid 4.1 Terminal Services and XenApp 4.5. It has since evolved to Windows Server 2003 SP2, App-V 4.5 Terminal Services CU1 + HF6 and XenApp 4.5 Hotfix Rollup 5.

To use a marketing phrase – our setup was cloud based. The farm would be stripped of anything not necessary. No Office. Because, which Office version would we install? No Java. Because, which Java version would we install?

This would standardize the server-setup to one common installation hosting all applications – increasing flexibility, scalability and still allowing the various requirements of all applications that could possible want to be hosted.

This of course lead us to include any necessary software within a single virtual package. A package that would contain exactly what the application owner specified as requirements. Such as Office 2000, Adobe Reader 7, 8 or 9… or you name it… Only limitation is the 4gb limit of any App-V package. 4.5 removed this limit! Almost…. by using the feature Dynamic Suite Composition we could work around it

Now – I was being told that one special application was going to be a challenge. Early on there was an insight that this system would have loads of middleware, different dependencies and would constantly be changing the configuration of any individual component.

Dynamic Suite Composition would of course be the rescue. As the system forced us to discover many new things (I can not stress enough that Aaron’s writings have been invaluable), however there was an ongoing struggle with odd things simply not working. Choosing the simple path and going back to the “single-package” approach was done quite early as the amount of issues reported could simply not be handled while using Dynamic Suite Composition. Usually when things go that bad it’s because somebody didn’t read the documentation. Apparently somebody in this case is me – so I read the documentation. Again. and Again… and felt pretty dumb…. because I just couldn’t figure it out.

Now, Dynamic Suite Composition was in my own little world a perfect usage for the scenario. The software needed Microsoft Office 2007, Adobe Acrobat, one small plug-in and some other minor stuff like Java. Early on I realized that there might be simply things – like a DLL conflict. Considering the fact that I separated the software into different packages to be able to cope with changes effectively I started thinking about what happened if there was a conflict between a registry key or file in the primary package and any secondary package.

There was no documentation regarding that – but let me clarify this;

Last loaded wins, apart from any configuration in primary OSD.
Packages are loaded in the order they are listed, so:

Primary Package
Secondary package 1
Secondary package 2

Any conflict between the packages means that Secondary package 2 wins. DSC suddenly didn’t appear as such a good solution as some ideas had to be scrapped right away. Apart from the above realization we continued working with it in some cases, but again – other issues kept appearing. Most commonly we received messages that the Macro-feature was not installed with Office.

The macro-feature is a DLL-file. It’s referenced using a short name. More precisely – it looks like this:

The reference was there, the file was there – but yet when Microsoft Office was made a secondary package it could not locate the file.

As the 4.6 beta was out and there was a Connect-site up – we of course tried the 4.6 release and could repeat the issue. After getting an e-mail confirming that the product didn’t meet our expectations but no elaboration of why it didn’t we decided to pursue this further and opened a Premier Support Case and finally got information detailing the behaviour:

Short name tables are not loaded from secondary packages.

Not really sure why, but any file being referenced using a short name from a secondary package will of course fail. In the above scenario – we have the luck of being able to change the reference – enter a long name path and all will be well. Currently there are more discussions ongoing regarding this behaviour – what it will mean in the end I am uncertain of.

So what can be done to avoid issues with the above? Make sure you do not have anything in the secondary package available in a location which uses long names. Such as %PROGRAMFILES%.

Since all of this was undocumented, our main focus was to get some proper documentation in place, and with the release of App-v 4.6 the sequencing guide was updated with a few notes and the replacement of some images that had been pretty harshly judged. None of the actual technical limitations were written, instead small notes like this were noticed;

Also, the secondary application can only be middleware or a plug-in and cannot be another full software product.

What does that mean? Office is not supported as a secondary package and along with it all other full software suites. Why? To minimize the risk of any short name requirements within secondary packages.

Realizing the limitations of a product is probably key to optimally using it for any environment – the current issue revolving around the fact that we know there are limitations with a feature and hopefully Microsoft can be honest about them. So we can plan accordingly.

Dynamic Suite Composition and short names is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Reduce logon times by excluding the bloat

Aaron Parker — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 20:00:01 +0000

Profile bloat – we’ve all seen it. Many applications, and even Windows itself, can store files in the most inappropriate places within the user profile. For example, here’s just part of what the Vodafone Mobile Connect application stores within the roaming portion of my profile:

Yes that’s 37.3Mb of logs. Handy.

Here’s iTunes storing 161Mb in 3295 files in AppData\Roaming – imagine waiting for that to copy at logon.

I’ve been spending some time with some of the user profile virtualisation (or user virtualisation / user environment management / user workspace virtualisation ) products lately and have started to compile a list of profile folders that I’ve needed to exclude from being managed.

Profile virtualisation products like this one and this one can optimise what is roamed; however exclusions may still be required and are necessary if are using standard Windows roaming profiles or less complex virtualisation solutions such as Citrix Profile Management.

Most of these products are very easy to install and configure and for the most part are ‘fire and forget’; however adding some exclusions is a simple way to improve logon and logoff times by reducing the amount of managed data.

Folder Exclusions

The following tables list a selection of folders from within the user profile (all relative to %USERPROFILE%) that should be considered for exclusion.

First up, here’s a list of the default user folders for Windows Vista and above, that in most cases would be redirected from the user profile to a network location:

Folder	Description
Contacts	Contacts folder (depreciated in Windows 7?)
Desktop	Desktop folder; usually redirected
Documents	Documents folder; usually redirected
Downloads	Downloads folder
Favorites	Internet Explorer favourites; usually redirected
Links	Windows Explorer favourites; usually redirected
Music	Music folder; usually redirected
Pictures	Pictures folder; usually redirected
Saved Games	Games saves
Searches	Windows Explorer custom searches; usually redirected
Videos	Videos folder; usually redirected

If you are using folder redirection, you may not need to add these to your exclusion list; however if folder redirection did not apply then excluding these from the user profile will prevent them from becoming managed (potentially managing very large amounts of data).

Next is a list of folders from various applications that either store large files or many small files that will impact on logon and logoff times:

Folder	Description
.VirtualBox	Sun VirtualBox; Default configuration and storage folder
Tracing	Windows Live Messenger, Office Communicator; tracing logs. Info how to change that location here
Podcasts	Zune; Podcasts folder
Virtual Machines	Windows Virtual PC; default configuration and storage folder
AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync	Apple iTunes; Folder used to store device backups
AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\Logs	Apple iTunes; Stores device logs
AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\iTunes\iPhone Software Updates	Apple iTunes; Stores full images of the iPhone OS
AppData\Roaming\Microsoft Office\Live Meeting 8	Microsoft Live Meeting; default installation folder
AppData\Roaming\Microsoft Shared\LiveMeeting Shared	Microsoft Live Meeting; shared folder
AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\XDE	Microsoft Visual Studio; Windows Mobile 7 emulator images
AppData\Roaming\Macromedia\Flash Player\macromedia.com\support\flashplayer\sys	Adobe Flash; Cookies and settings
AppData\Roaming\Macromedia\Flash Player\#SharedObjects	Adobe Flash; Cookies
AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Flash Player\AssetCache	Adobe Flash; cache folder
AppData\Roaming\Vodafone\Vodafone Mobile Connect\Log	Vodafone Mobile Connect
AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent	Windows; recent files and folders; lots of small files can increase logon/logoff times
AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu	Windows; personal Start Menu; if applications are managed this folder could be excluded
AppData\Roaming\SoftGrid Client\Icon Cache	App-V; Icon cache for shortcuts. If using App-V server this will be re-populated
AppData\Roaming\Juniper Networks\Juniper Citrix Services Client	Juniper Networks; Citrix ICA client binaries
AppData\Roaming\Juniper Networks\Setup Client	Juniper Networks; Setup client binaries
AppData\Local	Various; Local application data (i.e. non-roaming); should be excluded by default
AppData\LocalLow	Various; Local application data for low integrity applications; should be excluded by default
AppData\Roaming\MetroTwit\User_Images	MetroTwit user images cache
AppData\Roaming\Dropbox	DropBox install folder
AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Office\Recent	Shortcuts to recent files edited in Microsoft Office
AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Crash Reports	Firefox Crash Reports
AppData\Roaming\McAfee\Common Framework	Various McAfee apps including VirusScan. Logs files and others
AppData\Roaming\Spotify\Gracenote	Gracenote SDK DLLs used by Spotify

If you have any additional folders to exclude, let me know and I’ll add them to the list.

Reduce logon times by excluding the bloat is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Virtualising OpenOffice.org 3.x

Aaron Parker — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 23:56:41 +0000

This post details virtualising OpenOffice.org 3.x with Microsoft Application Virtualization; however the same basic steps should apply to any application virtualisation product.

Virtualising OpenOffice is a basic three-step process:

Bundle a version of the Sun Java Runtime Environment with OpenOffice (or link an existing virtual instance of the JRE to a virtual OpenOffice package)
Create an unattended installation of OpenOffice
Capture the OpenOffice package and customise it for execution

Sun Java Runtime Environment

OpenOffice relies on Java for some functions, but will install without it – if you don’t need those features, you can avoid installing Java. Take note when downloading OpenOffice – you can get two installers, one with Java and one without; however when I attempted to download the installer with Java, I kept getting the one without. It’s probably best to download OpenOffice and the JRE separately so that you have a bit more control over what gets installed.

To install the JRE, download the latest offline installer – Sun JRE 1.6 Update 18 offline installer and use this install script:

Sun JRE 1.6 Update 18 install script for App-V

The script will install the JRE to the virtual drive letter, install just the core Java components, disable the updater and ensure the quick starter service is removed.

Creating an unattended installation for OpenOffice

Setup for OpenOffice is Windows Installer based which makes creating an unattended install easy. There are several components that should be removed because they can’t be virtualised, aren’t suitable when OpenOffice is virtualised or just not suitable for your environment:

On-line Update (ensure users can’t attempt to update the virtual OpenOffice package)
Mobile Device Filters (for Palm and Pocket PC/Windows Mobile devices, not installed by default)
ActiveX Control (allows for viewing OpenOffice documents from within Internet Explorer)
Windows Explorer Extension (shows live icon views from within Windows Explorer, so this can’t be virtualised)
Quickstarter (runs a process at logon so that the OpenOffice applications start faster. Not a great feature to leave enabled for fast logons, and frankly if you have to add a quick start tool to your application, you’re doing it wrong. Windows does this for you)
OpenOffice.org Experience Improvement program (provides anonymous feedback to OpenOffice on the features used)

The screenshot below shows the available components for OpenOffice 3.2, with the options listed above (and the defaults) disabled:

The unattended reference for OpenOffice appears to be based on OpenOffice 2, so you may have to refer to the MSI itself when customising the install. See the Feature table for the names for each of the components. I prefer to do everything on the command-line, instead of creating a transform where I can, so my OpenOffice install looks like this:

OpenOffice.org 3 install script for App-V

Virtualising (or Sequencing) OpenOffice

OpenOffice.org 3.x has a dependency on the Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable, so that will need to be installed on your sequencer before you start (if you are using App-V 4.6 and above it too requires Visual C++ 2008, so you will need to include it in your base build).

My App-V asset folder for this example is Q:\OOo3.001 (that is, Q: is my virtual drive letter, I’m installing OpenOffice.org 3 and this is version 001 of my OpenOffice package). For OpenOffice, select the asset folder as the install folder because it will automatically install to a sub-folder named OpenOffice.org 3.

Before I capture the OpenOffice install, I have copied the setup files and scripts into a folder inside the sequencer (C:\Packages) and created an exception for this folder (so that the Sequencer does not pick up any extraneous files).

Install both the Sun JRE and OpenOffice and launch at least one of the OpenOffice applications during sequencing (run the main OpenOffice executable Q:\OOo3.001\OpenOffice.org 3\program\soffice.exe). On first run you will need to walk through the first-run wizard, although you can use an add-in to disable the wizard completely.

You can leave the user details blank if you like:

Of course you want to register..

After first run, a profile folder at %APPDATA%\OpenOffice.org\3\user will be created, which should come to somewhere around 1.8 MB. It also might be a good idea to check that OpenOffice can detect the JRE (open Tools / Options):

If you already have the JRE installed on your workstations, OpenOffice should detect it at runtime. Alternatively, you can use DSC to add the JRE support to OpenOffice.

Once the JRE and OpenOffice have been installed, move on to see the applications detected. Java Platform SE binary and Java Web Start Launcher will be in the list, but they can be removed.

If you have configured the OpenOffice setup to associate OpenOffice with Microsoft Office file types (DOC, XLSX etc), a second set of Calc, Impress and Writer shortcuts will be detected (labelled with a 1) which will contain those Microsoft Office file type associations. There will be a bit of work involved in moving the file types to the single shortcut, although you could edit the XML directly after saving the package.

Build feature block 1, if you need it, and end the sequencing wizard.

If the JRE install has worked correctly, you should not see the Java Quick Start service on the Virtual Services tab. If it is there, just remove it before saving the package.

The only post-wizard change you should need to make to the package is to delete %APPDATA%\OpenOffice.org\3\user\registry\data\org\openoffice\UserProfile.xcu the if you would like users to see the first-run wizard when they start OpenOffice for the first time.

Conclusion

So there’s how to virtualise OpenOffice without too much effort and you should be left with a pretty clean package weighing at approximately 500Mb that looks a little like this:

Virtualising OpenOffice.org 3.x is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Virtualising Firefox? Don’t forget to disable Updates

Aaron Parker — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 16:44:03 +0000

If you are virtualising Mozilla Firefox, you should probably consider disabling the update functionality within the browser, to ensure consistency of the virtual package. There are several items that need to be configured or removed:

The automatic updates functionality
Help / Check for Updates… menu item
The Firefox check-box in the Option / Advanced / Updates dialog box

Fortunately doing so is fairly straight-forward:

Disable Automatic Updates

Updates are disabled in the Options / Advanced / Updates dialog box (under Windows), which you can do when running Firefox during the sequencing/capture process – untick the Firefox check box and change When updates to Firefox are found to Ask me what to do.

Alternatively set app.update.auto and app.update.enabled to false in about:config or directly in %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\.default\prefs.js.

Leave Add-ons and Search Engines enabled as these are stored within the user profile and can be updated when running under application virtualisation.

Disable the Updates UI

Disabling the user interface elements to these update preferences and launch points is also important. To hide UI elements in Firefox, create UserChrome.css in %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\.default\chrome. This file does not exist by default, although you will find an example file in the chrome folder. Create the file and add the following lines to hide the updates menu item and the Firefox check-box in the Updates dialog box.

/* remove the Check for Updates menu item */
#updateSeparator, #checkForUpdates { display: none !important; }
/* remove the Updates / Firefox checkbox */
#enableAppUpdate { display: none !important; }

If it is working correctly, you should see something like this (before and after):

This method is not completely fool-proof (the modified files all exist in the user profile and are thus writeable) but it should stop users from unwittingly attempting to update Firefox and allow you to control when updates are deployed.

Virtualising Firefox? Don’t forget to disable Updates is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

KB Article: Sequencing Office 2010 beta in App-V 4.6

Aaron Parker — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 15:28:22 +0000

A new knowledge-base article, released on the 22nd, is available from Microsoft for sequencing Office 2010 (32-bit and 64-bit) with App-V 4.6:

Prescriptive guidance for sequencing the Beta version of the 2010 Office system in Microsoft App-V

It’s interesting to note that the article states that this is not the only way to sequence Office 2010. Does the Office team have something else up their sleeve?

No formal product support is available from Microsoft for this beta product. For information about how to obtain support for a beta release, see the documentation that is included with the beta product files, or check the Web location where you downloaded the release.

This article describes one method that you can use to successfully sequence the Beta version of the 2010 Microsoft Office system for use with Microsoft Application Virtualization (App-V) 4.6. The method that is described in this article is not the only method that is available. You may have to change the information in the article as appropriate for your particular environment.

KB Article: Sequencing Office 2010 beta in App-V 4.6 is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V 4.6 Released

Aaron Parker — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 20:33:45 +0000

Microsoft Application Virtualisation 4.6 (RTM) has been made available, which you can download from the Microsoft Download Centre, including some new and updated support tools:

Microsoft Application Virtualization for Remote Desktop Services 4.6 – Here you can download an ISO that includes the App-V client for RDS/Terminal Server. The ISO includes the server components as well. You will need a TechNet, MSDN subscription or access to the Microsoft Licensing site to get access to the desktop client (as of writing, it does not appear to be available yet).

Microsoft Application Virtualization Administrative Template (ADM Template) – An additional template has been created to support the 64-bit client and includes one additional policy (setting the virtual drive letter).

Application Virtualization MSI Compat Transform – This includes a transform file that you must run against an App-V 4.5 generated MSI to make it compatible with the 4.6 client.

Application Virtualization Application Listing Tool – This tool will give you information on running virtual applications, which looks like this:

Microsoft Application Virtualization SFT View – SFT View loads a driver that automatically mounts SFT files as read-only folders (you will see a corresponding .dir folder for each SFT). This is an easy way to see into the SFT file and might be useful for performing virus scanning if the tool was installed on the servers hosting your Content share.

Application Virtualization Client Log Parser Utility – This tools has been previously available and is an excellent troubleshooting resource. You can find some information on using this tool here Getting to Grips with the App-V Client Log Parser Utility (Launch Times) and here Getting to Grips with the App-V Client Log Parser Utility (Error Codes)

Application Virtualization Cache Configuration Tool – If you need to change the client cache size post install, this is the tool to automate that process with.

Application Virtualization Dynamic Suite Composition Tool – Not much looks to have changed with this tool. Use it to create package dependencies without have to edit an OSD file. There’s an example of how the tool is used in this video.

Application Virtualization SFT Parser Tool – This command-line tool can generate quite a lot of information about an SFT file and would be useful for some in-depth troubleshooting; however if you want to look into the SFT file to get information on it, you can go past SFT Explorer. There’s also a small bug in SFT Parser – the –H switch doesn’t work, so help from the command-line just isn’t there.

The most glaring omission from the tools supplied by the App-V team, is a utility to view what’s inside the users’ PKG file (to see what’s inside the virtualised profile). Fortunately, Kalle Saunamäki is hard at work on his own tool, which you can read about here: What’s stored in my PKG files?

App-V 4.6 Released is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

RemoteApp for Windows XP and Windows Vista, the missing pieces

Aaron Parker — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 02:17:58 +0000

You may recall from my last post on RemoteApp, that we can get RemoteApp for Hyper-V works on other platforms too. While it was straight-forward publishing applications from a Windows 7 host, the client would report this error when connecting to Windows XP and Windows Vista hosts:

Kind of annoying, because the original RemoteApp for Hyper-V post on the RDS blog, showed us something cool but left out the important part on how to get it working. Well, thanks to Justin and this comment, I’ve been able to fix the issue and get RemoteApp running on XP and Vista (unfortunately I can’t take any of the credit).

Liam Westley has already done a great job of documenting the complete process for setting up RemoteApp, so for full details go there – I’ll just summarise and fill in the missing pieces.

What You’ll Need

First up there is a set of minimum components that will need to be in place:

The client computer can be Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista SP1+ or Windows 7 (unless Microsoft decides to release an RDC update for Windows Server – unfortunately I don’t think they will)
Remote Desktop Connection 7.0 – built into Windows 7, available for Windows XP (KB969084) and Windows Vista (KB969084)
The RemoteApp host can be Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista SP1+ or Windows 7
If the RemoteApp host is running Windows XP or Windows Vista, you’ll need the following updates: Update for Windows XP SP3 to enable RemoteApp or Update for Windows Vista SP1 or above to enable RemoteApp (Windows 7 works out of the box)

Configure the RemoteApp Host

When configuring the host, I’ve been using been using a 1-to-1 setup, I haven’t tested this with pooled virtual desktops yet.

To enable RemoteApp on the host, install the hotfix, then configure the TsAppAllowList key in the registry. In this example, I’ve configured the required entries for running Calculator. Here’s a listing of the registry values I added with the pertinent values highlighted.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Terminal Server\TSAppAllowList]
"fDisabledAllowList"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Terminal Server\TSAppAllowList\Applications\calc]
"CommandLineSetting"=dword:00000000
"RequiredCommandLine"=""
"IconIndex"=dword:00000000
"IconPath"="%windir%\\system32\\calc.exe"
"Path"="C:\\Windows\\system32\\calc.exe"
"VPath"="%SYSTEMDRIVE%\\Windows\\system32\\calc.exe"
"ShowInTSWA"=dword:00000001
"Name"="Calculator"
"SecurityDescriptor"=""

The simplest method of discovering the required registry keys for each RemoteApp entry is to configure the applications on Windows XP Mode or Windows Server 2008 running Remote Desktop Services.

Creating RemoteApp Connections

I’ve originally based the .RDP file on those created by the RemoteApp Manager in Windows Server. There is documentation on TechNet on how to configure RemoteApp programs and creating the .RDP file for each application here: Configuring RemoteApp Programs.

The important entries for connecting to Windows XP and Windows Vista, that you may need to add manually, are disableremoteappcapscheck (set to 1) and alternate shell (set to rdpinit.exe). These were the only additional entries I need to add the .RDP file to get this working. DisableRemoteAppCapsCheck fixes the ‘remote computer does not support RemoteApp’ error, and Alternate Shell makes sure you actually get a published application and not a remote desktop.

An .RDP file to connect to a RemoteApp program then looks like this (the added lines are highlighted):

redirectclipboard:i:1
redirectposdevices:i:0
redirectprinters:i:1
redirectcomports:i:1
redirectsmartcards:i:1
devicestoredirect:s:*
drivestoredirect:s:*
redirectdrives:i:1
session bpp:i:32
prompt for credentials on client:i:1
span monitors:i:1
use multimon:i:1
remoteapplicationmode:i:1
server port:i:3389
allow font smoothing:i:1
promptcredentialonce:i:0
authentication level:i:2
full address:s:winxp1.domain.local
remoteapplicationprogram:s:||calc
remoteapplicationname:s:calculator
remoteapplicationcmdline:s:
alternate full address:s:winxp1.domain.local
disableremoteappcapscheck:i:1
alternate shell:s:rdpinit.exe
screen mode id:i:2
winposstr:s:0,3,0,0,800,600
compression:i:1
keyboardhook:i:2
audiocapturemode:i:0
videoplaybackmode:i:1
connection type:i:2
displayconnectionbar:i:1
disable wallpaper:i:1
allow desktop composition:i:0
disable full window drag:i:1
disable menu anims:i:1
disable themes:i:0
disable cursor setting:i:0
bitmapcachepersistenable:i:1
audiomode:i:0
redirectdirectx:i:1
autoreconnection enabled:i:1
prompt for credentials:i:0
negotiate security layer:i:1
remoteapplicationicon:s:
shell working directory:s:
gatewayhostname:s:
gatewayusagemethod:i:4
gatewaycredentialssource:i:4
gatewayprofileusagemethod:i:0
use redirection server name:i:0

RemoteApp in Action

When launching the RemoteApp program, the UI isn’t quite as seamless as you get with the XenApp client. You will first see a warning prompt if the .RDP file is not signed, and then a dialog box while the client connects:

If the RemoteApp host is Windows XP, the user will be required to click the Details button to see the remote login dialog box and enter their credentials:

If the client is Windows XP or above and the host is Windows Vista or above, you can configure credential pass-through (single sign-on) to make connecting seamless. You must first enable CredSSP on Windows XP SP3 clients. Pass-through won’t work for Windows XP hosts – although you may be able to save the username and password in the .RDP file instead.

So finally with all of the pieces in place, here’s what you’ll see with applications running via RemoteApp. In this screenshot I have Calculator running remotely from Windows XP and Windows Vista next to the local version.

One thing to note is that the remote applications are all group together on the taskbar; in this screenshot, the two remote Calculators are grouped with Remote Desktop Connection – users’ won’t see separate remote buttons as you get in competing products.

So What’s Left?

Use of RemoteApp is not restricted to the brand of hypervisor – RemoteApp will be available on Windows XP+ regardless of where it is running. You could, for example, use blade PCs as hosts.

If you have Citrix XenApp or Quest vWorkspace, you already have tools to publishing applications from virtual desktops, so where would this actually be useful? SMBs without either product would benefit (although I have had one enterprise customer ask me about this feature) or perhaps this would work as a replacement for Windows XP Mode if you don’t like Windows Virtual PC (and who does?).

Deploying and managing the .RDP files could be fun. A simple method of deployment would involve the use of Windows Installer packages adapted from those generated by RemoteApp Manager. You could also use your user environment management tool of choice; however the option that holds most promise is extending RD Web Access. Custom code will be required, but it would replace copying .RDP files to users’ desktops and could even support pooled virtual desktops.

Ultimately it would be nice to see this documented on TechNet. Apparently though, the RDS team are working on a follow up post that should give us all the info we need and more.

RemoteApp for Windows XP and Windows Vista, the missing pieces is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V Video Series available from Microsoft

Aaron Parker — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 10:21:23 +0000

Microsoft has made available a set of 11 videos on App-V. These are mainly introductory, but are still worth watching even if you’ve been working with App-V for some time.

Microsoft Application Virtualization (App-V) separates the application from the operating system preventing application conflicts and enabling the ability to run multiple versions of an application of the same desktop. Virtual applications can be delivered in many ways – streaming by assigning applications to user, delivering to machines via Configuration Manager or by using file streaming from removable media.

Using App-V and AppLocker together ensures that no matter how the application is delivered or what format is takes, physical or virtual, it will respect the policies defined by IT.

Watch these demonstrations to learn how to configure App-V; create, update, and publish virtual applications; and create and manage policies for virtual applications.

The videos are available from microsoft.com here: Application Virtualization (App-V) Video Series

The page appears to be intermittently available at the moment, so here’s the full list of videos:

App-V Video Series available from Microsoft is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

App-V Errors 00000006 and 000D3002 When Adding Packages

Aaron Parker — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:34:06 +0000

I’m unsure if this is a bug or by design, but if you are using SFTMIME to add packages to an App-V client, you may receive the following error:

The handle is invalid.

Error code: 460579-23C02532-00000006

Which looks something like this:

The issue is in the path to the manifest XML file for the package – when executing the command like this, I’ll see the error every time:

SFTMIME ADD PACKAGE:"Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001" /MANIFEST "\\VBOXSVR\Packages\Microsoft Office\2010_x64\000\Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001_manifest.xml" /OVERRIDEURL "\\VBOXSVR\Packages\Microsoft Office\2010_x64\000\Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001.sft" /GLOBAL /CONSOLE

Can’t see the the problem? The command certainly looks like it should work. An entry in the log file sheds light on the issue:

[02/09/2010 17:23:57:638 INTF VRB] {tid=AB0:usr=Admin}
SWCreatePackage(name=’Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001′, manifest=’\VBOXSVR\Packages\Microsoft Office\2010_x64\000\Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001_manifest.xml’)

The first backslash is truncated, leave the UNC path incorrect. The same happens for the path to the SFT file – again the log file shows what’s going on:

[02/09/2010 17:21:07:936 JGSW ERR] {hap=20:app=Microsoft Word 2010 (Beta) 084154.001:tid=9D8:usr=Admin}
The Application Virtualization Client could not connect to a server because the URL specified, ‘\VBOXSVR\Packages\Microsoft Office\2010_x64\000\Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001.sft’, was invalid (rc 04300507-000D3002).

When attempting to stream the package, the operation fails and the following error is displayed:

The Application Virtualization Client could not launch Microsoft Word 2010 (Beta) 084154.001.The protocol specified in the OSD file is not supported. Report the following error code to your System Administrator.Error code: 460579-04300507-000D3002

Which looks like this:

Thankfully a workaround is very easy to implement – just add an extra backslash to each path:

SFTMIME ADD PACKAGE:"Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001" /MANIFEST "\\\VBOXSVR\Packages\Microsoft Office\2010_x64\000\Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001_manifest.xml" /OVERRIDEURL "\\\VBOXSVR\Packages\Microsoft Office\2010_x64\000\Microsoft_Office_2010_x64_084154.001.sft" /GLOBAL /CONSOLE

The ADD PACKAGE command will then work and the package will stream correctly.

App-V Errors 00000006 and 000D3002 When Adding Packages is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

RemoteApp for Hyper-V. Hyper what?

Aaron Parker — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 14:00:15 +0000

Microsoft posted about RemoteApp for Hyper-V yesterday, which was essentially highlighting the application publishing capabilities available in Windows XP mode and Windows Virtual PC; however this particular blog post calls out the use of RemoteApp to publish applications on Windows XP and Vista guests running under Hyper-V.

It’s fantastic to see this capability provided in the base product – SMBs implementing Remote Desktop Services in Windows Server 2008 R2 will benefit greatly. However, calling it “RemoteApp for Hyper-V” is a bit of a misnomer.

So instead of Hyper-V, here’s Internet Explorer published as a RemoteApp from a Windows 7 guest VM running under VirtualBox 3.1:

This demonstrates that the RemoteApp feature is not dependant on the hypervisor. You can therefore, use RemoteApp on any hypervisor or even on Windows clients running directly on hardware.

Also, contrary to what the blog post says, Windows 7 is not required for the client, this capability can be extended to Windows XP and Windows Vista, as long as they have the Remote Desktop Connection 7.0 client installed. Here’s Internet Explorer 8 running as a RemoteApp on a Windows XP client:

What is missing from the blog post is specific steps required to get this functionality working under Windows XP and Windows Vista. Hopefully we may see those instructions soon – I’ve been having some trouble getting RemoteApp working on those older operating systems:

RemoteApp for Hyper-V. Hyper what? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Some More Windows Virtual PC Screens

Aaron Parker — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 17:48:17 +0000

Of course, Windows Virtual PC has been covered in detail already, but I got a chance to play with the product and there’s some neat UI experiences that I hadn’t seen covered yet. Here’s a quick overview of interacting with Windows Virtual PC.

Windows Virtual PC gets a spanking new icon:

Once installed, Virtual PC actually creates a new top level user folder, a nice touch too I think:

You can move this folder just like you can with other user folders:

Virtual machines are managed directly within Windows Explorer – the old management/admin application window from older versions of Virtual PC is no more:

You can open the virtual machine settings from within Explorer too:

Creating a new virtual machine is just as you would expect, except very simplified. Give the machine a name and location (by default virtual machines are stored in C:\Users\\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Virtual PC\Virtual Machines):

Configure memory and networking (I have two network cards in this machine and VPC keep choosing the disconnected card – yay..)

Finally you get options for creating the VHD:

This revision looks pretty good for some basic virtualisation tasks (in now way is it taking aim at VMware Workstations and others). Now where’s the 64-bit guest support?

If you’re having issues seeing the screenshots, you might have more luck by going directly to my SkyDrive folder:

Some More Windows Virtual PC Screens is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Did you know that App-V 4.5 CU1 is not beta?

Aaron Parker — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 18:05:06 +0000

I’m a little slow off the mark here (I’ve got my head buried in something unrelated), but I’ve just found out today that the App-V 4.5 Cumulative Update 1, although only available on Connect, is not actually a beta, it is the final code that you can start deploying.

The MDOP blog covered this release last month, but I think I heard “Windows 7 support” and didn’t hear much after that. My bad, I need to pay more attention.

So what is new in CU1 (4.5.1.15580)?

Support for Windows 7 Beta and Windows Server 2008 R2 Beta
Improved support for sequencing the Microsoft .NET Framework
Customer feedback and hotfix rollup (includes hotfix rollup 3 plus some other fixes)
Instant access or removal of applications assigned to end users

Get it from Connect today or wait until next month when it will be generally available to all (including the TS client which is not available on Connect).

Did you know that App-V 4.5 CU1 is not beta? is post from stealthpuppy.com. Except as noted otherwise, this work is ©2005-2010 Aaron Parker and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.