Posts tagged vmware view

This Month on the VMTN Forums – 4/12

May 2nd

Posted by eeg3 in Virtualization

Interesting Q&A’s from April:

  • Question: Can’t activate OEM XP Install after P2V
  • Answer: P2V is successful, but cannot activate. This is due to OEM licensing, which is bound to particular hardware. Switch to a Volume Licensing Key or try contacting Microsoft.
  • Question: Does adding more vCPUs do permanent damage?
  • Answer: No, this only causes problems with older versions of Windows that had specific HALs for SMP/non-SMP. If there is a problem, the VM can be reverted back to the previous vCPU count.
, , ,
iPad Help Screenshot

VMware View iPad App Updated to v1.2

Oct 24th

Posted by eeg3 in Virtualization

The latest version of the VMware View app has been released for both the iPad and Android. Several new documented changes in this version, as well as some other slight undocumented modifications. Here is the documented list:

  • Optimized for VMware View 5 with improved performance
  • Support for iOS 5 including AirPlay
  • Presentation Mode for use with external display and AirPlay
  • Embedded RSA soft token simplifies login to desktop
  • Background tasking to move between Windows and iOS apps 
  • Updated look and feel
  • Integrated online help
  • Buffered text input for multibyte text entry
  • Now in French, German, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese
  • Bug fixes

The three bolded are my top choices for best new features. It was a complete pain having to reconnect when switching between apps, and made me almost not want to even use it. I’m very happy to see that is now fixed.

The included online help is also a blessing as it gives novice users (which should be a large portion of the userbase of this app, if VDI is successful) a way to figure out how to maneuver and operate the application.

 

Lastly, Presentation Mode will be very handy for a lot of users.

Two of the undocumented features that I have noticed are:

  • Passwords are no longer savable. You must authenticate every time you log in. Previously you could save the password to the iPad, but this was removed for security reasons.
  • The screenshot of desktops used as icons for the specific Virtual Desktops is now blurred, which is likely for security reasons as well.

 

The only thing I wish they would have fixed, which is ultimately not an issue with just this app but other apps out there as well, is the fact the drop down menu to select the touchpad, disconnect, etc. is interfered with now by the iOS 5 Notification Menu. It can be a pain trying to pull down the right bar. Hopefully that gets fixed in the next release, as well for other apps as well.
, , , , ,
viewManager45

View 4.5 First Thoughts

Sep 12th

Posted by eeg3 in Virtualization

View was released around 9pm on Thursday, and I had our environment upgraded shortly there-after. We don’t have a ton of users on virtual desktops yet, and VMware is typically very good about not releasing unstable products, so why not? :)

Upgrade Process

The upgrade process is very easy, as described in the View 4.5 Upgrade Guide. It’s, more of less, simply a matter of launching the executables on each of your nodes (connection server(s), security server, vCenter server, and desktops). The only part that I wish was a little less cumbersome is upgrading the agents on Individual Desktops. The upgrade guide specifically says:

If you use full-clone desktops or other virtual machines that you added as individual desktops or as part of a manual pool, upgrade View Agent by using whatever third-party tools you usually use for software upgrades.

I think VMware kind of “passed the buck” in this regard. We just upgraded all of our individual desktops manually. It was kind of tedious, but luckily we didn’t have too many. Rolling out the updated agent through recomposing our linked clones was much easier: simply update the master image, create a new snapshot, point to that snapshot, recompose. The agent essentially becomes a core piece of the operating system, it would be nice if they had a more automated-way even if it was similar to how VMware Tools upgrades work.

New View Manager Interface

The interface has been completely revamped with this release, and it is entirely for the better. It now requires Adobe Flash to be installed to view it, however.

One of the best new features if the ability to manipulate User Data Disks much more easily. You can detach them and attach them all now through the Persistent Disks tab under the Inventory section. This is particularly useful if you want to delete a VM, but re-use the UDD on a new VM. It is unfortunate RTO Virtual Profiles did not make it into this release, but this certainly makes dealing with UDDs much less cumbersome.

View Manager Event Logging

When you log into View Manager for the first time after the upgrade, you will notice it wanting you to configure the event database. You will need to point it to a supported Database server type specifically for it to store logs. Information will now be stored to this database, such as users logging in/out of virtual desktops, login audits for View Manager, generic stats like maximum number of users with concurrent desktop sessions, adding pools, composer events, etc. You also have to ability to export the log data to third-party log analysis tools. It’s a very nice addition.

Windows 7 Support

In View 4.0, Windows 7 was listed as experimental. They would still offer support for it, but the quality wasn’t quite there. In 4.5, Windows 7 is now completely supported, both as a client and as a virtual desktop. We didn’t have any problems with 4.0 and Windows 7, but 4.5 does feel snappier. Maybe it’s all psychological, though.

Other features

This is the first release with a Mac version; it only supports RDP, just like the Linux client. One of the non-noted features in View 4.5 is that the Windows View Client now has the ability to Auto-Connect USB devices. The graphics for all of the features now have a more polished professional look, as well.

Some more additions in View 4.5 that I haven’t had a chance to tinker with directly are:

Tiered storage. By placing the Replicas on a separate storage device from Linked Clones, they can be shared by all Linked Clones. You can also use high performance solid-state disks (SSDs) to improve recomposition performance.
Local Mode or Type 2 hypervisor. Formerly known as Offline Desktop, Local Mode provides encrypted, encapsulated, and uninterrupted desktop services. IT professionals have full control on data synchronization, replication schedule, or deployment policies including Local Only smart card access, USB access, and more.
Smart card and two-factor authentication. By adding your root certificate from a domain certificate authority, you can secure your organization’s workstations with smart cards and smart USB tokens.

Summary

Overall, this is a solid release. Were there tons of new revolutionary features and extensions added? Not really. They did, however, put an immense amount of polish on View 4.0. I believe it is a solid release, and that View is heading in the right direction. It is definitely worth upgrading.