Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops 7 2305
About the release
This Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops release includes new versions of the Windows Virtual Delivery Agents (VDAs) and new versions of several core components. You can:
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Install or upgrade a site: Use the ISO for this release to install or upgrade core components and VDAs. Installing or upgrading to the latest version allows you to use the latest features.
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Install or upgrade VDAs in an existing site: If you already have a deployment, and aren’t ready to upgrade your core components, you can still use several of the latest HDX features by installing (or upgrading to) a new VDA. Upgrading only the VDAs can be helpful when you want to test enhancements in a non-production environment.
After upgrading your VDAs to this version (from version 7.9 or later), you do not need to update the machine catalog’s functional level. The 7.9 (or later) value remains the default functional level, and is valid for this release. For more information, see VDA versions and functional levels.
For installation and upgrade instructions:
- If you are building a new site, follow the sequence in Install and configure.
- If you are upgrading a site, see Upgrade a deployment.
Seamless window management packets
Seamless window management packets are now implemented as part of an effort to enhance the seamless virtual channel experience in HDX. For more information on virtual channels, see Citrix ICA virtual channels.
Virtual Delivery Agents (VDAs) 2305
Multiple webcam resolutions support for VDA and CWA Windows
High-definition webcam streaming now supports all webcam resolutions. If media type negotiation fails, HDX now defaults back to the default VGA resolution (640 x 480 pixels). See High-definition webcam streaming for details.
Audio volume synchronization
Audio volume is now synchronized between the VDA audio and your redirected audio devices. You can now tune the volume using the VDA audio volume slider and have the same volume on your device.
Web Studio
Autoscale available with Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops
Starting with this release, you can use Autoscale to power manage machines in your Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops deployments. It provides a consistent, high-performance power management solution, letting you balance costs and user experience. For more information, see Autoscale.
Support for identifying why a machine is in maintenance mode
Previously, PowerShell was your only choice to identify why a machine was in maintenance mode. You can now achieve that in Web Studio:
- Use Search to locate the machine.
- Check Maintenance Reason on the Details tab in the lower pane. Or, hover over the Maintenance mode column. The following information can appear:
- By Administrator: Put into maintenance mode by the administrator.
- Maximum Failed Registrations: Put into maintenance mode as machine exceeded maximum allowed registration attempts.
Also, the Maintenance Reason filter is now available. You can use it to identify the target machines. The feature is useful for administrators to troubleshoot issues with machines in maintenance mode.
Support for using shared images to create Azure machine catalogs
When creating Azure catalogs in Web Studio, you can now select shared images from different subscriptions (shared through the Azure Compute Gallery). For more information, see Create a machine catalog using an Azure Resource Manager image.
Ability to track the progress of catalog creation and updates
Web Studio now lets you stay up to date on catalog creation and updates. You can gain an overview of the creation and update process, view the history of steps performed, and monitor the progress and running time of the current step. For more information, see Start creating the catalog.
Change certain VM settings after creating Azure VM catalogs
Using Web Studio, you can now change the following settings after creating a catalog:
- Machine size
- Availability zones
- Machine profile
- License type
To do that, on the Machine Catalogs node, select the catalog and then select Edit Machine Catalog in the action bar. For more information, see Edit a catalog.
Policy modeling improvements
The policy modeling feature is now generally available with Web Studio. You can simulate policies for planning and testing purposes. For more information, see Use the Policy Modeling wizard.
More session details
When you view a session in Web Studio > Search > Sessions, the session view (in the lower pane) now includes more session details to help you troubleshoot and identify client issues:
- Reconnect time. The time when a session reconnected after being disconnected.
- Client platform. The platform used to launch the session.
- Client version. The version of the client platform used to launch the session.
- Remote host IP. The IP address of the remote host where Citrix Workspace is being hosted.
Citrix Director
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Support authentication via Citrix Gateway. Citrix Probe Agent for application and desktop probing now supports authentication via Citrix Gateway domain credentials. This helps run the Probe Agent on machines that are connected to StoreFront via Citrix Gateway. The comprehensive probe results available on Director help troubleshoot issues related to the applications, hosting machine, or connection before the users experience them. For more information, see Application Probing and Desktop Probing
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Autoscale management in Director. You can monitor the metrics of Autoscale-managed machines from the Trends pages. For more information, see Monitor Autoscale-managed machines. Autoscale provides a consistent, high-performance solution, to proactively power manage your machines. It aims to balance costs and user experience. For more information, see Autoscale.
Machine Creation Services (MCS)
Support for changing disk related custom properties of an existing catalog and existing VMs in GCP
Previously, in GCP environments, you could add the custom properties only when you created the MCS machine catalog. With this feature, you can now change the following disk-related custom properties of an existing catalog and existing VMs of the catalog.
PersistOSDiskPersistWBCStorageTypeIdentityDiskStorageTypeWbcDiskStorageType
This implementation helps you to select different storage types for different disks even after you create a catalog and thus, balance pricing associated with different storage types. For more information, see Change disk related custom properties of an existing catalog.
Ability to reset the OS disk of a persistent VM in an MCS created machine catalog in Azure, Citrix Hypervisor, and Google Cloud
You can now use the PowerShell command Reset-ProvVMDisk to reset the OS disk of a persistent VM in an MCS created machine catalog. The feature automates the process of resetting the OS disk. For example, it helps in resetting the VM to its initial status of a persistent development desktop catalog created using MCS. Currently, this feature is applicable to Azure, Citrix Hypervisor, Google Cloud, and VMware virtualization environments. For more information on using the PowerShell command to reset the OS disk, see Reset OS disk.
Support for creating hybrid Azure Active Directory joined machines
When you create a catalog, a Hybrid Azure Active Directory joined identity type, is now available in Machine Identities. With that identity type, you can use MCS to create hybrid Azure Active Directory joined machines. Those machines are owned by an organization and signed into with an Active Directory Domain Services account that belongs to that organization.
For information about requirements and considerations related to hybrid Azure Active Directory join, see Hybrid Azure Active Directory joined.
For information about creating hybrid Azure Active Directory joined catalogs, see Create Hybrid Azure Active Directory joined catalogs.
Ability to get historical errors and warnings associated with an MCS machine catalog
Previously, you only got the latest warnings and errors associated with a machine catalog. With this feature, you can now get a list of the historical warnings and errors of an MCS machine catalog. This list helps you to understand any issues with your MCS machine catalog and fix those issues.
For more information, see Retrieve warnings and errors associated with a catalog.
Support for converting a non-machine profile-based machine catalog to machine profile-based machine catalog in Azure environment
In the Azure environment, you can now use a VM or template spec as a machine profile input to convert a non-machine profile-based machine catalog to machine profile-based machine catalog. Existing VMs and new VMs added to the catalog take property values from the machine profile unless overwritten by the explicit custom property. For more information, see Convert a non-machine profile-based machine catalog to machine profile-based machine catalog.
Improved host connection creation experience
You can now get the following information while you create a host connection:
- List of all Citrix supported hypervisor plug-ins, including third party plug-ins
- Availability of hypervisor plug-in. If the availability status is false, possible reason could be that Cloud Connector is not installed
This feature helps you to correctly setup a resource location and thus, create a host connection. For more information, see Connection.
Support for double encryption on managed disk in Azure environment
In the Azure environment, you can now create an MCS machine catalog with double encryption. Double encryption is platform-side encryption (default) and customer-managed encryption (CMEK). Therefore, if you are a high security sensitive customer who is concerned about the risk associated with any encryption algorithm, implementation, or a compromised key, you can opt for this double encryption. Persistent OS and data disks, snapshots, and images are all encrypted at rest with double encryption. For more information, see Double encryption on managed disk.
Ability to reject invalid custom properties in Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Azure environments
You can now avoid potential confusion if custom properties set at New-ProvScheme and Set-ProvScheme do not take effect. If you specify non-existing custom property or properties, you get an error message. For more information, see Important consideration about setting custom properties.
Support for validating ARM template spec
You can now validate the ARM template spec to make sure that it can be used as a machine profile to create a machine catalog. There are two ways to validate the ARM template spec:
- Using the Web Studio
- Using the PowerShell command
For more information on validating the ARM template spec, see Create a machine catalog using an Azure Resource Manager image.
Support for updating hardware version of new VMs added in an MCS machine catalog
In VMware environments, you can now update the hardware version of the newly added VMs in an existing MCS machine catalog using a machine profile source. Therefore, you do not have to create a machine catalog to update the hardware version of the VMs added to a catalog. You must use the machine profile workflow to use this feature.
Support for machine profile in VMware
In VMware environments, you can now create an MCS machine catalog using a machine profile. The source of the machine profile input is a VMware template. The machine profile captures the hardware properties from a VMware template and applies them to the newly provisioned VMs in the catalog. For more information, see Create a machine catalog using a machine profile.
Support for zone-redundant storage in Azure
Previously, MCS offered only locally redundant storage. With this feature, zone-redundant storage is now an option in Azure, allowing you to select a storage type depending on what type of redundancy you want to use. Zone-redundant storage replicates your Azure managed disk across multiple availability zones, which allows you to recover from a failure in one zone by using the redundancy in others. For more information, see Enable zone-redundant storage.
Support for getting custom properties from the machine profile input in GCP
Previously, in GCP environments, while creating an MCS machine catalog using a machine profile input, you had to explicitly specify the custom properties. The action forced an extra effort. With this feature, you can now derive the following custom properties without explicitly defining them:
ServiceOfferingCryptoKeyIdCatalogZonesStorage
When you run New-ProvScheme and Set-ProvScheme commands and do not explicitly specify the custom properties, then the values of the properties are derived from the machine profile input.
For example, New-ProvScheme -MachineProfile writes the machine profile’s machine type to the provisioning scheme’s ServiceOffering property unless you specify ServiceOffering in the New-ProvScheme command. If you run Set-ProvVMScheme twice, then the most recent command takes effect.
Support for machine catalog creation using an image from a different subscription in the same Azure tenant
Previously, in Azure environments, you could only select an image within your subscription to create a machine catalog. With this feature, you can now select an image in the Azure Compute Gallery (formerly Shared Imaged Gallery) that belongs to a different shared subscription to create and update MCS catalogs.
For information on sharing images with another service principal in the same tenant, see Image sharing with another service principal in the same tenant.
Increased capacity with improved performance for Citrix in Google Cloud
Citrix can now support catalogs containing up to 3,000 VDAs in a single Google Cloud project. This update brings performance improvements to both provisioning and power management operations.