Citrix Support is focused on ensuring Customer and Partner satisfaction with our products.
One of our initiatives is to increase the ability of our Partners and Customers to leverage self-service avenues via our Knowledge Center.

Find below the Citrix Knowledge Center Top 10 for August 2010.

Top 10 Technical Articles

Top 10 Whitepapers

Top 10 Hotfixes

Top 10 Presentations

Top 10 Tools

David
Citrix Support on:
Twitter – @citrixsupport & @citrixreadiness
Facebook
LinkedIn

This document will answer all the questions on Demo (Previously known as NFR) License

Q: How do I get NFR/demo license for XenApp?

A: XenDesktop Platinum Edition includes XenApp Platinum Edition plus significant additional functionality and benefits. Please download and use the XenDesktop Platinum edition licenses

The Screenshot shows the Citrix Products which are included under XenDesktop License.

(XenDesktop License)

Q: How do I get a Demo (Previously known as NFR) License copy of XenDesktop 4?

A: Demo (Previously known as NFR) License copies of XenDesktop 4 are only available to authorized Citrix partners. Access to media and licenses is managed through the secure My Citrix portal.

Below are the links which would help you in downloading the Demo (Previously known as NFR) License.

http://community.citrix.com/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=63177331
http://www.citrix.com/tv/#videos/1436

Q: I have a Citrix Presentation Server 4.5 Environment and I would like to have Demo (Previously known as NFR) License for Enterprise Edition?

A: Licenses are available as Platinum edition only, we recommend you to upgrade your Citrix Presentation Server 4.5 to Feature Pack 1 and set your server edition as Platinum to utilize Platinum Edition Demo (Previously known as NFR) License.

Please follow the link attached if you are upgrading your Citrix Presentation Server 4.5 to Feature Pack 1.

Upgrade to CPS 4.5 and How to change Server Editon

Q: How many Licenses do I get for XenDesktop if I am a Citrix Ready Technology Partner?

A: You get 100 User Demo (Previously known as NFR) License.

Q: How many Licenses do I get for XenApp if I am a Citrix Ready Technology Partner?

A: You get 100 User Demo (Previously known as NFR) License. You will need to use XenDesktop platinum in order to use XenApp licenses.

(XenDesktop License)

Q: if I allocate 10 users License for one time, what happens to rest 90 Users Demo (Previously known as NFR) License?

A: With the same License Code, you can allocate the rest 90 User Demo (Previously known as NFR) License.

You can follow the links below to allocate the rest of 90 User Demo (Previously known as NFR) License.

http://community.citrix.com/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=63177331
http://www.citrix.com/tv/#videos/1436

Please see screenshot

Important note on Licenses
Please note that XenDesktop license key contains 100 user licenses. You should only activate required number of user license (3-5 users in most of the cases). You will be able to reuse and activate the remaining users for a different test scenario or product.

Q: I am unable to retrieve new Serial numbers; I am getting an error “You have already reached the maximum number of license for this product”?

A: The error generally means that you have generated the License Code, However you can still use the same License Code to generate User Demo (Previously known as NFR) License unless if you have allocated all of it.

Q: I want to upgrade my License Server; could you provide us a link to download the Latest License Server?

A: The Latest License Server available for download is Version 11.6.1; you can download it from the Link below.

Download License Server

Q: I have changed the Hostname of the License Server; do I have to generate a new License File?

A: No, You can reallocate the License file you had for your previous Hostname to the New Hostname. Please follow CTX115870

If you have any questions which are not anwered in this FAQ Document, Please feel free to write to us @ citrixready@citrix.com

Citrix Support is focused on ensuring Customer and Partner satisfaction with the support of our products. One of our initiatives is to increase the ability of our Partners and Customers to leverage self-service avenues for finding answers and resolving problems. A key area that the Support teams focus on is development of troubleshooting and health checking tools.

Citrix Support have been developing tools to help You, our Partners and Customers to troubleshooting your Citrix environments for many years now. Over the past year I have developed some video demos and wrote blogs to increase the awareness of these tools. Below you will find the full list of tools available from Citrix Support along with links to useful resources.

Let me know if I am missing any. Thanks.

David
Citrix Support on:
Twitter – @citrixsupport & @citrixreadiness
Facebook
LinkedIn

Citrix Support is focused on ensuring Customer and Partner satisfaction with our products. We are working on multiple items to help make it easier to find answers and solve problems via self-service avenues, all of which are available to all our Partners and Customers to leverage.

Last November we launched the How To video initiative and to date have over 130 videos covering 13 products available on Citrix TV.

To make it easier for you to find these videos, we have added technotes on the Knowledge Center linking back to Citrix TV.

The following is a list of the articles per product series.

• XenDesktop
• XenServer
• XenApp
• NetScaler
• Provisioning Services
• Access Gateway Standard Edition
• Access Gateway Advanced Edition
• Access Gateway Enterprise Edition
• EdgeSight
• Password Manager
• Web Interface
• Workflow Studio
• Citrix Receiver/Merchandising Server/Dazzle

David
Citrix Support on:
Twitter – @citrixsupport & @citrixreadiness
Facebook
LinkedIn

Back in March I asked if 2010 was going to be the year that we would run out of IPv4 addresses on the Internet. And yes, it is still on course to happen, if not this year, then next, as it is increasingly difficult for ISPs to get their hands on tranches of IP addresses. 

“Are Citrix products ready for a transition to IPv6?” is a good next question to ask, and the answer is YES, for the most part.

The most affected products are those that are directly internet facing, particularly NetScaler and Access Gateway. 

NetScaler

NetScaler has supported IPv6 features since 2007. But with version 9.0, support for IPv6 was enhanced, allowing IPv6 communication all the way back to the application servers in the data center. NetScaler 9.2 provides further improvements for mixed IPv4 / IPv6 environments. These are the types of environments we will see a lot of in the next few years as we are transitioning from purely IPv4 to predominantly IPv6. You can hide your IPv4 servers behind NetScaler and give them IPv6 internet addresses. Conversely, you can place IPv6 servers behind NetScaler with IPv4 public addresses. Being able to give your sites public IPv6 addresses without the concommitant cost of renumbering your internal network is going to be agreat help to many enterprises

Access Gateway

Access Gateway Enterprise Edition (AGEE) has supported IPv6 for some time with the current level of support illustrated in the following possible scenarios. Additional scenarios will be supported going forward including those where both the client-side and corporate network are configured with IPv6.

Citrix will continue to evolve the Access Gateway strategy, vision, and roadmap to address simple, secure, and fast application access and delivery over both IPv4 and the growing number of IPv6 networks.

Other products

As the transition to IPv6 is most urgent for internet facing equipment that requires a unique IP address, there is less immediate demand for IPv6 support in XenApp, XenDesktop and Branch Repeater.

Today, both XenDesktop and XenApp support IPv6 in a proxy mode behind Access Gateway. As US federal government agencies are beginning to mandate IPv6 support, there are plans afoot to support a direct IPv6 connection from Receiver to the desktop or the application and to add full IPv6 support to the management infrastructure.

Branch Repeaters are typically installed inside the corporate network to speed up communications between enterprise branches or datacenters. Their operations are generally internal and not exposed to the wider internet. That said, there are plans to begin supporting IPv6 in the future as field demand dictates.

Hosting IT as a Service has been around for 20 years.  Just ask the guys from Connections for Business, a Managed Service Provider in Fort Lauderdale, who has been in business for the past 30 years.  Yeah, I said Fort Lauderdale.  You may ask, I thought the only business in South Florida is tourism?  What is a technology company doing there?  Well, they are making a business… a good business and have been around for many, many years helping the SMB get out of the IT business. 

According to Jonathan Garber, VP of Business Development for Connections, they were The Cloud before there was one.  When I tapped him for more on this statement, he merely replied that they have been providing IT as a Service to the state of Florida before the “Cloud” ever existed.  That companies across the state have been using Connections as a way to off load all of their IT needs and focus on the things that make them money.  In one particular case, Jonathan told me about a firm who was more than willing to cut a check each month for thousands of dollars to Connections because the flexibility to use an outside service provider increased his profitability by leaps and bounds.  Connections provides services to scores of companies with the same value proposition.

It was refreshing to hear from a service provider who not only knows their stuff, but has the background and customer references to show what a top notch IT as a Service company looks like. In fact, they have been so dedicated to this business, they actually developed their own Network Operations Center software front end.  It’s called Connect Smart and it worked so well for them, they decided to put some shrink wrap around it and sell it to other service providers.  Now Connections for Business runs their own IT as a Service business, sells their NOC software and is poised to be a market maker in the southeast region of the U.S.

They have the ear of a large U.S. telco as well who is looking to use them as an incubation center for SMB IT services.  You can imagine that with all of this success, Connections was elated to hear about the Citrix Service Provider program. In fact they were one of the first to sign up. Jonathon told me, “Citrix provides us with the scalable solution to deliver Enterprise level power to the SMB market and access via the widest range of end devices. We are looking forward to expansive growth as this market continues to emerge. The SMB is ready for IT as a Service and we believe that together with Citrix, we can deliver.”

Connections is one more example of a company who is seizing the opportunity to meet the demand of the SMB in the IT as a Service space.  If you’re looking for a company who can do the same for you, just check out our partner locator.  Once you’re on the landing page, just click on the “Hosting Providers” tab. You can find Connections for Business and over five hundred other CSPs worldwide to help you out.

OSI Layers 1 – 7 ~ virtualized

Citrix owns the virtual stack, OSI Layers 1 through 7 that is. There isn’t any other solution that can claim the fact that they can install Virtual Machines on bare metal, run a Virtual Layer 2 Switch, a Virtual Layer 3/4 router, and applications all the way up to Layer 7.

If you haven’t virtualized your infrastructure, it’s time to do so, because Virtualization is radically changing datacenter and branch architectures. It is not just servers that are getting virtualized. Applications, hardware resources and everything in between can now be in its own virtual container. This is huge in providing you the capability to reduce costs, and increase your computing flexibility.

The vNetworkStack solution virtualizes switches, routers, load balancers, network firewalls, application firewalls, SSL VPN, IPSec VPN, intrusion prevention, content switching, compression, caching – all of the application delivery controller features – along with your virtualized application servers and virtualized desktops.

You can check out how to do it at http://vNetworkStack.com, or follow the blueprint we built just for this Proof of Concept.

The blueprint.

See it live.

It’s Powerful!

Have you heard the buzz? There’s a lot to choose from at Synergy Berlin and you can now view the interactive Session Catalog listing many of the breakout session details & event activities. Take some time to explore the variety of offerings in the Desktop Virtualization and Datacenter & Cloud tracks.

Once you’ve registered, you’ll also have access to the online My Organiser tool that allows you to set up your ideal agenda of breakout sessions and event activities in advance.

Here are some session highlights:

• Get under the bonnet of XenClient technology - Find out how a bare-metal client hypervisor based on the open-source Xen platform helps deliver blazing-fast local desktop computing performance.
  
  

• What’s new in XenDesktop? The best desktop virtualisation solution is now even better - Learn how Citrix is enhancing XenDesktop to meet the needs of 100 percent of employees enterprise-wide and deliver the best user experience on the market.
  
  

• From A to XenApp: The comprehensive technical guide to optimal XenApp farm design (2010 Edition) - Learn how to build an environment that is stable, scalable and optimised for maximum performance to achieve record-breaking user density.
  
  
  
  

Do you speak geek?

Then get ready… Geek Speak Live!, the ultimate un-conference, is coming to Synergy Berlin! Packed with rapid-fire discussions and debates among industry leaders, technical experts, and audience members, you never know where the conversation will take you! The Geek Speak Live! track that’s run for the geeks by the geeks, will include the Geek Speak Tonight! event and two full days of 50-minute Geek Speak breakout sessions. This unique, audience-driven, and unfiltered technical track is not to be missed! The Geek Speak Live! session details will be available in July.

More on Synergy Berlin

Synergy Berlin incorporates the three previously separate European iForums – Antwerp, Edinburgh, and Munich – into a single, enhanced global conference that will feature a wide array of content never before available at European events.

Synergy is a great opportunity to increase your knowledge of virtualization, cloud computing, and networking. This open, English-language event is an unmatched value that includes:

• Content-rich sessions for every audience level and focus
• Free in-depth skills training at Hands-on Learning Labs
• Complimentary Citrix certification exams onsite
• Access to Citrix execs and global product experts
• Product demos at Citrix and partner exhibits in the Technology Showcase
• And much more!
  
  
  
  

So join us in Berlin this fall for THE definitive virtual computing event of 2010, where you’ll sharpen your skills and learn powerful new IT strategies and best practices for your organization.




Visit www.citrixsynergy.com/berlin for more information and to register.




Hope to see you there!




Best,
Laura Whalen
Citrix Systems, Inc.

Electronic Medical Records (EMR) implementations have their own, unique challenges. Healthcare organizations are concerned with selecting a vendor, complying with a myriad of regulations, and basically transforming the way healthcare is delivered to their patients.
Given the transformative nature of an EMR implementation, virtualization is often just a side thought for health CIOs. Therefore, I’d like to shed some light into the topic and share my personal top 5 reasons to pursue this topic further- starting with the centralization of medical records data.
For a quick definition of the term itself, please refer to yesterday’s blog.
I assume that the backend database for your electronic health records reside in a single, centralized datacenter. Through global server load balancing, you may have already implemented site-to-site redundancy, but that’s beside the point for today’s discussion.
So, traditionally, you would have rich client applications or web browsers on the user’s endpoint to consume and manipulate the medical records data. This automatically implies that a lot of health data moves to and from the datacenter and often to remote locations where it is challenging to maintain a tight grip on security.
Application or Desktop Virtualization can solve that problem. Both of these techniques move the client software piece (or web browser) to the datacenter, where it executes securely inside your facility. The health data never even leaves the datacenter. The user interaction happens via a secure, high performance protocol (such as Citrix’ HDX in the XenApp and XenDesktop product lines) and gives the user a snappy interaction with the software, while only exchanging screen updates and keyboard/mouse events between the end user and the datacenter. Additional data streams pertaining to peripherals, printers, USB devices, scanners, and client hard drives are possible, but can easily be disabled to promote further security.
No data ever makes it to the end point, and therefore reducing the risk of HIPAA/HITECH covered security breaches. In addition, user sessions can be audited to establish an independent trail of information in case the regulators or courts require a closer look.
If you’re curious, I encourage you to check out Dan Feller’s Ask the Architect site. Dan has a wealth of information on desktop and application virtualization and associated whitepapers and reference architectures.
Florian Becker
Twitter: @florianbecker
Virtualization Pulse: Tech Target Blog
Ask the Architect – Everything Healthcare

The following is a blog I posted on my “other” site – Virtualization Pulse, hosted by Tech Target. Most readers on these pages are already very knowledgeable, so please forgive the simplistic view. In the near future, I will publish additional blogs on virtualization and specifically focus on the the healthcare IT space. Consider this one a relatively simple level-set for the audience. Enjoy.
———————————

Given that there are a lot of incentives associated with the adoption of Electronic Medical Records, medical CIOs and their teams are inundated by vendor messages these days. Phrases like “Meaningful Use”, “HITECH”, “HIPAA” are on the forefront of everyone’s mind, but you may also hear about virtualization. Given that there is still some confusion on the topic, I’d like to clear a couple of things up:

“Virtualization” is a term that has been traditionally used in the context of server virtualization. The technology involved is often referred to as “Hypervisors” which basically allow a modern server with plenty of CPU and Memory resources to share those resources between multiple “workloads” or “virtual servers”. So, instead of having one physical server with 16 CPU cores and 128 GB of RAM, this server can often house 40-60+ individual workloads that act on your network just as if they were much smaller individual servers. The benefits are obvious. Today’s servers are relatively cheap to acquire and most server workloads don’t require nearly as many computing resources to do their job. IT departments can lower cost by running fewer physical servers, consume less rackspace, lower power consumption and cooling costs. Advanced virtualization solutions also allow for virtual servers to automatically move to a separate physical host in case of a hardware failure. The failover process is often seamless and therefore provides resiliency, but typically requires a separate, redundant storage area network for this to work on the fly. Workloads with less criticality can be moved in a semi-manual fashion where they are simply restarted on another physical host by the administrator.
Vendors in this space include VMware (vSphere), Citrix (XenServer), Microsoft (Hyper-V) and a number of other players.

Application Virtualization. This is another form of virtualization, which has virtually nothing to do with server virtualization (pun intended). In this model, an application (think about your office productivity suite, or your electronic medical records client) is installed on a central server and executes there. The user connects from their endpoint (PC, laptop, thin client devices, etc.) via a remoting protocol and essentially controls the application remotely. This can be done on the simple level with Microsoft Terminal Services and the RDP protocol, and on the higher end via specialized solutions such as Citrix XenApp (formerly known as Presentation Server or MetaFrame). The benefits are obvious. Applications can be centrally managed and IT support personnel would no longer have to touch an end users system to install or patch an application. All updates are performed on a few centrally located servers. This approach also has the advantage of the application being physically close to the backend data of the app (on a low-latency, high bandwidth network), which leads to faster execution of the app and much increased security as the data never leaves the datacenter. The only information that is exchanged between the end-user’s device and the central server are screen updates and mouse and keyboard events. The protocols also include the capability of conveying information such as audio, printing, USB device support etc. The performance is actually astonishing in many cases and the most demanding customers in the area of engineering run their complex design applications via Citrix XenApp.

Desktop Virtualization. This is the latest and greatest. Instead of executing just a set of applications in the datacenter, the industry is moving towards executing desktop operating systems in the datacenter and allowing users to connect to the desktops . One could write a whole book about desktop virtualization, so I am trying to keep it brief. Some vendors tout a “VDI” or “Virtual Desktop Infrastructure” model, where each user basically has their own, assigned, virtual desktop in the datacenter. This model moves the headache of desktop maintenance to a central location, but still encounters some of the same challenges associated with traditional desktop management (such as the need to patch multiple desktop instances and troubleshoot/fix corrupted or infected desktops).
More advanced models go towards a shared desktop image model, where each user connects to a brand new, pristine desktop operating system, which folds the applications and user settings into the desktop as the user connects. This has the advantage of ensuring the highest performance (after all, a brand new desktop always performs best) and can also cut down on the number of desktops to maintain. Having just one or a handful of desktop master images to patch and maintain for thousands of users provides great efficiency gains and cost savings.

So, let’s recap. Server, Application, and Desktop Virtualization are three distinct disciplines in healthcare IT and are important to understand. Don’t fall for the siren’s song and believe that a particular vendor who is good at one discipline is automatically an expert at the other virtualization disciplines.
Check back on these pages in the near future for my rundown on virtualization techniques for your EMR implementation.

Florian Becker
Twitter: @florianbecker
Virtualization Pulse: Tech Target Blog
Ask the Architect – Everything Healthcare