Download AppSense Environment Manager Release Notes

Environment Manager
Release Notes (Version 8.6)
These release notes include:
•
Components in this Release
•
Important Upgrade Information
•
New Features
•
Known Issues and Limitations
•
Bugs Fixed
•
Supported Operating Systems and Technologies
•
Required Utilities and Components
Components in this Release
Component
Version
Agent
8.6.313.0
Personalization Server
8.6.313.0
Console
8.6.313.0
Tools
8.6.313.0
Documentation
8.6.11.0
Database
8.6.24
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 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Important Upgrade Information
Environment Manager 8.6 agents are compatible with configurations created from version 8.4 and
8.5. The agent will load and run these configurations without the requirement to upgrade them to
the 8.6 format.
The required utilities have been updated since version 8.5. See Required Utilities and Components
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 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
New Features
New Personalization Workflow
The Personalization Console has been redesigned to improve the configuration experience,
especially for new users.
The landing page has several important changes:
 The navigation tree has been restructured to guide the user in the correct workflow for
creating and configuring a Personalization Group.
 The welcome message walks the user through the high level steps that need to be
performed to configure new users, discover their applications and import their data into the
database.
 The quick setup wizard has been removed, with the new workflow providing an easier and
more convenient user experience.
Configuration of a new database can now be achieved through four fundamental steps:




Step 1: Define a Personalization Group
Step 2: Enable Data Collection
Step 3: Add applications to the Personalization Group
Step 4: Import users’ existing data
Improved Data Collection and Application Personalization
Template Creation
The Data Collection feature is used to discover what applications your users are running, and what
Personalization settings need to be captured. This information can then be used to configure the
Personalization Groups.
Data Collection can be enabled on a per-Personalization Group basis, and the discovery is
performed on each endpoint. As users run their applications the Environment Manager Agent
records details about each application, including the name, version and operating system. For each
application the agent also collects information about which registry keys and folders the application
accesses.
The discovered information is sent back to the Personalization Server and stored in the database
ready for the configuration phase. Note that no actual Personalization data is captured at this stage.
Once the data has been collected the new Template Creator feature can be used to configure
which applications can be managed in the Personalization Groups. It provides information on which
registry keys and folders have been accessed by each application as well as the average and
maximum size of the data that would be personalized for each setting. Using this information you
can choose which keys and folders to include for the application. There are even built-in exclusions
that can be selected for well-known settings that aren’t usually personalized, and a list of global
includes and excludes to guide towards only capturing what is really needed for the application.
Note
Although this section refers to applications, in Environment Manager 8.6 the configuration model
has changed and administrators are strongly guided to only add applications as part of an
Application Group. This ensures that the configuration is performed using AppSense best
practices, ensuring that should other applications need to share settings they can easily be
grouped together.
When adding an Application, the console will prompt to either create a new Application Group or
add the application to an existing group.
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Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Profile Migration
The final step to setting up the Personalization Group is importing users’ existing user profile data
into the Personalization database.
Once enabled, the new import feature in Environment Manager 8.6 runs the next time a user logs
on. During logon it reads the Personalization config for that user and copies all of the settings that
are configured to be included from the local profile into the Personalization database. The
administrator can then use the EM Browser Interface to monitor progress for all users in the
Personalization Group.
The import mode also supports reading the application data from a network location, for example
when roaming profiles are used.
Note
There is a PowerShell command available for situations where import of specific applications is
required, rather than a bulk import for all applications. This might be necessary when multiple
versions of the Office Suite are in-use simultaneously on the desktop estate, and it is desired to
capture settings into multiple application groups.
An export function has also been provided that will copy the data from the Personalization database
back to the user’s local profile (or roaming profile).
Usability Improvements
Updates to the Environment Manager console to simplify its operation:
Policy
• Management Center “Save & Unlock” icon on the quick access toolbar
Personalization
• The console will prompt if the user is modifying the Personalization database and has a Policy
Configuration loaded that doesn’t have a Personalization Server configured
•
When selecting a Personalization Server to connect to, the console will search the local
computer for any that are installed and configured, and automatically present these as available
options
•
The configuration import/export dialog now has “select all” and “deselect all” options where
there are multiple entries to add
Note
The previous “Administrator” and “User” roles have been renamed to better convey the
responsibilities of these roles:
EM 8.0 - 8.5 Role
EM 8.6 Role
Administrator
Master Administrator
User
Administrator
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 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Endpoint Self-Service Tool
Based on the popular PersInfo from AppSense Exchange, this tool provides the first visible
Environment Manager component to the end user.
The tool can be set to run in the task bar’s system tray by enabling it per Personalization Group,
with optional conditions on whether it will be available. It will run in either basic or advanced modes
depending on the user’s role configured in the Personalization database:
Mode:
Basic
Advanced
Available to
Any users not defined in the Master
Administrator role on the
Personalization Server
Users defined in the Master Administrator role on
the Personalization Server
Features
•
Delete and rollback archives
•
Session information
•
Show policy action progress
•
Manage archives
•
Show policy action progress
•
Settings
•
Refresh local cache
Session Information
Available in advanced mode.
Provides general information on the user’s session such as user name, Personalization Server
URL, Personalization Group and whether the software is licensed.
Details of application personalization and windows personalization settings are also shown.
Archiving
Available in basic and advanced modes.
Allows the user to rollback and delete archives for their managed applications.
In advanced mode archives can also be created and edited.
Show Policy Action Progress
Available in basic and advanced modes.
This option will show real-time progress of any folder copy actions that have been configured for the
user. This is useful for initial setup of new users to verify that all data has been copied successfully,
or in data centralization projects to track the progress of copies to a synced folder.
Settings
Available in advanced mode.
Allows the administrator to enable notifications of Personalization activity. For example, when the
client syncs with the Personalization Server.
The agent can also be configured to display a colored frame around any managed applications that
have been launched.
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Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Refresh Local Cache
Available in advanced mode.
This will ensure the local Personalization cache is in sync with the Personalization Database.
Note
As well as the systray, there is a standalone version of the tool that can be used by running:
%ProgramFiles%\AppSense\Environment Manager\EndpointSelfService\EndPointSelfService.exe.
If an administrator remotes into a user’s session, they can access the advanced mode of the tool
by running it with their credentials.
API
The Endpoint Self-Service Tool has an API that can be used from PowerShell or VB to obtain
information that is displayed in the UI. Please see the Product Documentation for further details.
Note
We strongly encourage third parties to use the API to develop tools that analyze Personalization
status. The profileconfig.xml file has now been locked-down so it is only readable by
administrators.
Enhanced Network Triggers
The Network triggers have been updated to fire every time a new network connection is made. For
example a physical Ethernet, WiFi or VPN connection will cause the trigger to re-fire.
In order to determine the type of connection new session variables have been created that can be
evaluated and the appropriate action taken, including:
•
Network Adaptor description, friendly name, id and IP address
•
Virtual and wireless adapter evaluation
•
Domain name and type
EmMon Debugging Tool
Environment Manager 8.6 has adopted Event Tracing for Windows (ETW) for all debug logs.
The main advantage of this is support for “live logging” – the ability to enable logging without
restarting the EmCoreService or a reboot, making it much more likely to generate useful logs when
a problem occurs. It also consumes fewer system resources, delivering deep analysis with
negligible overhead.
Note
The ETL files generated by the new ETW debug tracing technology can be large, so we
recommend the use of circular logging, or multiple files of a maximum size. Granular capture
options are available to minimize the amount of data collected. Also, consider only running ETW
logging when troubleshooting a specific problem, and disable it as soon as the behavior has been
captured.
EmMon has been developed to provide a powerful tool for analyzing the ETL files generated by the
EM agent.
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Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Once a log file has been loaded the user can choose from several predefined reports or elect to
view the entire file. Advanced filtering is available to narrow down on users, tasks, threads,
sessions and view successes and failures.
The data can also be displayed in a graphical timeline as with the previous LogViewer tool that it
replaces.
DataNow Integration
DataNow user settings can be configured directly in Environment Manager and applied when your
users log on.
This action can enable user sign on and set the “Home” map point, with editable session variables
that can be used throughout the configuration to reference common DataNow locations such as
Documents, Desktop and Favorites
Custom settings can also be configured at computer startup to specify advanced settings.
Note
Registry actions must still be used to populate values like the location of the DataNow server if the
user will not be configuring those settings.
Citrix and VMware Conditions
New conditions have been added to query specific settings when connecting to Citrix and VMware
environments
Citrix XenDesktop/XenApp:
• Client OS, type, version and encryption settings
•
NetScaler session policies and hostname
•
vDisk presence and mode
VMware View:
• Broker URL, DNS name, IP address
•
Is the broker tunneled, and the tunnel URL
Note that VMware conditions are only available in the Desktop Created logon sub-trigger, because
VMware does not populate these values until late in the Windows logon cycle, typically after the
desktop has been displayed.
New Personalization Console Role: Application Team
This role extends the “Support Team” role introduced in Environment Manager 8.5, by allowing
support users to manage the applications defined for a Personalization Group whilst still restricting
access to the configuration in the Personalization database.
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 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Infrastructure Reduction
Ongoing performance improvements have resulted in the following advancements in Environment
Manager 8.6:
•
70% reduction in database size through deduplication of archives
•
Double the Personalization Server capacity compared to 8.5 GA
Combined EM/AM Drivers
Environment Manager and Application Manager now share a common driver which provides
improved support for Windows 8 PCs using SecureBoot.
Page 8 of 11
 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Known Issues and Limitations
The known issues and limitations are now detailed on myAppSense. Navigate to
www.myAppSense.com, log in and select Software > DesktopNow > Environment Manager >
EM Known Issues.
Bugs Fixed
The following customer support issues have been resolved in this release:
Problem ID
Title
Details
10880
Winlogon notification
subscriber taking a long
time to handle the
notification event
Customers may notice sessions on their Citrix XenApp
6.5 servers with only the following processes running:
csrss.exe winlogon.exe Logonui.exe.
Additionally, the Application Event log shows instances
of the following Event: Event ID: 6005 Source:
Microsoft-Windows-Winlogon Detail: The winlogon
notification subscriber <EmSysNotify> is taking long
time to handle the notification event (Logon).
From a user perspective, logons may appear to hang
on "Please wait for the AppSense User Virtualization
Manager"
10860
10916
Personalization data being
incorrectly deleted when
ProfileCleanUpDelayDays
is enabled
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 1:
Data Collection failure
Data Collection failing to send passive data for various
applications with the following errors being logged:
When setting the new Advanced Setting for
"ProfileCleanupDelayDays" to 0 or higher (-1 disables
the feature), queued syncs for a managed application
may fail to read the list of Includes / Excludes if they
were modified after the user logged on, causing all
data for the application to be lost.
L2 T5096 2067578 [PassiveRequest::Execute]
ERROR 2 normalising passive data file
L3 T5096 2067578
[ProfileManager::AddCommsLogEntry] CommsLog:
ERROR sending passive data for process 3360
10947
Windows 8.1 logoff
processing fails to run
When using legacy mode with Windows 8.1, log off
actions are not run.
10672
Sync Failures in 8.5
after/during
DesktopSettings upgrade
Sync failures which prevent WSG data from getting
uploaded to server.
Data Collection causes
AM URM to fail
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 2:
10878
Corrects **No data associated with this file** errors in
logs.
Application Manager’s URM is failing in session when
Environment Manager 8.5 SP1 is installed and Data
Collection has been configured.
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 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Problem ID
Title
Details
10883
EmSystem fails to
complete long-running
shutdown actions
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 3:
Slow Office Performance
when opening and saving
files in EM 8.5
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 7:
Java Applications fails to
load Java Virtual Machine
allocating heap all
allocation
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 5:
10866
10941
After upgrading the EM from EM 8 FR4 SP3 to 8.5
SP1, customers may experience issues with shutdown
actions not completing.
Office 2010 / 2013 applications are slow when
launching and saving documents when Office is
personalized.
When personalizing java.exe, and configuring
maximum heap limits (1GB) then when launching
java.exe it throws an error:
Error occurred during initialization of VM
Could not reserve enough space for object heap
Error: Could not create the Java Virtual Machine.
Error: A fatal exception has occurred. Program will
exit.
10586
Issue expanding CSIDL
values
If a CSIDL path has been added to a Windows
Personalization item, the CSIDL value fails to be
expanded is “csidl” is written in lower case.
This causes the item to not be captured by
Personalization
10834
EMPS Custom Windows
Settings Groups filled with
Desktop Settings Data on
upgrade
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 4:
10697
Session Data is not
migrating data like
Desktop Settings
Legacy Session Data is not migrated in to new
Windows Session Groups, even if the registry keys in
Session Data match a defined registry key in the new
WSG.
11028
Personalization Data Sync
issue in local cache mode
From EM 8.5 SP1 Agent Hotfix 6:
When a custom Windows Settings Group is added to
capture settings from a file system location (e.g.
{CSIDL_FAVORITES}), when a user first logs onto the
newly upgraded system, the contents of the file system
location is deleted and replaced with the accumulated
contents of the ‘Legacy’ Desktop Settings cache and
the folder is hidden.
There has been a data sync issue identified within
Environment Manager (EM) 8.5.720 when certain
conditions have been met.
Page 10 of 11
 1999-2015 AppSense Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Environment Manager - Release Notes (Version 8.6)
Supported Operating Systems and Technologies
The supported Operating Systems and Technologies are now detailed in a compatibility matrix
available on www.myAppSense.com (select Software > DesktopNow > View Compatibility
Matrices > Environment Manager).
Required Utilities and Components
Component
Required Utilities and Components
Database Server
Microsoft SQL Server 2008 – all editions
Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 – all editions
Microsoft SQL Server 2012 – all editions
Microsoft SQL Server 2014 – all editions
Personalization Server
Microsoft Visual C++ 2013 Redistributable Package
Microsoft Windows Installer 3.1
Microsoft Core XML Services (MSXML) 6.0
Windows PowerShell 3.0 (only required for scripting)
Microsoft .NET Framework 4.x
Internet Information Services (IIS)
Microsoft ASP.NET 4.x
Console
Microsoft .NET Framework 4.x
Microsoft Visual C++ 2013 Redistributable Package
Microsoft Windows Installer 3.1
Client
Microsoft Visual C++ 2013 Redistributable Package
Microsoft .NET Framework 4.x (only required for ESST)
Microsoft Windows Installer 3.1
Microsoft Core XML Services (MSXML) 6.0
XML Lite 1.0.1018.0
Page 11 of 11
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