Already day 2 of Citrix Synergy 2018. Time flies. Today the day started with a general keynote by Dr. Condoleezza Rice, followed by a lot of breakout session. In this blog my experiences of day two.
The day started with a general keynote provided by Dr. Condoleezza Rice. She told a story about the world situation, the effect of innovation and technology. Where innovation and technology were according to Dr Rice not good or bad, but neutral. It depends how the technology is being used, some inventions both lead to wonderful things as things that are not that good. According to Dr Rice it is important that technology will be available for everyone to keep everyone in the loop in development. The same applies to automation. Automation is a good thing, but with automation the current workforce should be taken into account so they don’t will be loosed. After their talk Dr Rice had a conversation with Tim Manahan about all kind of current situations in the world.
After the keynote I attended the session of Christian Reilly and James Bulphin with the future of work. Christian started about his demo of yesterday that did not want exactly according plan. However this session still be full of demoes of stuff that may work or even will become some feature in product (or not). Christian started with the demo of yesterday (with lot of fun). This time it was working where within the actions tab in Citrix Workspace the time off request was showing up instead of really going into the application. He also shows the PowerApp option. He showed the SSON within a Citrix Desktop as well using FAS and started the presentation using Alexa and some nice acronyms of CTO ߘ鮠Christian continued with the extending of the (Citrix) Workspace. Like the idea of using Analytics with Machine Learning to increase productivity. Next topic was trends and observations: every organization is now a technology team, relentless pace of change, era of cloud, rebirth of AI, change is coming for every direction. Next topics were the 4th Industrial Revolutions and implications for tomorrow’s IT organization. They continued with some demoes with a cool document approval workflow based on face recognition based on Workspace Hub, Azure Face API, Citrix Analytics, ShareFile, Slack API and chatbot support including troubleshooting and creating a support ticket automatically. Christian ended the session with implications for tomorrow’s CIO: no industry or business is immune to the impact.
Next session I attended the session CTPs investigating Citrix Cloud Performance: The naked truth by Benny Tritsch and Thomas Krampe. They started of with parts that will be covered of the Citrix Cloud: XenApp Essentials, XenDesktop Essentials and XenApp/XenDesktop Services. In this session they will focus on Azure as the Resource Location. Thomas explained how the infrastructure was build including some considerations around NetScaler usage in this set-up, Cloud Connectors (High Available), LoginVSI. Thomas continued with the results of the LoginVSI test of the some of the D-Series (DS2s -> 8 users, DS4s à 18 users, DS12 à 22 users and DS13 à 42 users). However from a cost perspective looking at the costs per use the smaller were more cost effective. Benny continued with XenApp/XenDesktop with NVIDIA GPU, starting with comparing the available options (passthrough CPU it’s not vGPU), followed by explaining REX analytics used for the tests. Benny showed the results of his tests both showing Citrix ICA TCP (because the Azure NS does not support EDP currently) as RemoteFX UDP. RemoteFX is using lots more bandwidth in most tests, but there are scenarios where RemoteFX is more efficient. Thomas wrapped up the session with the lesson learned: know your deployment strategy (cannot have multiple editions on one account), know your use case (feature set between editions are very different), Azure Limits, Active Directory Integration, use Cost Calculator and some tips and tricks.
After lunch I went to the session End User Workspace experience with Citrix Receiver today and future presented by Vipin Borkar and Arvind Sankara Subramanian, however it was renamed to Citrix Workspace App. Vipin started of the evolution of the Citrix User Experience, followed by the current messy world of real cloud transformation. This lead to Workspace App delivering Virtual Apps, Virtual Desktops, SaaS Apps, Web Apps, Mobile Apps and Content. Build on HDX Engine, includes a Browser engine, Files Plug-ins and is Mobile Aware. Arvind continued discussing the unified experience, followed by showing the Workspace App in action both out of the App as the web client via the desktop as mobile app. Out of Workspace App (in combination with Endpoint Management aka XenMobile) mobile app likes SecureMail can be installed. Workspace App logically also supports the Citrix Workspace Hub. They also discussed new features in the Citrix Receiver on all platforms (could not keep with writing down the enhancements). Next topics were features that are coming soon: HTML5 multi monitor support, Chrome Launcher Integration (for Chromebook), multiple sessions with the Android/Chromebook client. Vipin discussed the branding possibilities of the Workspace App including a demo. Session ended with a Q&A where several good questions were asked. Summarizing a lot of questions about Receiver current functionality: currently functionality will still be there for most of the questions. Citrix is aiming to support more 3rd party integration on all components.
Next session I attended was From StoreFront to Citrix Workspace by Joe Vaccaro and Craig Hinchliffe. Joe kicked of the story of this Synergy: contact increase in Apps, Data and Devices in use. Craig continued about the role of StoreFront (arrogations point of several versions of XenDesktop/XenApp). Craig continued about the advantages using the Citrix Workspace platform. Joe explained the Workspace in some more detail including the mobile applications, followed by Cloud App Control. Craig demoed the Citrix Workspace. Craig continued showing at a glance how the Cloud Services kick in the Citrix Workspace. Craig continued with a demo of the configuration part within Citrix Cloud (the administration “console”) including connecting the on-prem XenApp/XenDesktop, where XenApp 6.5 still is supported and configurable. Craig also showed the branding possibilities from the back-end as the user experience. Joe wrapped up the session (get started today, support for existing deployments, integrated out of the box with Citrix services).
Last session of the day was Everything you need to know about Windows 10, Server and Citrix presented by Chris Edwards, Fernando Klurfan and Scoot Manchester. The session kicked off with discussing the partnership with Microsoft including the latest additions: Aligned release win10, day1 support Server 2019, 7.18 supported on server core and RDmi value-add from Citrix. Fernando told about the engineering partnership (Windows Insider program, earlier access to builds, Security Update Verification Program and engaged with MS compat team. Chris took over discussing the release strategy (Citrix Cloud, Current Release and LTSR), followed by the support of Microsoft on the Windows 10 versions combined with the Citrix release schedule. Fernando continued with the information out of the field about usage of Windows 10 versions with Citrix XenDesktop. Based on a customer case Fernando shared some tips and tricks (SCCM team need to involved, apps owners verify compatibility, upgrade process being test). Chris continued about improving user experience and correlated topics (vGPU, H.265 video codec, vGPU XenMotion, HDX adaptive transport). New enhancements are desktop/table mode recognition, Windows 10 Peripherals support. Fernando continued about Microsoft Teams in combination with Citrix (short team: web-based teams with browser content redirection, chrome/edge/windows endpoints. Long term: Desktop new receiver side media engine). Fernando continued with Windows Server 2019 starting with the version (LTSC and SAC, where LTSC has Desktop Experience and RDSH). At this moment Scott Manchester was invited on the stage. Scott started with a bit of history. Microsoft and Citrix will work together on Server 2019 and RDmi. Scott touched what’s new in Server 2019 (high available RDLS, simplified RDLS, user experience perfmon, per-user windows desktop search catalogs, optimized Windows Defender, Windows Admin Center). Fernando took over again with a demo of Citrix with Windows Server 2019. Chris came in some time constraints so went really quick to several items as that Citrix will embrace RDmi, Citrix App Layering, Azure deployment options, Workspace Environment Management, Office 365 cache mode (O365 User Layer, User Profile Management Outlook Container), XenMobile (Citrix Endpoint Management) with Windows 10).