Multitouch in Windows 7

The Vista Blog has a video on Multitouch in Windows 7. Seems to be the same UI the MVP's played with and saw on the Microsoft Surface Table in Building 46 in Redmond.
http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsvista/archive/2008/05/27/microsoft-demonstrates-multi-touch.aspx

Download Pick: RocketDock

Todays download Pick is called RocketDock. RocketDock will appeal to all the Mac Fanboys and Fangirls who must use a Windows PC but long for the Mac style popup doc. Works just fine even on Vista.

http://rocketdock.com/

You can customize and it exactly where you want it on your screen and even works with multiple monitors so you can put a taskbar on the 2nd monitor. Lots of themes and stuff for it also!

Citrix iForum 2009 May 4 to 7 at MGM Grand in VEGAS BABY! Closing Night Party Pictures

For more information on Citrix Synergy (Previously called Citrix Iforum) and to sign up to go see the Citrix Synergy web page at:

http://www.citrixsynergy.com/

Hi All
Mark Templeton announced tonight that Citrix iForum 2009 will be in Las Vegas at the MGM Grand May 4 to 7,

My closing night party pictures with Dana Carvey are at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jkenzig/CitrixSynergy2008Party

Here are a few of my Favorties. We had to promise never to install applications again. (I wonder if that means don't install Citrix either?)
And I got to meet Mark Templeton after Dana Carvey was on.

Another VECD Bomb

I've brought up and discussed that I am upset that you need software assurance to GET a VECD license (the only Microsoft license that legally lets you run a VDI be it Vista or an XP machine by choosing downgrade rights.) So here is another gotcha to get your blood boiling.
You don't own a VECD license and unless you renew your software assurance each year you are illegally running VDI's. They've got you locked in. Have a gander at this from the FAQ on VECD

Can I continue to order or use VECD for Software Assurance after my agreement (and corresponding Software Assurance) has expired?

No. VECD for Software Assurance (the license intended for traditional PCs licensed for Windows Vista with Software Assurance) may not be ordered or used after expiration of Software Assurance coverage. The license is only available for PCs with active Windows Software Assurance coverage. VECD (for thin clients or Windows PCs without Software Assurance) may be procured under any valid EA, Select License, or CASA enrollment. However, the subscription co-terminates with the enrollment and may not be extended beyond the expiration date without the renewal of the agreement.

Shaking head, all these companies telling me that VDI is the end all be all here is another PITA that you have to deal with. I don't need software assurance. As a library we get software pretty inexpensively. We change our PC's/Servers every 3 years and get NEW OS's for them. There is no inherent reason to pay a yearly price for them.

Hate to say it but VDI continues to leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Apps from Kenzigs Barcamp Presentation that was canceled

People left very early from Barcamp at Citrix Synergy and I did not do my presentation so here are some of the utilities I was going to present. Please comment and let me know what some of your favorite utilities are that you use every day. Free ones especially!

Kenzigs favorite utilities that have helped eliminate stress!

The Citrix Presentation server 10.20 Client
http://www.citrix.com/English/ss/downloads/details.asp?downloadId=1339751&productId=186&c1=sot2755
Of course the number one thing I use all day long is the Citrix ICA Client. Connecting to admin apps is heavily used. The 10.x clients have improved Seamless Windows, Smooth Roaming, Speed Screen Image Acceleration, Wan Drive Access performance, SercureICA, Pass through Authentication, Printing and Keyboard passthrough. Have you upgraded to the latest version?

AltDesk
http://www.astonshell.com/altdesk/
This has got to be one of my all time favorite utilities. AltDesk creates several Virtual Desktops you can easily switch back and forth between. There is a portable version you can use on your USB key drive. I plug in the key when I go to users desktops, run this program up and switch to a new desktop and leave all their apps intact. When done I close the program and never changed a thing on their PC. $15 shareware

DameWare Mini Remote control
http://www.dameware.com/products/dmrc/
This is the least expensive licensed per administrator and not number of desktops and the only remote control software I have found that works within Windows Vista without requiring user interaction. (I can’t say I’m not liking GoToAssist Express Beta which comes in a close second. You can check that out at https://express.gotoassist.com/servlet/signup)

SequoiaView http://w3.win.tue.nl/nl/onderzoek/onderzoek_informatica/visualization/sequoiaview/
SequoiaView is a FREE product that gives you a treemap of files on your hard disk so you can visually see what files are taking up the most space. I use this from my USB key drive to see if there are large files I can delete prior to creating images for PC’s
TreeMaps are a novel idea you can even get your news like this at: http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm

PrintNow
http://www.msterminalservices.org/files/printnow.zip
PrintNow is a TSR utility that reenables the Print Scrn key. This is an old utility from PC magazine that still works even on Vista and within an ICA/RDP session it is invaluable!

System Center Virtual Machine Manager Beta
If you are using Virtualization go out and get yourself a Microsoft Connect Account and
check this product out! It will control both Hyper-V and VMWare ESX VM’s
http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/scvmm/default.mspx

Ctrl-Alt-Del Consultancy Utilities
Warren Simondson has written so many excellent utilities for Citrix and Terminal services they would be too numerous to mention here. But go out and have a look see for yourself at: http://www.ctrl-alt-del.com.au/CAD_ResGuides.htm But some samples are GetTSCIP a command line tool to get the Clients IP and GETPUBAPP a command line utility to get what server a Citrix Published app is on.
Oh did I mention they were all free?


Barracuda Spam Firewall
http://www.barracudanetworks.com/ns/products/spam_overview.php
Support calls for email garbage have all but been eliminated since we have installed this baby! It goes in between your switch and mail server, just point your SMTP mail IP to this guy and watch your spam disappear!

Here is a sample of just ONE days stats from our usage:
· Total emails processed: 309,868
· Blocked (bad recipient - no such username here): 53,102
· Blocked spam emails: 249,278
· Blocked (rate controlled) 1,058
· Blocked due to virus: 27
· Allowed - tagged: 1,342
· Allowed: 5,061
That is right it blocked almost a quarter of a million spam messages in one day for us!

RTO Software Virtual Profiles
http://www.rtosoftware.com/Products/VirtualProfiles/VP.htm
OMG I’ve seen demos of this product that speeds up loading profiles from 34 seconds down to 9 seconds. It only loads the part of the profile it needs to get you in and when you access other parts it downloads them on the fly as needed. I’ll admit we don’t use this yet but I plan to!
Citrix also just purchased Sepago Profiles from them.

Veeam FastSCP
http://www.veeam.com/vmware-esx-fastscp.html
If you are using VMWare ESX this utility is pretty much indispensible. It’s like FTP for your VMWare servers, you can use this to copy VM’s on or off of your servers.

Microsoft Remote Server Administration Toolkit for Vista/Server 2008
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=9ff6e897-23ce-4a36-b7fc-d52065de9960&DisplayLang=en
Updated version of RDesktops and Remote Admin tools for Vista and Server 2008. Boy I am so happy they finally released this! I use Rdesktops daily along with Active Directory Users and Computers Snapin all in one console to control my entire environment.

DTaskManager Task Manager Replacement
I’d have to say I probably keep this FREE utility running half the day. Every time IE stalls and you can’t close it with the regular task manger this one has a Kill Task option that works every time. Scroll down the page to find it. Also shows ports in use, User/Kernel modules. Also have a look at DShutdown at this site!http://dimio.altervista.org/eng/

2xExplorer
http://www.simtel.net/product.php?id=34054R
emember Windows 3.1 when you could have multiple panes of explorer open to copy between them. You could easily drag and drop files back and forth among partitions. 2xEplorer is a file explorer replacement that works on all Windows OS versions from 95 to Vista. (and yes in TS and Citrix sessions) I use this daily and it is a real time saver. This is the FREE version and uses a single executable that can be put on your USB jump drive.

PortableApps
These are applications made to run on your USB Key. Imagine a PC that doesn’t have Firefox or OpenOffice on it. Plug in your key and you are up and running.
http://portableapps.com/

DeNamik LoadGen
http://www.dabcc.com/downloadfile.aspx?id=344
This tool helps to perform massive load tests in a simplified manner, something which is important to any centralized computing environment. FREE

Instant Memory Cleaner
http://www.vasileios.gr/freesoft/inst_mem_clean.htm
This is a little front end utility for the cli ClearMem in Windows XP and Vista. When your machine slows to a crawl you click on the icon in your taskbar and it will free up your memory. This is a free tool. Lots of other useful utilities on this site also.

TSPE
http://www.gourami.eu/products/tspe-terminal-server
Edit your Terminal Services Profile path for multiple users all at once! FREE

Process Lasso
http://www.bitsum.com/prolasso.php
Automatically adjust the allocation of CPU cycles so that system responsiveness is improved in high-load situations. FREE

Customize Web Interface
http://www.thomaskoetzing.de
If you want to customize Web Interface and haven’t heard of my fellow CTP Thomas Koetzing you’ll need to go to his site. He has numerous tips and scripts to get you started.

Get rid of that Grey box
http://www.brianmadden.com/Forum/Post/96324
Ok I admit this one is mostly just a link to a discussion but the issue happens to all users as soon as you install Office on a Citrix Server. The language bar loads and if you are using seamless apps a grey box hangs around. Here is how to get rid of it.

There are 2 Web 2.0 web apps that have made my life easier. One is called http://Twitter.com. The other is called http://Tumblr.com . Twitter helps you keep up on what your coworkers and friends are downing. Tumblr makes blogging beyond simple.

Citrix Synergy Day One Photos

For your enjoyment I have posted my pictures from Citrix Synergy here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jkenzig/CitrixSynergy2008dayone

Kenzig's Citrix Synergy Pictures Day Two

Citrix Synergy Day Two Pictures are now posted at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jkenzig/CitrixSynergyDayTwo Feel free to use freely!

See I really did present at Citrix Synergy

See I really did present at Citrix Synergy.  Also presenting Wednesday night.

 

All pictures from Tuesday are here

http://picasaweb.google.com/jkenzig/CitrixSynergy2008dayone

 

Jim

 

Grokking in the Tech World

I was laying in bed unable to fall asleep with my mind racing last evening and coming up with brilliant thoughts as I sometimes do and then started remembering back to the days when I was Nature Director for a CYO camp about 30 years ago. It was probably one of the best jobs I ever had. Just out of high school, they game me room and board and a whopping $80 a week salary.

I in return during the school year taught Nature at day camp and during the summer at regular camp. At day camp we would get children that would come in from the inner city, the sidewalk jungle if you will, whom had never even seen a tree in their entire lives. Now yeah they SAW trees, but they never really looked at them. So they really hadn't seen them.

Back then I introduced these children to the idea of Grokking in nature. The scientific definition of Grok from Wikipedia is to share the same reality or line of thinking with another physical or conceptual entity. In Heinlein's view of quantum theory, grokking is the intermingling of intelligence that necessarily affects both the observer and the observed. In simple terms at least to me Grokking means to study and experience an object(or idea) and take it apart piece by piece until you have whittled it down to looking at its most infinitesimal parts.

The experience I gave the children started with hugging trees and looking at them deeply and finished with us Grokking an Orange. If you ever looked at an Orange, I mean really looked at it, you would notice that it is always very cool to the touch, the bumps on the outside are intriguing, inside it is broken into sections, and if you dig deeper into those sections you will see that the Orange has little tiny juice sacks all tide together to give you that tasty goodness when you bite into it.

So I'm laying in bed and I'm thinking... and I'm remembering and I'm thinking and then it comes to me.. what is happening right now in the Computer Industry and Tech world can be compared to Grokking. We are slowly tearing apart how we see things and separating and even virtualizing our applications, layers, networks, OS pieces like profiles, files, music and much more. A quote by Bill Gates came into my head:

“Today, you always know whether you are on the Internet or on your PC’s hard drive. Tomorrow, you will not care and may not even know.”

And this is happening before our eyes, things like Microsoft Live and Live Mesh and Google Apps are good examples. OS Virtualization and virtual desktops and virtual layers in routers and virtual apps by a plethora of companies are here or on the horizon. In the not so distant future we will be able to pick and choose what we want our OS, software, computers, handheld devices and media to behave like and be at any given time. Do I want a Linux box one minute and a Windows or Mac box the next, instantly switching between them? The technology exists. Do I want my smart phone to be able to connect and run applications from my desktop be it a mac, Linux or windows box while it displays a virtual screen and keyboard on the surface in front of me. You bet I do. Do I want to have multiple IP addresses assigned to me virtually depending on how I log on so I easily connect to different subnets and networks. Your darn right I do.

Everyone speaks about "convergence" but maybe it is not really about that anymore, just maybe it is about "Grokking" and separating all the pieces to make our lives easier to "share the same reality."

Download Pick: PRTSRVCHG New Utility to remap Network Printers.

The folks at Ctrl-Alt-Del have a new freeware utility called PRTSRVCHG which is  a command-line utility to assist the ease of remapping network printer paths for individual clients after a print server has been migrated to a new server, with a new name. When an administrator uses the PRINTMIG utility to move printer shares from one server to another server with a new name, and printer shares are retained, the hardest task is to search the individual users list of connected printers, and remap all printers to the new server. PRTSRVCHG makes this process easier by automatically replacing the old server name with the new one when the utility is run within a user session.

It is available on:

http://www.ctrl-alt-del.com.au/CAD_TSUtils.htm

Worldwide Telescope

Just got a twitter that Worldwide Telescope is now available. I saw a short demo of this at the Microsoft MVP Summit. It is totally awesome!

http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/

Killer video on RTO Virtual Profiles

Doug Brown has posted a killer interview and demo of RTO Virtual Profiles with Kevin Goodman. They show a login going from 34 seconds down to 9! Awesome or as Doug would say KILLER!
Check it out at:
http://www.dabcc.com/video.aspx?id=9

ChipPC to introduce the Xtreme "Plug" Pc

Definitely something to check out at Citrix Synergy!

Chip PC’s Plug PC will be the flagship product drawing as low as 3.5 watts of power at maximum load and featuring on-board multimedia acceleration; establishing the Plug PC as the logical replacement to traditional fat PC’s. With its design centered on ease-of-use it is to provide seamless integration into desktop virtualization enviroments.

Clearcube Spins off Software Division to VDIWorks

Another VDI player to deal with. ClearCube a name we haven't heard in a while has spun off it's software division to be called VDIWorks. Oi! YAVDIV (Yet Another VDI Vendor)
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Infrastructure/ClearCube-Spins-Off-Software-Division/

Todays new catchphrase Presentation Virtualization

While you were away the TS desktop was renamed...

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/presentation-terminal.aspx

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Blog Post Pick: Rationalizing a Virtual Desktop Architecture

This one from the Microsoft Virtualization blog by Manlio Vecchiet is a MUST read
Rationalizing a Virtual Desktop Architecture
http://blogs.technet.com/virtualization/archive/2008/04/30/rationalizing-a-virtual-desktop-architecture.aspx

I just want to quote the whole thing to here but just go read it.

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Licensing Vista for VDI - Are you ready for VDI Maybe not

If you want to use Vista as a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) heads up. Did you know that only the Windows Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktop (VECD) version of Vista can be used this way. Here is a document that has the skinny.

http://download.microsoft.com/download/3/d/4/3d42bdc2-6725-4b29-b75a-a5b04179958b/licensing_vista_with_VM_technologies.docx

So as I understand it after you pay get the Hyper-V, Or Vmware VDI or Citrix Desktop solution license and server hardware, you'll need to of course pay for the local Windows Vista license the VECD one on the device so you can run a vista VDI. It gets very confusing. But the bottom line is if you aren't running VECD when accessing Vista in a VDI you are violating Microsofts licensing agreement. Hope you purchased the correct version.

Are you confused now? I still am. But I always thought that the synonym for Microsoft licensing is "Confusion". That is why we have VARs. LOL

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Citrix Announces 6 new Citrix Technology Professionals

Please join me in congratulating the following 6 individuals who have been awarded the Citrix Technology Professional award!

Alexander Ervik Johnsen
Gustavo Gurmandi
Jason Conger
Ruben Spruijt
Steve Greenberg
Wilco van Bragt

www.citrix.com/program/ctp

VMWare Announces Project Northstar (Thinstall) Beta

Just got this info in my inbox:

VMware is pleased to announce the release of VMware Project North Star (Thinstall) Beta 2, now available for download on the VMware Web site. This release marks a significant milestone in our efforts to integrate Thinstall with other VMware products, and includes new features that simplify deployment and strengthen security for "Thinstalled" applications.

http://communities.vmware.com/community/beta/northstar

New Features in Beta 2:

• Simplify application dependency mapping and license management with Application Link: This feature allows administrators to dynamically link Thinstall packages to one another, making it possible to create separate packages for interdependent components (such as Java or .NET) and use them across multiple Thinstall packages.
• Reduce security risks with Application Sync: This feature allows customers to execute updates to virtual applications through a secure Internet connection, increasing application portability while reducing security and patch risks to offline and out-of-network machines.
  

Note: After reviewing extensive feedback from partners and customers, VMware has decided not to release the Thinstall License Manager (TLM) at this time. If you that have questions about the future availability of TLM, please contact your Thinstall sales representative.

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Whitepaper: Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 (SCVMM)

Manages Virtual Server, Hyper-V and VMWare ESX VM's

http://download.microsoft.com/download/6/f/8/6f8a7125-041a-46f9-a9ec-362b13fe0445/VMM2008_White_Paper_Draft3.6_FINAL.pdf

Demos of this tool I've seen are fantastic!

Beta is here http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/scvmm/default.mspx
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