Choosing a citrix monitoring strategy key capabilities needed and pitfalls to avoid

Choosing a Citrix Monitoring
Strategy: Key Capabilities Needed
& Pitfalls to Avoid
SPONSORED BY
Bala Vaidhinathan
CTO, eG Innovations

© eG Innovations, Inc | www.eginnovations.com
Tim Mangan
CUGC Boston Leader
CTP Fellow, Microsoft MVP
Moderator

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Today’s Presenter
Bala Vaidhinathan
CTO, eG Innovations
bala@eginnovations.com

• Citrix performance monitoring using Citrix Tools
– Citrix Director
– Citrix NetScaler Insight Center
– Citrix SCOM Management Packs
• Key requirements for Citrix Monitoring
• What to avoid with Citrix Monitoring?
• Ideal Citrix Monitoring Strategy
• Hands-on demo
• Q&A
Agenda

eG Innovations
• Leading provider of IT performance monitoring,
diagnosis and reporting software
• Founded in 2001
• Citrix Premier Technology Partner since 2004
• Specialists in Citrix performance monitoring and
management
• Our solutions are used in some of the largest
Citrix deployments in the world
• Global footprint across Five Continents
www.eginnovations.com

Customer Successes
FINANCE
GOVERNMENT MANUFACTURING
HEALTHCARE

Customer Successes
INSURANCE
UTILITIES SERVICE PROVIDERS
LEGAL

Awards and Recognition

Why Talk About Citrix Monitoring Strategy?
• 90% of enterprises are not fully satisfied
with the way they are managing their
Citrix infrastructure
• 67% use two to five tools to manage their
Citrix infrastructure
• 76% spend more than two days a week
on troubleshooting
90%
67%
76%
Source: 2016 Citrix Performance Survey,
http://www.eginnovations.com/solutions/sign-in?whitepaper=36

48%
45%
7%
The most performance sensitive service
Similar in performance demands as other services
Not that performance sensitive
Citrix – One of the Most Performance
Sensitive Enterprise Applications
Source: 2016 Citrix Performance Survey
http://www.eginnovations.com/solutions/sign-in?whitepaper=36
93% believe that Citrix is one of the
performance sensitive services in
enterprise networks.

Audience Poll
What are the biggest performance management
challenges you face?
• User experience issues
• Takes too long to troubleshoot problems
• Unable to find out root cause of issues
• Reactive, as opposed to being proactive
• Helpdesk has no idea, so escalates too many issues

Citrix Monitoring Tools
From Citrix

Citrix Monitoring Tools from Citrix
• Standard
– Citrix Director
– Citrix Studio
• Enterprise
– Citrix NetScaler MAS
• Platinum license
– Microsoft SCOM Management Packs (formerly
Comtrade)
– NetScaler features like Gateway Insight

Citrix Director
Citrix Studio Citrix Director
WCF [80] WCF [80]
Machine Creation
Services
Infrastructure
Services
Broker
Service
Feature &
Integration Services
Virtual Desktop
(VDA)
Citrix
Desktop
Service
Citrix ICA
Service
(PicaSvc2.exe)
Configuration
Services
Machine
Creation
Service
Host Service
AD Identify
Service
Environment
Test Service
Configuration
Logging
Service
Monitor
Service
Storefront
Service
Broker
Service
Delegated
Admin Service
Controller
SQL ServerSQL ServerSQL ServerSQL Server

Citrix Director – Summary
Good insights into Citrix sessions and virtual channels
Citrix logon breakdown for troubleshooting logon performance
Delivery controller error reporting – failed connections,
desktops, etc.
Control action – shadow session, terminate session, etc.
Only focuses on the Citrix stack
Visibility mainly to the delivery controller and VDAs
Provides primarily a user based perspective which doesn’t
scale to large environments
More of a helpdesk tool – on-demand analysis, not proactive
alerting

HDX
Insight
ICA Session
Start and
Stop
ICA Session
Handshake
Periodic
Status on
Data
Transfers
Virtual
Channel
Events
Application
Start and
Stop
TCP Events
(Latency,
Jitter, RTT)
Citrix NetScaler Insight Center

Citrix NetScaler Insight – Summary
Insights into Citrix sessions and application launches
Visibility into network connections from user terminals
Easy to deploy, agentless
Not sufficient if the problems are on the Citrix servers/ desktops
No visibility into the non-Citrix tiers (storage, virtualization, etc.)
Requires NetScaler Platinum license

Monitors Rules Views Tasks Knowledge Reports
Citrix Management Packs
Microsoft System Center Operations Manager (SCOM)
Citrix SCOM Management Packs

Citrix SCOM Management Packs – Summary
Good for SCOM users – Citrix alerts in SCOM
Insights into all key Citrix tiers
Several built in reports – sessions, logons, resources, etc.
SCOM not easy to use for a Citrix admin
Drilldowns are minimal
Visibility into VMware, other tiers requires other
management packs
Need Citrix platinum license

Citrix Monitoring Tools from Citrix
Primarily a Citrix Silo Solution
Limited end-to-end visibility (Citrix stack primarily)
Limited end-user experience
No root cause analysis
Metric focused; reactive rather than proactive
Citrix Platinum license for advanced monitoring or Management Packs
Good for service desk/helpdesk to use at times
Good enough for smaller companies, 200-300 employees
Citrix is improving but focus is still trying to absolve Citrix rather than
true performance management

Citrix Performance Monitoring
What do we need?

Factors Driving the Need for a Citrix
Monitoring Strategy
Trends
&
Pain Points
Adoption of new
technologies in
Citrix
implementations
EOL of EdgeSight
(No longer
available)
New deployment
of Citrix XA/XD
version 7.x
Upgrades of old
version of XA/XD
to version 7.x
Focus on end-
user experience
Too many Citrix
consoles,
No centralized
visibility
SCOM
Management
Pack only
available with
Platinum license
Expensive to move
to Citrix Platinum
to unlock full
features of
Director

Citrix Performance Management
Citrix performance management must cover the non-Citrix tiers as well!

• Resource usage on the servers
• Citrix sessions and their states
• Session reporting for audit and compliance
• Citrix User Experience with synthetic and real user
experience monitoring
• Citrix virtual channels for each user session
• Citrix application usage and resource patterns
• Virtual desktop activity and resource usage
• GPUs and other newer capabilities
• Citrix license usage
Citrix Monitoring Requirements:
Deepvisibilityinto

Server Monitoring: Required, Not Sufficient
CPU
Memory
Disk
Network
Server Monitoring
▪ Is the server sized correctly?
▪ Is there an OS bottleneck: CPU,
memory, disk?
▪ Is the page file usage high?
▪ Are there many disk
reads/writes?
▪ Is any process leaking handles?
▪ Are there excessive TCP
retransmissions from the servers?
Citrix performance can be affected by network, virtualization, storage,
application issues. Server monitoring is necessary, but not sufficient.

Session Monitoring
▪ Are many sessions in
disconnected state (using
unnecessary resources)?
▪ How well is session pre-launch
working?
▪ Are many sessions inactive?
▪ Is user logon disabled on any
server?
▪ Compliance & Auditing: Who
logged in? When? How long?
▪ Conn
▪ ConnQ
▪ Active
▪ Disconnected
▪ Idle
▪ Down
▪ Prelaunch
▪ Linger
Monitoring Citrix Sessions & States
ICA Client
ConnQ
Listener Port Idle
Idle
Active
ICA
Session
Virtual Session

Logon is
slow
Application
is slow to
launch
Session gets
disconnected
Keystrokes
don’t show
up on time
Multimedia
playback is
choppy
User
ExperiencePrinting
doesn’t
work
Monitoring Citrix User Experience
User Experience
Monitoring
▪ How long did Citrix logon
take? If slow, why? Profile?
AD? GPO?
▪ How long does app launch
take?
▪ What is a user’s screen
refresh latency?
▪ Historical data for
troubleshooting?

✓ Emulates users
✓ Imposes the same workload
again and again
✓ Provides a measure of
experience EVEN when
there is no real load
✓ Monitors real users
✓ Actual workloads
✓ Direct measure of what
users are seeing
Synthetic Monitoring
Monitoring the Citrix User Experience
Real User Monitoring
User Experience
Monitoring
▪ Simulate logon; launch
different applications
▪ Synthetic monitoring
from multiple locations
▪ Real user monitoring
from the client, network,
server
▪ Must use a combination
of both approaches

Monitoring ICA Virtual Channels
Virtual Channel Monitoring
▪ What is the input/output line
speed?
▪ How much bandwidth is the
user session consuming?
▪ How much of this is:
▪ Audio bandwidth?
▪ Video bandwidth?
▪ Printer bandwidth?
▪ Drive bandwidth?
Framehawk
DCR
Thinwire
Multimedia
Flash
Generic USB
CDM
Audio
Lync
Printing
Mobile SDK
Mobile Sensors
Smartcard
Clipboard
KB& Mouse
ICA

Monitoring Citrix Application Usage
Virtual Application
Monitoring
▪ What are the most
popular applications?
▪ What are the most
CPU/memory intensive
applications?
▪ Who is accessing each
application?
▪ For how long was an
application accessed?

Monitoring Citrix Desktops (VDI)
Virtual Desktop Monitoring
▪ Visibility inside the desktop is
essential
▪ Should not require agents on
each desktop
▪ Report by user logged onto the
desktop, not VM name
▪ What applications are being
accessed? What resources are
in use?
▪ Which URLs are accessed for
browser apps?

Monitoring GPUs
GPU Monitoring
▪ Monitoring must be GPU-
aware
▪ Support for shared and
pass-through GPUs
▪ Highlight GPU bottlenecks
▪ Identify which
processes/VMs are
consuming GPU
CPU(s) Memory Hard Disk NIC Graphics
Hypervisor
vDriver vDriver
OS – XenApp Server
VM
User
Session
User
Session
User
Session
Virtual
Driver
Virtual
Driver
HDX
GPU
Driver

Monitoring Citrix License Usage
License Monitoring
▪ Is the license server available
and is it responsive?
▪ Is checkin/checkout of licenses
happening as expected?
▪ Are sufficient terminal server
licenses available?
▪ How many licenses are in use
and what are peak usage
times?

Monitoring the Citrix Delivery Controller
Delivery Controller (DC)
Monitoring
▪ Are all key services running?
▪ Is the DC responsive? Connection
to License server, Database ok?
▪ Is it time synchronized with
Active Directory?
▪ Are there connections failures,
unregistered desktops?
▪ Are there any VDAs not reporting
to the DC?
▪ Is any delivery group running out
of capacity?
Receiver
StoreFront
Citrix
Studio
Delivery
Controller
DB
Windows
Server OS
Machines
Windows
Desktop OS
Machines

Monitoring Citrix StoreFront
Citrix StoreFront
Monitoring
▪ Is the Citrix StoreFront
available and is it responsive?
▪ Are the stores accessible?
▪ What is the workload on the
StoreFront/IIS web server?
▪ Are connection or
authentication failures
happening?
▪ Is there any unusual activity
to the StoreFront server?
HA Pair StoreFront
Group
XenDesktop
Site
NetScaler
StoreFrontStoreFront
XenDesktop
Controller
XenDesktop
Controller

Monitoring Citrix NetScaler
NetScaler
S1
S2
S3
Pw0
E1
AD
SAAS
Gateway
SQL
FTP
HTTPS
HTTP
TCP DMS
UDP C6 C8
IAAS
NetScaler
Citrix NetScaler Monitoring
▪ Is VPN tunneling working?
▪ Many application accesses
blocked by firewall rules?
▪ What is the bandwidth
saving from compression?
▪ Are any of the load balanced
virtual servers down or slow
to respond?
▪ What ICA sessions are
happening? Who and how
long?
Optimization Security Switching
SSL Offload Application Firewall L7 Request Switching
(Load Balance)
TCP Offload L4-7 ACL Advanced Health Check
TCP Buffering DoS Protections Content Switching
Surge Protection Rewrite + Responder GSLB
Compression SSL VPN VLAN, SR-IOV, PBR
Caching AAA for App Traffic Dynamic Routing
Web 2.0 Push Cloud Gateway App
Controller
AppExpert Callout
XenMobile NetScaler Cloud Connector
NetScaler DataStream

Monitoring Citrix Provisioning Services
Citrix PVS Monitoring
▪ How much of the RAM cache is
used? Is the server’s RAM sized
correctly?
▪ How much I/O from cache vs.
disk?
▪ Are there time outs at the client
side?
▪ Excessive vDisk retries?
▪ What are boot times of targets?
▪ Any vDisks locked for long time?
vDisk
Citrix Provisioning Server
XenApp Servers/
VDI Desktops

Monitoring Citrix XenMobile & ShareFile
Citrix XenMobile/ShareFile
Monitoring
▪ Is MDM available?
▪ Are there any non-compliant,
unmanaged or jailbroken devices?
▪ Any devices with blacklisted
applications?
▪ Track growth in adoption
▪ ShareFile connectivity working?
▪ Are the local storage zones
working?
XenMobile
MDM
NetScaler
Gateway
ShareFile

Monitoring the Non-Citrix Infra
▪ Any unusual blocking activity
on SQL server?
▪ Is the virtual platform sized
correctly? Are CPU ready times
within limits?
▪ Is Active Directory responsive?
▪ Is there excessive queueing for
any of the backend apps?
▪ What is the network latency
between the user’s terminal
and the server farm?
Monitoring the Citrix Supporting
Infrastructure
Exchange
Server
Microsoft
Hyper-V
VMware
SQL
Database Profile Server
SAN

Key Citrix Metrics to be Monitored
• Logon time
• Profile load time
• Application launch time
• Screen refresh latency
• Network retransmission
time
User Experience
• Bandwidth used
• Audio bandwidth
• Video bandwidth
• Printer bandwidth
• Drive bandwidth
• Framehawk frames per
second
HDX Channels
• Top users by CPU,
memory, IOPS, GPU
• Top applications by CPU,
memory, IOPS, GPU
• URLs accesses by users
User & Application Activity
• Who logged in and when
• What applications did
they access
• When disconnects
happen
• Idle time in session
XenApp/XenDesktop
Sessions
• NetScaler
• StoreFront
• Provisioning Services
• Delivery Controller
• License server
• Data store
Citrix Tiers
• Virtualization platform
• Storage
• Network in data center
• Network to user terminals
• Infra services – AD, DNS
Supporting Infrastructure

Citrix Services Delivery Overview
Access Layer
NetScaler Gateway Storefront Services
Control
Layer
Delivery Controller License Server Directory Servers SQL Server
Physical/Virtual
Resources
VMware Horizon | Citrix XenApp | Oracle | SAP | Microsoft | Enterprise Apps ...
Citrix XenApp / XenDesktop (WAAS) IT Services
User Groups / Consumers / Customers
Trading | Accounting | Online Banking | Patient Records | ...
Internal/External Customer-Facing IT Services
Infrastructure
Health
Application
Health
Business Transaction Health /
End-User Experience
Pooled Desktops | Hosted Apps | Shared Desktops | XenClient | Remote PC

Pitfalls of Siloed Approach
Access Layer Control
Layer
Delivery Controller License Server Directory Servers SQL Server
Physical/Virtual
Resources
VMware Horizon | Citrix XenApp | Oracle | SAP | Microsoft | Enterprise Apps ...
Citrix XenApp / XenDesktop (WAAS) IT Services
User Groups / Consumers / Customers
Trading | Accounting | Online Banking | Patient Records | ...
Internal/External Customer-Facing IT Services
Infrastructure
Health
Application
Health
Business Transaction Health /
End-User Experience
Pooled Desktops | Hosted Apps | Shared Desktops | XenClient | Remote PC
NetScaler Gateway Storefront Services

Audience Poll
What is your key Citrix monitoring requirement?
• User experience monitoring
• Proactive Monitoring
• End-to-end visibility of the Citrix stack
• Analytics that delivers right info at the right time
• More metrics/Graphs to dig through
Tell us what you think!
Choose all options that apply

Citrix Monitoring Requirements:
• End-to-End
• Get centralized Total Service monitoring from one console for
all involved elements
• All-encompassing
• Ability to see all your information with one single-pane-of-glass
• Intelligent
• Provide insights to pinpoint the root cause of problems
• Automated
• Discovery, monitoring, and script-based actions for self-healing
• Proactive
• Provide trustworthy alerts, in advance
• Simple to use
• IT helpdesks (non-experts) can use the tool for problem triage

Alerting & Ticketing
Multi-modal alerting
(proactively)
Integration with helpdesk tools –
ticketing and workflow management

StoreFront
Firewall
Firewall
NetScaler
Desktop Delivery
Controller
Virtual Machine
Infrastructure
Virtual Desktop
Agent
XenMobile SaaS, Web,
Mobile, Data
Provisioning
Services
XenApp
Profile Store
License Server
Data Store
Domain Controller
Cloud
Switch SAN
Where is the Root Cause?
What is the root cause of the service problem?
Network? VMware? AD? SQL? Storage? Profile Server?

Want …
Mobile App for Monitoring
▪ Monitor on-the-go
▪ Get alerts wherever you are
▪ Find and fix issues from a
smart phone

Pitfalls to Avoid
More metrics more use
Focus just on user metrics – effect vs cause
Silo view into the Citrix world – you never get the
complete picture
More graphs more use – need analytics, not data
UI for just admins (non-scalable for other stakeholders)

eG Enterprise – Live Demo

12/14/
2017
Oracle Confidential –
Internal/Restricted/Highly Restricted
5
5

Unified Monitoring of Everything Citrix
Complement & Extend Citrix Performance Management Solutions
NetScaler
Insight Center/MAS
Multiple Admin
Consoles
Director/
EdgeSight
Citrix Products
eG Enterprise
Citrix Monitoring

Multi-level auto-baselining of the environment helps you automatically
identify trends and proactively isolate performance issues
Baseline
Actual Metric
Auto-Baselining

Mobile App for On-the-Go Access

eG Enterprise – Reach, Depth and Speed
Visibility into all the Citrix tiers
In-depth (domain specific) monitoring of each tier
Visibility into non-Citrix tiers supporting Citrix
Insights into all aspects of user experience
Auto-baselining for proactive alerting
Correlation across tiers for root-cause diagnosis
Reporting customized to different stakeholders
On-the-go mobile access

Dramatically simplify and
accelerate application
performance management.
Deliver peak performance,
user satisfaction and ROI.
User Satisfaction
IT Productivity
Higher service
uptime
Simplicity
Cost control & ROI
Total Citrix
Performance
Management
“
”
Total Citrix Performance Monitoring
Benefits

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