How to Avoid the Top 7 Mistakes Made When Managing Citrix Performance

© eG Innovations, Inc | www.eginnovations.com
How to Avoid the Top 7 Mistakes Made
When Managing Citrix Performance
Raymond Otero
Manager of End-User Computing
Anexinet
Raymond.otero@anexinet.com
Srinivas Ramanathan
CEO
eG Innovations
srinivas@eginnovations.com

Moderator
Christine Ackley
Director of Marketing Operations
eG Innovations
Christine.Ackley@eginnovations.com

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Logistics

Srinivas Ramanathan
CEO
eG Innovations
srinivas@eginnovations.com
Raymond Otero
Manager, Infrastructure Delivery & End-User Computing
Anexinet
Raymond.otero@anexinet.com
Today’s Presenters

 Citrix – Use cases and need for performance
management
 Top 7 mistakes when managing Citrix performance
and how to avoid them
 Solution Tour: eG Enterprise for Citrix XenApp &
XenDesktop
 Q & A
Agenda

FAST FACTS
Recognized by:
 Award Winning Technology Firm Founded in 2000
 Serving emerging, mid-market & Fortune 1000 clients
 $110M + -2015 Revenue
 250+ Employees & Growing
 We are a privately-held, privately-funded organization
 Award winning - 6 year consecutive run as “Best Place to Work”
Anexinet – Fast Facts

 Anexinet Client Service Model consists of three Solution Areas
led by a Vice President of Delivery:
 Application Solutions - develop application and processes that
integrate disparate systems
 Business Intelligence Solutions - access business critical information
for dynamic and accurate decision making
 Infrastructure Solutions - deliver highly available converged
infrastructure solutions for missions critical applications
 Each “Solution Area” consists of core Practice areas
Anexinet – Solutions Portfolio

Server, Storage, Network
 HP, EMC, Cisco, Oracle/Sun, Enterasys
 Blade Technologies
 Networking and Convergence
 SAN (ISCSI/FC/FCOE), NAS
 Enterprise Systems Management
Virtualization and OS Platforms
 Software Defined DataCenter
 VMWare, XenServer, Hyper-V, IVM
 Microsoft – Azure, O365, SCCM, Hyper-V,
AD/ADFS, Exchange, Lync
 UNIX – HPUX, Linux, Solaris
Data Protection, Security, & Resilience
 Backup and Recovery
 Archiving, Discovery, and Compliance
 Secure Data Access and Encryption
 Disaster Recovery and BCP
End User Computing & Mobility
 Virtual Desktop Infrastructure
 Profile and Persona Management
 Application Virtualization/Streaming
 Mobile Device/Application Management
 BYOD and NAC
Anexinet – Infrastructure Solutions

EUC Solution Partners – Virtualization and Mobility Infrastructures
Workspace
Data
Desktops Collaboration
Apps
Personal
Anexinet – EUC Solutions

 Leading provider of IT performance
monitoring, diagnosis and reporting
software
 Specialists in performance monitoring and
management for Desktop and Application
Virtualization
 Citrix partner since 2003, VMware partner
since 2007
 Our solutions are used in some of the largest
Citrix/VDI deployments in the world
About eG Innovations

Citrix Technology Use Cases

Source: 2016 Citrix Performance Survey,
http://www.eginnovations.com/solutions/sign-in?whitepaper=36
Citrix Services are Business Critical
80%
16%
4%
Very important
Somewhat important
Not that important
96%
see Citrix as being
business critical
If the Citrix service slows down or
has an outage, business is
impacted.

Web Applications Citrix Applications
Request content, download and browse on the
client – scrolling on the client.
Highly interactive, accesses to the server/remote
desktop.
Request / response based, forms filled out on the
client, submitted at the end;
Forms filled on the server – every keystroke goes to
the server.
Response time requirement: < 4 seconds Response time: < 150 msecs
Sessions used to retain context. Session used to keep the interaction going.
Multiple connections, compression, caching, pre-
fetching etc. to speed download.
Single connection, optimization limited to
compression.
Throughput requirements higher – download
pages, display content.
Throughput less important, interactivity more
important.
Infrastructure slowness causes slower access. Infrastructure issues can disconnect sessions,
keystrokes don’t show up on time, screen painting
is slow. Users get frustrated.
User Experience for Citrix, More
Important than for Web Applications

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 Applications

MemoryCPU Disk Network
 Adequate for simple, client-server applications
X Not sufficient for complex, modern applications
Citrix Performance Monitoring is NOT
Monitoring of Server Resources

Rachel Berry
ex-Product Manager,
Citrix Systems
Kevin Goodman
CEO,
FsLogix
Evaluating Citrix Monitoring Options

User Experience is a Key to Citrix Success
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

1. Look for performance monitoring tools with Citrix domain
expertise.
Citrix Performance Monitoring Tips

Handling Citrix Performance Complaints
My desktop is
not working…I cannot login
to my desktop My applications
launch very
slowly…

Handling Citrix Performance Complaints
Who gets the first call?
Who is blamed?
It’s always you - the
Citrix Administrator

27%
29%
30%
31%
37%
40%
42%
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
Virtualization platform
Server OS
Network in the data center
Citrix tiers
Storage
Infra services (AD, Profile, etc.)
Enterprise applications
Network connection to the user terminals
Where do Most Citrix Problems Lie?

Network StoreFront on
ESX
Active Directory
SQL
XenApp on
VMware ESXDelivery Controller on
VMware ESX
License Server
Profile Server
Enterprise
Apps
vCenterOracle
Client
SAN
Switch
What is the root cause of the service problem?
Network? VMware? AD? SQL? Storage? Profile Server?
Where is the Root-Cause?

1. Look for performance monitoring tools that have Citrix domain expertise.
2. When users complain that “Citrix is slow”, the problem could
be anywhere in the infrastructure. End-to-end visibility is a
key to rapid troubleshooting.

Built-in Citrix Monitoring Tools
 Integrated monitoring tool with Citrix XenApp 6.5
 No longer included with Citrix productsEdgeSight
NetScaler
Insight
Multi Admin
Consoles
Director/
EdgeSight
Citrix Products
Monitoring tools in Citrix XenApp / XenDesktop 7.x

 Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop sessions tracking
 Deep insights into Citrix logon process
 Drill downs into applications used
Director
How many users
are connected
Are there many
connection failures?

 Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop sessions tracking
 Deep insights into Citrix logon process
 Drill downs into applications used
Director
Citrix Director is a good troubleshooting tool, not a monitoring tool.
What applications are
running in a user’s session

 Insights into application and bandwidth usage
 Network performance visibility: is a
slowdown due to the user’s network or your
data center network?
NetScaler
NetScaler Insight gives you the network-centric view. What if your problems
are on the servers/desktops, or in the virtual platform or storage?

Citrix Director / EdgeSight
VMware VCOPS - Virtual
Task Manager - Windows
Event Viewer - Windows
EMC Ionix - Storage Cisco UCS Manager - Hardware
CiscoWorks - Network
For End-to-End Visibility, You Need …
Lack of integration makes monitoring & diagnosis slow and manual.

1. Look for performance monitoring tools that have Citrix domain expertise.
2. When users complain that “Citrix is slow”, the problem could be anywhere in the
infrastructure. End-to-end visibility is a key to rapid troubleshooting.
3. Built-in tools provided in the Citrix stack are useful, but not
always sufficient for managing performance end-to-end.

Virtual Server Management Solutions …
 Monitor the Virtualization platform only – not the connection brokers,
storage, network, profile servers, terminal servers, …
 Track VMs and not users
 No way to map a user to a VM
 Workload of VM dependent on who is logged in
 Monitors a desktop from the outside (black box!)
 No understanding of what is happening inside the desktop
 What applications are running?
 Is high CPU usage because of load or a faulting application?
Virtual Desktop Management = Virtual Server Management
VDI – New Challenges, New Solutions

1. Look for performance monitoring that has Citrix domain expertise.
3. Built-in tools provided in the Citrix stack are useful, but not always sufficient for
managing performance end-to-end.
4. Virtual desktops are VMs, but you can't use monitoring tools
you've used for virtual servers to monitor virtual desktops.

Introducing eG Enterprise

A couple of transactions
are seeing errors.
One of the services is
having a critical issue.
Monitoring Services, Not Silos

Some of the transactions
are seeing slowness.
Monitoring the User Experience

Seems to be an issue with
the VMware server
hosting virtual desktops.
Analyzing Performance End-to-End

The issue seems to be inside
the virtual desktop (not in
the virtual platform)
Pin-Pointing the Cause of the Problem

Two of the desktops – user
alan’s and james’ are seeing
issues.

TCP retranmsmit ratio is
very high – this points to a
network connection issue to
the desktop.

Root-Cause of the
problem
Effects of the
problem
Making Diagnosis Simple

Identify & resolve
problems preemptively,
before users call!
Network? Database?
Application?
VMware?
Citrix?Web?
eG Enterprise is a General Practitioner for your Citrix infrastructure.
Service Owner
eG Enterprise Citrix Service Manager

4. Virtual desktops are VMs, but you can't use monitoring tools you've used for virtual
servers to monitor virtual desktops.
5. You don't always have to involve your experts in problem
diagnosis, if you invest in service monitoring and auto-
correlation.

Insights into browser-based accesses
Domain-Expertise with Citrix

Network latency is
affecting Citrix user
experience
Insights into network latency and its impact on Citrix performance

Total login time as
seen by the Delivery
Controller
Breakdown of login
time into phases
Visibility into Citrix logon process – from the Delivery Controller

Group policy
processing is what is
taking time
Details of the CSE
that is causing logon
slowness
Visibility into the Citrix logon process from XenApp

HDX Channels
 Bandwidth used
 Audio bandwidth
 Video bandwidth
 Printer bandwidth
 Drive bandwidth
 Framehawk frames/s
User & Application Activity
 Top users by CPU, memory,
IOPS
 Top applications by CPU,
memory, popularity, IOPS
 URLs accessed by users
User Experience
 Logon time
 Profile load time
 App launch time
 Screen refresh latency
 Network RTT
Citrix Tier-wise Visibility
 NetScaler
 StoreFront
 Provisioning Services
 Delivery Controller
 License server
 Data store
Supporting Infrastructure
 Virtualization platform
 Storage
 Network in DC
 Network to user terminals
 Infra services – AD, DNS
Sessions
 Who logged in, when
 What applications did
they access
 When disconnects happen
 Idle time in session
Citrix Monitoring Capabilities

Integrated Monitoring of Everything
Citrix
Complement & Extend Citrix Performance Management Solutions
NetScaler
Insight
Multi Admin
Consoles
Director/
EdgeSight
Citrix Products
eG Enterprise
Performance Monitoring

Before
Migration
After
Migration
Use Cases for Performance Monitoring:
Migration Analysis

Answers key
questions about Citrix
usage: who, when,
how long, what?
Compliance and Audit

A few of the servers
are handling most of
the sessions
Capacity Optimization

Capacity Planning

4. Virtual desktops are VMs, but you can't use monitoring tools you've used for
virtual servers to monitor virtual desktops.
5. You don't always have to involve your experts in problem diagnosis if you invest in
service monitoring and auto-correlation.
6. Performance management is more than just about
troubleshooting problems.

Assess
DesignDeploy
Maintain Plan
Performance
Monitoring
When Should Performance Monitoring
be Considered?
 Baseline the
infrastructure from
the very beginning
 Mitigate risk of failure
down the line
 Process vs. costly
ad-hoc fixes
 Ensure scalability &
deliver ROI

1. Look for performance monitoring that has Citrix domain expertise
managing performance end-to-end
4. Virtual desktops are VMs, but you can't use monitoring tools you've used for virtual
servers to monitor virtual desktops
5. You don't always have to involve your experts in problem diagnosis if you invest in
service monitoring and auto-correlation.
6. Performance management is more than just about troubleshooting problems
7. Don’t look at performance management just AFTER you have
deployed the Citrix infrastructure

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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http://www.eginnovations.com/freetrial
Send an Email
info@eginnovations.com
Call Us
+1 (866) 526 6700
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