Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide. Citrix EdgeSight for Endpoints 5.4 Citrix EdgeSight for XenApp 5.4

Transcription

1 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Citrix EdgeSight for Endpoints 5.4 Citrix EdgeSight for XenApp 5.4

2 Copyright and Trademark Notice Use of the product documented in this guide is subject to your prior acceptance of the End User License Agreement. A printable copy of the End User License Agreement is included on your product installation media. Information in this document is subject to change without notice. Companies, names, and data used in examples herein are fictitious unless otherwise noted. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, for any purpose, without the express written permission of Citrix Systems, Inc Citrix Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Citrix is a registered trademark, and Citrix Presentation Server, Citrix XenApp, Citrix XenDesktop, and EdgeSight are trademarks of Citrix Systems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Trademark Acknowledgements Adobe, Acrobat, and Flash are trademarks or registered trademarks of Adobe Systems Incorporated in the U.S. and/or other countries. Microsoft, Windows, Windows Server, and Internet Explorer are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Document Code: April 1, 2011 (MS)

3 CONTENTS Contents Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Overview Before You Begin Implementing Solutions with EdgeSight Resolve System Performance Problems Identify and Resolve Session Problems Resolve Application Problems Resolve Network Problems Proactively Manage Hardware and Software Assets XenApp Capacity Planning Track Usage Capture and Store Data for Long Term Use Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports Overview Citrix EdgeSight Server Console Citrix EdgeSight Terms and Concepts Accessing and Using Historical Reports Browsing for Reports Searching for Reports Accessing and Using Real-Time Data Using Monitoring Tools Using the Farm Monitor Using the Dashboard Using the Alert Console Using the Alert List Using Troubleshooting Tools Using the User Troubleshooter Using the Device Troubleshooter Citrix EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring Using Real-Time Reports Real-Time Report Components

4 4 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Saving Real-Time Reports Displaying Real-Time Reports Customizing Reports Accessing and Using Process Fault Data Capturing Context at the Onset of a Performance Problem Data Displayed By Agent and Device Type Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Using EdgeSight to Resolve System Performance Problems System Performance Scenario Displaying Recent System Performance Displaying Recent Alerts Displaying the Historical Performance for a Device Display Asset Changes Display Resource Utilization Information Using EdgeSight to Resolve Session Performance Problems Session Performance Scenario Displaying Recent Session Performance Displaying Round Trip Time Data Displaying Client and Server Session Startup Time Data Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Applications Problems Application Problem Scenario Problem Notification and Initial Investigation Using Real-time Data to Discover Problem Context Displaying Recent Hardware and Software Changes Using Crash Reports to Investigate Application Problems Comparing Overall Device Performance to Peers Handling Non-responsive Applications Monitoring Applications Using Active Application Monitoring Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Network Problems Network Problem Scenario Identifying Network Problems Comparing Current and Historical Network Delay For a Single Device Comparing the Network Delay for a User with Other Users Finding Machines with High Network Volume Finding Network Segments with Slow Response Times

5 Contents 5 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation Using EdgeSight for Capacity Planning Capacity Planning Scenario Displaying the Current Resource Utilization of Machines Managing Application Rollout Application Rollout Scenario Displaying Current and Prior Resource Usage Displaying Prior and Current Alerts Managing Multiple Application Versions Multiple Application Version Scenario Displaying the Process Version Displaying Machines Running the Same Process Version Managing Licensing and Compliance Licensing and Compliance Scenario Displaying Application Usage Using Citrix EdgeSight to Track Usage Monitoring License Usage Monitoring Published Application Usage Monitoring Session Duration Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping Archiving Data Defining Archive Requirements Selecting Data for Archiving Determine Archiving Frequency Warehousing EdgeSight Data Data Warehousing Components Citrix EdgeSight Data Warehousing Strategy Select Data for Warehousing Determine Warehousing Frequency Determine Data Storage and Disk Configuration Needs Index

6 6 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide

7 CHAPTER 1 Overview Before You Begin Citrix EdgeSight is a performance and availability management solution for XenApp, Presentation Server, XenDesktop and endpoint systems. Citrix EdgeSight monitors applications, sessions, devices, and the network in real time, allowing you to quickly analyze, resolve, and proactively prevent problems. EdgeSight also monitors Citrix License Servers and displays license usage information. This document provides guidelines and scenarios for using EdgeSight to ensure that end users in your enterprise have the required application and network resources to work more productively. Citrix XenApp was formerly Citrix Presentation Server. For the purposes of this document, XenApp is used as the primary product name and, unless otherwise indicated, refers to both XenApp and Presentation Server systems. This chapter describes solutions which can be implemented using EdgeSight and lists prerequisites for effectively using this guide. This document assumes that you are working in an environment where the EdgeSight Server is installed and has been running with some alerts configured for at least one week. It is recommended that the server collect data from a minimum of 20 to 30 devices. This provides you with sufficient data to be useful in working with the scenarios. Implementing Solutions with EdgeSight Citrix EdgeSight collects and displays performance and availability information that allows you to isolate and resolve a wide range of application, device, network, and session problems. This document presents scenarios based on different types of problems and tasks. As you use these scenarios, refer to the EdgeSight Server online help for procedures on how to use the EdgeSight Server Console and for definitions of the data displayed in reports. Before using these scenarios, review Chapter 2, Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports for basic instructions on using historical and real-time reports, monitors. and troubleshooters to display data.

8 8 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Resolve System Performance Problems EdgeSight allows you to identify, investigate, and define a resolution for performance issues affecting one or more systems from a single user interface. You can use EdgeSight to display notifications of performance anomalies, display system performance metrics over time, display hardware and software changes on systems, and display how systems are using resources such as memory, CPU, and disk. See Chapter 3, Using EdgeSight to Resolve System Performance Problems for details. Identify and Resolve Session Problems It is difficult to determine the source of a user s reported Citrix application problem because performance metrics are only currently available at the system level, not at the user session or network level. The first challenge is to locate the server accessed by the user and session. Support personnel may guess the server farm and server based on the application (applications may be grouped by server farms). Once they locate the suspected server, they do not have performance characteristics for that particular user and session. Instead, they can only assess the overall server performance, which may not reflect the problem seen by the user. If the problem is not the server, important network data is not available, such as client latency, log-in time or response time, and volume with back-end servers. In short, their ability to isolate and identify a user-reported performance problem is time-consuming and costly. Citrix EdgeSight for XenApp allows support personnel to quickly identify the server accessed by a user and session and then display relevant performance information. Also, a wide range of network-related reports are available that provide information on ICA client traffic, ICA session latency, volume, delay, and round-trip time. See Chapter 4, Using EdgeSight to Resolve Session Performance Problems, for more information on using EdgeSight to diagnose and resolve session problems. Note that the session data collected and displayed depend on the installed versions of the EdgeSight Agent, the XenApp or Presentation Server, and the ICA client. For example, end-user experience monitoring metrics are not collected for Presentation Server systems prior to version 4.5. For more information on data collection and display by EdgeSight Agent type and version, see the Citrix EdgeSight Administrator s Guide.

9 Chapter 1 Overview 9 Resolve Application Problems EdgeSight allows you to identify, investigate and define a resolution for application problems such as errors, crashes, lack of response (hangs), thrashing, and general performance issues. You can use EdgeSight to display problem notifications, display what was happening on the system at the time of the problem, list recent software and hardware changes, and compare application performance across multiple systems. You can also proactively monitor critical XenApp applications using EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring. See Chapter 5, Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Applications Problems for details. Resolve Network Problems EdgeSight allows you to identify, investigate and define a resolution for network problems such as network delay, high round trip times, or Web errors. EdgeSight allows you to compare current and historical network performance for one system or across multiple systems, to find systems with high network volume, and to identify network segments with slow response times. See Chapter 6, Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Network Problems for details. Proactively Manage Hardware and Software Assets EdgeSight does more than just help you solve problems; it can also help you in planning and implementing improvements in your enterprise. With EdgeSight, you can perform capacity planning, rollout new applications, manage multiple versions of applications, and implement licensing and compliance policies. See Chapter 7, Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation for applicable scenarios. XenApp Capacity Planning Administrators need to know when they will run out of capacity and need to add servers to their XenApp farm. Because there are many variables, including user activity level, number of applications running on the server, number of active sessions, and system resource capacity, administrators must use their judgment. For example, they may add 6 users at a time and when server capacity approaches 60 to 70 percent, they add a new server. This approach can be inefficient and does not enable active planning, such as determining how many servers should be purchased by quarter for the upcoming year.

10 10 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide In other cases, the number of users may remain stable but new applications are added to the servers in the farm. Administrators may not know what impact the new application will have on performance and the maximum number of supported concurrent users. Additionally, administrators need to know if a new application causes a compatibility issue with any other applications running on the server. Currently, they lack the granular data necessary to understand these issues. EdgeSight for XenApp allows administrators to closely monitor resource usage over time and also configure real-time alerts so that they are notified when certain usage levels are exceeded. Administrators can also focus on the performance of new applications and receive timely notification of process hangs and faults. See Chapter 7, Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation, for more information on using EdgeSight for capacity planning. Track Usage EdgeSight allows you to track the usage of Citrix licenses, published applications, and the duration of sessions. You can display reports with current and historical Citrix License usage information, such as total, available, and in use license counts by product family or individual product. Usage is tracked for all Citrix license types. For published applications, information is collected on application launches and on unique users. Session duration can be displayed by farm or by user group, and can be filtered for specific devices or users. All of these capabilities allow you to determine what Citrix products or published applications are being used and who is using them. See Chapter 8, Using Citrix EdgeSight to Track Usage for more information on using EdgeSight to track usage. Capture and Store Data for Long Term Use EdgeSight provides archive reports which can be transferred to long term storage for using in analysis and record keeping. By archiving or warehousing data, you can have continued access to long-term historical data while ensuring optimum performance from your EdgeSight Server. See Chapter 9, Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping for guidelines on archiving and warehousing EdgeSight data.

11 CHAPTER 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports This chapter describes how to access various types of Citrix EdgeSight data, both from the EdgeSight Server and EdgeSight Agent databases. Overview EdgeSight collects performance and availability data on each device running the EdgeSight Agent. By default, 3 days of historical data is retained on the agent database (7 days for a virtual desktop). Data is retained for a longer period in the event that the agent has problems communicating with the server or the system running the agent is not connected to the network. Data stored in an EdgeSight Agent database can be accessed from the EdgeSight Server Console, as described in Accessing and Using Real-Time Data on page 16. Data is consolidated and uploaded to EdgeSight Server where it is used as the basis for reports, which display data using tables, charts, and graphs. EdgeSight provides a broad range of standard reports. In addition, custom reports can be created. For more information on using reports, see Accessing and Using Historical Reports on page 15. Each EdgeSight Agent continuously and unobtrusively compares critical performance parameters and conditions against thresholds. When an abnormal condition is detected, such as high memory usage, excessive network delay, or a process fault, the agent generates an alert. If the alert criteria match a configured alert rule, the agent sends a real-time alert to the associated server. Alerts not matching an alert rule are uploaded with the rest of the day s data. For more information on displaying real-time alert information, see Accessing and Using Process Fault Data on page 26. Process fault alert rules enable the capture and storage of crash files. For more information on using crash files, see Accessing and Using Process Fault Data on page 26.

12 12 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Citrix EdgeSight Server Console You interact with Citrix EdgeSight Server through the Citrix EdgeSight Server Console. The console provides you with a powerful and flexible tool for displaying availability and performance information about XenApp and end-user systems in your enterprise. When using the console, you browse pages supplied by a Web server which display reports generated from data stored in the Citrix EdgeSight database. A wide range of standard reports are available. After an EdgeSight Administrator adds you as a console user, you will receive an with login information. Depending on how authentication is configured for the server, your login information can be in the form of an address and password or it can be your Active Directory username and password. To display the console, bring up a browser and point it to the URL for the EdgeSight Server log on page. Log on to the console using your user name and password. The EdgeSight Server Console has the following components. Tabs Use the tabs at the top of the content area to select the type of data you want to display or operation you want to perform. The tabs are as follows: Getting Started This tab provides overview information for each tab. Click on each tab name to display descriptions of tab features. A checkbox allows you to disable the display of this tab on your subsequent logins. Monitor This tab allows you to perform real-time monitoring of performance counters on specified devices and to display information on alert conditions. Troubleshoot This tab allows you to perform real time troubleshooting using troubleshooting tools and real time reports. The real time reports display data directly from an agent database. Plan and Manage This tab allows you to display summary reports which provide an overview of your environment. Summary

13 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 13 information can be displayed for devices, XenApp servers, users, processes, and the network, including web sites and transactions. Track Usage This tab allows you to display reports on usage of Citrix licenses, on published application launches and users, and on session duration. Browse This tab allows you to browse or search lists of reports and to display reports. You can also display report properties and subscriptions. Configure As a non-administrative user, you can edit your profile, and display reports you have designated as favorites. If you have administrative privileges on the server, the operations available on this tab allow you to additionally configure companies (including agent options, alerts, devices, and security), configure the server (including licensing, authentication, database grooming, and company creation), and monitor server status (including messages, jobs, services, and agent database broker activity). Navigation Tree Use the Navigation Tree at the left of the content area to select the specific type of operation you want to perform or the type of report you want to display. On the Configuration tab, click the icon or the corresponding page name to expand or contract that portion of the list. Menu Bar Use the Menu Bar at the top of the content area to perform common operations on the current page, such as bookmarking a page, refreshing a page, or printing a page. When displaying a report, you can add the report to the list of favorite reports or subscribe to the report. Filter Bar Once a report or monitoring page is selected, use the Filter Bar to filter data. Depending on the report or page selected, filter by department, group, time period, process, device, user, site, and other data types. Filter data to isolate information based on particular classes of processes, devices, or users and to quickly identify problems or trends. You can also filter data on non-report pages such as the Current Alert List or the administrative and configuration pages. Click Go to apply filter parameters. (You can run reports without having to click Go by setting the Automatically Run Reports setting to Yes when editing your profile.) Help Link Click the Help link at the top right of the console to invoke context-sensitive online help. In addition to context-sensitive help, the help system also provides reference material, such as glossaries of report counters and a definition of SQL views.

14 14 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Citrix EdgeSight Terms and Concepts A company is the primary organizational unit on an EdgeSight Server. A single server can support multiple companies. Companies are broken down into departments. Departments are organized as a hierarchical tree with a default root department (All), and device-specific subdepartments (XenApp Farms, XenDesktop Farms, and Endpoints) which are created on installation. The structure of the XenApp Farms subdepartment is determined by the XenApp or Presentation Server farms. The structure of the XenDesktop Farms subdepartment is determined by the Desktop Delivery Controller (DDC). Additional Endpoint subdepartments can be created automatically as agents register with the server, or can be created manually by a user with administrative privileges. Configuration information is associated with agents based on their department. Each department corresponds to a set of systems running Citrix EdgeSight Agents. These systems are referred to as devices. In addition to the department structure, you can organize devices by custom groups. A custom group is a user-defined collection of devices. Membership in a group can be based on the associated departments, device characteristics, or queries. Note that the console user interface uses the term group in report names to indicate both departments and custom groups. In addition to groups of devices, you can also create user groups which are collections of XenApp, XenDesktop, or endpoint users. Many reports containing data on user experience can be filtered by user groups, allowing you to monitor system performance for a group of users with specific characteristics. Users log on to the console to display reports or perform administrative tasks. (Note that reports use the term user to indicate a XenApp or XenDesktop user associated with a session.) Each user is assigned a role (such as the default roles of Administrator, Report Viewer, License Server Monitor Administrator, and License Server Monitor Viewer) which has an associated set of permissions. These permissions determine what actions a user can take and what pages are displayed on the console. For example, a user with a role of Report Viewer can display reports but cannot display pages under the Company Configuration or Server Configuration menus or perform administrative functions on the server. Users can display reports from the console or can receive them based on a subscription which specifies the distribution or a report by or to a file share. (This is an effective means of distributing targeted information to people in the organization without requiring them to log on to the console.) Subscriptions are distributed based on a defined schedule.

15 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 15 Accessing and Using Historical Reports EdgeSight provides a set of historical reports that display availability and performance data. Historical reports are useful when examining trends over long time periods or across large numbers of devices. You can browse or search for reports, or use these features in conjunction with one another. All reports are available from the Browse tab. As you work with EdgeSight, you may find that you use some reports frequently. Add these reports to your Favorite Reports page for easy access. Display the report and click on the Add to Favorite Reports link in the menu bar. See the Working with Reports and the Favorite Reports online help topics for more information. Browsing for Reports You can browse for reports by time frame, data type, object type, or report type. As you select a browse term, you refine the list of reports, making it easier to find the report you want. Browse terms are cumulative, and the browse terms selected are shown at the top of the report list. For example, if you want to find out which applications were recently experiencing the most problems, select Process as the object type, then select Stability as the data type. This results in a very manageable list of reports detailing process availability, errors, hangs, and faults. Or, if you wanted to display data about session startup time, select Session as the object type and Performance as the data type. The Data Type menu changes to display a list of performance metrics, including Client Startup Time and Server Startup Time. As you work with EdgeSight, you may find that you use some reports frequently. Add these reports to your Favorite Reports page for easy access. Display the report and click on the Add to Favorite Reports link in the menu bar. See the Working with Reports and the Favorite Reports online help topics for more information. Searching for Reports You can search for reports on the Browse tab by entering search terms and clicking Search. (Do not enclose search terms in quotes.) The search function looks not only at report names, but report descriptions and labels. Once you have performed a search, you can choose the scope of subsequent searches (all reports or only those currently listed). This allows you to refine the list until you find the report you want to display.

16 16 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Accessing and Using Real-Time Data EdgeSight provides a wide range of tools and reports allowing you to access remote devices and display real-time data stored in an EdgeSight agent database.you can display real-time data from the Monitor, Troubleshoot, or Browse tabs using the following tools and reports: Monitor Tab The tools on this tab allow you to quickly detect and begin investigating problems in your environment. Once an issue has been detected, you may want to use the tools and reports available from the Troubleshoot tab to more thoroughly investigate the issue. See Using Monitoring Tools on page 17 for more information. Farm Monitor The Farm Monitor allows you to browse through a XenApp or XenDesktop Farm and display real time data about alerts for one or more devices. The top portion of the Farm Monitor displays recent alert information. The lower portion of the Farm Monitor displays detailed contextual data about activity on the device at the time of a selected alert, including performance counters, sessions, processes, and network usage. Dashboard The Dashboard allows you to display performance counters in real time information for specific devices based on a saved configuration. This allows you to quickly detect changes in performance and resource usage on critical machines in your environment. Alert Console and Alert List The Alert Console provides you with a graphical overview of recent alert activity. This allows you to identify trends in alert conditions across your environment. The Alert List displays information about incoming real-time alerts from XenApp and endpoint devices. When an abnormal condition is detected, the agent on the device generates an alert and, if an alert rule is configured, sends a notification to the associated EdgeSight Server. Troubleshoot Tab The tools and reports on the this tab allow you to drill down into real-time data for a specific device or user. See Using

17 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 17 Troubleshooting Tools on page 20 for information of using the troubleshooters. User Troubleshooter The User Troubleshooter allows you to display detailed performance data for sessions across a XenApp Farm for a specified user over the last three days. Device Troubleshooter The Device Troubleshooter allows you to display detailed real-time performance data for a device. Real-time Reports Real time reports display information from the specified EdgeSight Agent database in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet format. See Using Real-Time Reports on page 21 for information on displaying real-time reports. Track Usage Tab The License Usage Summary report displays the latest license usage information (in use, available, and total) for product groups or individual products. You can drill down to display breakdowns by license version. For more information on using this report, see Chapter 8, Using Citrix EdgeSight to Track Usage, Browse Tab The real-time reports available on the Troubleshoot tab are also included in the report list on the Browse tab. In addition to the troubleshooters and reports, tools are provided that allow you to perform a trace route, display a process list for a device, or find the EdgeSight Server associated with a device. Since remote access to EdgeSight agents enables you to affect the machine behind the firewall, remote access has some requirements that must be met: Downloaded controls may be required You will be prompted to download controls when initially using monitoring or troubleshooting tools, or realtime reports. Ensure that your browser settings will allow you to perform downloads. Administrative privileges Because you are directly accessing the EdgeSight Agent database, administrative privileges are required on the device you are accessing. Using Monitoring Tools The tools on the Monitoring tab are designed to provide timely notification of alert conditions or of performance problems on critical machines.

18 18 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Using the Farm Monitor The Farm Monitor helps you monitor alert conditions occurring on XenApp and XenDesktop systems within farms. The farm structure shown on the monitor is read directly from the farms.when an alert condition is detected by an EdgeSight Agent running on a device, an alert is generated. An alert icon is displayed for each farm and device which has encountered an alert condition. You can display alerts for varying time periods ranging from 15 minutes to 6 hours. Click on a farm to display all alerts for that farm, or click on a device to only display alerts for that device. From here, you can display several types of information: Click on the menu icon for an alert and select Alert Detail to display an alert details popup window. Details include a description of the alert condition, the specific parameter in the alert rule, and the alert count. Click on the menu icon and select Alert Excel Sheet to display a remote report in a new window. This report contains details about the alert and the system context at the time of the alert. Click on an alert to display alert context information in the Device Information pane. On the Process and System tabs, two charts are displayed per counter; one showing the value at the time of the alert and one showing the current value. Click on either chart to show an expanded version. On the Session, Process, and Network Summary tabs, click on the chart icon for a row to display counter details for any item. Click on the chart popup to show an expanded version. See the Farm Monitor topic in online help for more information on using and customizing the monitor. See the Citrix EdgeSight Administrator s Guide for information on configuring real-time alert rules. Using the Dashboard The real-time Dashboard allows you to display real time information for specific devices and counters based on a saved configuration. This allows you to quickly detect changes in performance and resource usage on critical machines in your environment. Creating or editing a dashboard configuration requires that you be an administrator on the EdgeSight Server. See the Citrix EdgeSight Administrator s Guide or the Real Time Configurations topic in online help for more information on creating configurations.

19 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 19 To use the dashboard, select a configuration and click Start Updating. The color of the icons displayed for each counter indicate how the current counter value compares to the threshold. (Click Show Legend to display the legend for the icons.) Position the cursor over a counter to display the current value, or click on a device to display detail charts for all counters. If you observe a condition that requires further investigation, you have the following options: CLick on a device to display the detail charts and click on the report icon to display a Real-time Device Summary report in a new window. Click on the screwdriver icon to display the Device Troubleshooter. Using the Alert Console The Alert Console provides you with a graphical overview of recent alert activity. This allows you to identify trends in alert conditions across your environment. By default, the console displays the last three days of alert activity for all devices.you can filter the display to focus on specific groups of devices, types of alerts, or alert content. See the Alert Console online help topic for more information on using the console. Using the Alert List The Alert List displays information about incoming real-time alerts from XenApp and endpoint devices. When an abnormal condition is detected, the agent on the device generates an alert and, if a matching alert rule is configured, sends a notification to the associated server. Click the plus icon to expand an alert to show details. You can also click the menu icon and select Real-time from the pop-up menu to display a real-time report with alert details and system context. Consider the following when using the Alert List: Real-time alert data is available on the console for three days if the default database grooming configuration is used. Real-time alerts are designed to notify you of critical events which require action. In most cases, underlying problems have been addressed or escalated before alerts are removed from the database. Some alerts require extensive data collection, such as process faults or snapshots. Although the alert may be displayed on the console, the associated crash files are only available on the console after data collection is complete and the files have been uploaded to the server. In some cases, depending on the event, the state of the machine running the agent may not allow for data collection. In these cases, the alert will appear on the console, but crash files are not available.

20 20 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide See the Alert List online help topic for more information on using the list. Using Troubleshooting Tools The tools on the Troubleshooting tab are designed to allow you to drill down into real-time data for a specific device or user. Using the User Troubleshooter The User Troubleshooter allows you to display detailed performance data for sessions across a XenApp Farm for a specified user over the last three days. The troubleshooter looks for sessions based on the following information: Domain and username (domain\user). This field is required. A device name (optional). This is the name of the XenApp server hosting the session. The session status: all, active, or logged off (optional). Use the drop down menu to select they types of sessions to display. Once you have identified the user, click Find Sessions to search for matching sessions. For each session, an icon indicates whether the user is currently connected to the session or logged off. Click on any session to display detailed information on performance counters. On the Session Summary, Channel Detail, System Summary, and System Network Summary tabs, click on any counter chart to expand it. On the Process Detail tab, click the chart icon for any process to display performance counters for that process. The Stability tab displays alert data. See the User Troubleshooter online help topic for more information on using the troubleshooter. Using the Device Troubleshooter The Device Troubleshooter allows you to display detailed real-time performance data for a device. You can either search or browse for a device. The search function is dynamic; as you enter a device name, the device list is updated to show matching devices. (Wildcard searching is not supported.) When you have located the device, click Go to display information about the device. On the System Summary and System Network Summary tabs, click on a performance counter chart to expand it. You can then click on a data point in the expanded chart and display details in a data grid. On the Process List and Network Summary tabs, click on a chart icon to display performance counters for the selected process. The Stability tab displays alert data. See the Device Troubleshooter online help topic for more information on using the troubleshooter.

21 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 21 Citrix EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring Citrix EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring enables an administrator to create and monitor application response metrics for applications delivered by XenApp systems. This software allows the administrator to record and create virtual user scripts and define tests. When the tests are run, virtual user ICA sessions are generated on the target XenApp servers. The results of the tests provide application response and availability information. The administrator also creates real-time alert rules to notify users of application service level performance issues. EdgeSight Console users are notified of application response and availability problems through the following real-time alerts: Application Response Failure and Application Response Time. You can use the Farm Monitor to display alert information and the server context at the time of the alert. You can also use the User Troubleshooter to display information about the test session associated with the alert. The user specified should be that used for the test session. The following historical reports display Active Application Monitoring data: Application Response Failures, Application Response Time, and Application Response Time for a Test. Citrix EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring is installed and run separately. See the Citrix EdgeSight Installation Guide for installation instructions. See the online help provided with the Active Application Monitoring controller for information on defining and managing test operations. Using Real-Time Reports You can use real-time reports (Troubleshoot tab > Real-time Reports) to display data from EdgeSight Agents running on XenApp, XenDesktop, or endpoint devices. These reports display information from the selected agent database using Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. These reports are interactive, customizable, and extensible. While historical reports help you assess trends across groups of systems, realtime reports help you resolve performance problems on specific systems. Realtime reports provide data that is both granular and recent, allowing you to investigate problems thoroughly and in a timely fashion. By connecting directly to an agent database, the data available is of a finer granularity than that stored in the server database. By displaying the remote data in an Excel spreadsheet, you can customize and build your own views and graphics into the large amount of data that is captured by agents. Real-time reports display data in both 5 minute slices and 5 or 15 second slices depending on how large a time period of data is selected when generating the report. In addition, data is available as it is collected, with no need to wait for data to be uploaded to the server.

22 22 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide EdgeSight provides the following types of real-time reports: Device Summary Various summary graphs for a quick overview of what has been happening on the machine. Alert List Detailed alert information for the device over specified time period, including system performance and context at the time that the alert condition occurred. System Performance Displays memory, processor, network, and I/O statistics. Also displays the default perfmon performance counters. System Compare and XenApp Summary Displays performance counters from multiple devices for use in comparing system performance. The data is presented by device and also by counter, allowing you to view overall performance for each system or to directly compare counter values across systems. Network Performance Detailed network performance information (volume, round trip time, and delay) by host, application, protocol, or user over the specified time period. XenApp User Summary System, session, and application performance counters for a specified XenApp user and system. The following scenario describes how you might use real-time reports to resolve a performance problem: There are indications that a device is at risk for experiencing performance problems. These indications could include the device appearing as a leader in a memory usage report, a sharp increase in the number of memory-related alerts, or a user calling you and complaining of a system problem. A first step might be to invoke the Device Summary report to inspect the overall state of the system. You can adjust the time frame of the report to show more data as required. To adjust the time frame, navigate to the Start sheet, change the start and end times and click Update. (By default, the start time is set for 7:00 AM of the current day, and the end date is set to the current date and time.) Spikes in resource usage may indicate a specific area and time frame for further investigation. Next, you can display the System Performance report and look at memory-related performance counters. Double-clicking on a data point in the chart displays process performance for the related time period which may expose high memory usage by a particular process. After drilling down to display process performance data, you can select another counter to display using the Counter drop-down menu or change the number of processes display by changing the value in the Top field. This enables you to broaden your investigation to look at different aspects of performance and a larger set of applications.

23 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 23 You can also approach the problem from the point of view of looking at specific alert conditions. Display the Alert List report and double click on a memoryrelated alert to display performance counters and device context before and after the alert was generated. Three graphs are displayed showing CPU, memory, I/O, and network statistics. The red line on the graphs indicates the time that the alert condition occurred. A table of applications and tasks indicates what applications the user was using prior to and slightly after the alert occurred. In some cases, you may want to compare the device performance with another device to determine whether the problem is specific to the device in question. Use the System Compare report to display basic performance data for multiple devices, or the XenApp Summary report to display basic performance data and session data for multiple systems. You can first compare the overall performance for each device and then directly compare specific counters on both devices. You can specify a list of devices in which you are often interested and set the start and end date and time to capture the last fifteen minutes of data. The resulting report serves as a very powerful real-time dashboard. Once the spreadsheet is configured the way you want it, you can save it for reuse at a later date. As you can see, real-time reports provide quick access to detailed data and give you a means to investigate a problem from multiple perspectives. Real-Time Report Components Each real-time report is made up of multiple Excel sheets of the following types: Start Displays the Device Selection dialog, which is preloaded with the name of the selected device and start and end dates and times. Use the Start Date and End Date fields to adjust the time frame for the report. Click Update to redisplay the chart after entering the new dates or changing the device name (directly from the spreadsheet). By default the spreadsheet sets the start date to 7:00 am of the current day and the end-date to the time that the report is requested. Chart Displays charts showing performance counter data. Click on data points in charts to drill down to related or more detailed data. Depending on the report, there may be multiple chart pages. Data Displays the data underlying the charts. For many of the charts different granularities of data are displayed depending on how large a time period is queried from the remote device. If you select a large period time and the agent were to try to return a large dataset then it would take too much memory, time, network bandwidth and, most importantly, would overburden the remote device. Note that in some spreadsheets the data is captured and populates the same sheet as the graph, while other spreadsheets record the entire recordset as a separate underlying sheet. It depends on how the data is organized on the remote database and how it is retrieved.

24 24 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Saving Real-Time Reports Because the EdgeSight Server Console uses embedded Microsoft Excel software, you cannot save a real-time report using the Save button in the Excel toolbar. To save a real-time report: 1. Display the real-time report you want to save. 2. Press F12. The Save As dialog is displayed. 3. Change the location and file name as required and click Save. Displaying Real-Time Reports Real-time reports are available on the Troubleshoot tab on the EdgeSight Server Console. When you first invoke a remote report after logging in to the console, you must select a device, or, in the case of the XenApp User Summary, a user and device. Once a device is selected and credentials are provided, the report is generated using a default time frame of the current day, starting at 7:00 AM and ending with the current time. You can edit the start and end dates and times to display more or less data. Select the Start tab, edit the Start Date and End Date values, and click Update to regenerate the report. The amount of data available for display depends on the agent configuration. The default is to retain 8 days of data. Different granularities of data are displayed depending on how large a time period is queried from the remote device. Many of the charts in the real-time reports are interactive. Double-click on a data point to drill down to more detailed information. The following table describes what details are available for display. Report Click on To display details about Alert List A specific alert CPU, memory, I/O, and network statistics at the time of the event, plus end-user application context System Performance A data point in any chart Process performance on the selected device System Compare or XenApp Summary Network Performance A data point in the endpoint performance chart for a device A data point in a volume chart A data point in a delay/rtt (round trip time) chart Process performance on the selected device. The XenApp Summary report also includes session performance data. Connection and transaction volume by host, application, protocol, or user Connection and transaction delay by host, application, protocol, or user XenApp User Summary A data point in any chart Process/session performance

25 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports 25 Customizing Reports When using the System Performance or System Compare reports, you can change which counters are shown in a chart and, in some cases, add counters to a chart. This capability is most useful when using real-time reports to actively investigate a problem. You can also customize a report using the embedded Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) source code. Adding a counter is the easiest way to display more data in a chart. For example, open the System Performance report for a device. Note that the performance counters are listed in the table to the right of the chart. If the table is full, you must replace one of the existing counters to display a new counter. Navigate to the SysPerfCompute sheet and select the name of the counter you want to add to a chart. (It is best to use the computed data rather than the raw data found in the SysPerfData sheet.) Copy the counter name, return to the SysPerfChart sheet and paste the counter name into the table. Set the scale value as required. In most cases, the relationship between performance counters is more important than the absolute values. Decreasing the scale values for those counters with high absolute values provides a more easily readable chart. Return to the Start sheet and click Update to refresh the report and display the new counter on the chart. The Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) code is embedded in each report, allowing you to use the Visual Basic Editor to edit the code that retrieves the data from the remote device and generates the charts. Open the report you want to modify and select FileSave As from the browser menu to save a copy of the report. For information on Excel, see Excel Developer Portal at msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/office/aa aspx. For information on VBA, see Visual Basic Developer Center at msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbasic/default.aspx.

26 26 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Accessing and Using Process Fault Data When a process fault occurs on a device, the EdgeSight Agent captures contextual information for the machine and the application, if available. In addition, the agent captures a memory dump, stack traces, and a detailed module list for the failing application. Information on process faults is collected primarily when the fault occurs. Additional information, such as resource usage data, is collected later. The agent checks the configuration requirements previously downloaded from EdgeSight Server. If a process fault alert has been configured for the failing process, the files are compressed into special payloads and uploaded to the server whenever network bandwidth is available and system resources are free. The crash report is available in the following formats: Crash details (ASP page) XML report (XML file) Mini dump (DMP file) Crash CAB (contains the XML and DMP files) Capturing Context at the Onset of a Performance Problem One of the biggest challenges in troubleshooting performance problems as reported by end-users is in understanding the underlying context in which the problems are occurring, specifically what applications and processes are running and how those processes are impacting overall performance. Historically, EdgeSight captured data automatically when an application crashed. But in many cases users report problems when processes run-away and the application or system goes into a hung state. EdgeSight provides the ability to take a remote snapshot at the onset of a performance problem. This feature allows you to remotely analyze the current state of the end-users system, identify a potential problem and capture a full set of diagnostic data that can be shared internally with the application owner or externally with a third-party vendor to troubleshoot any potential problems within the application. To perform a remote snapshot: 1. Navigate to the Troubleshoot tab and select Device Process List. Click the Device icon to bring up the Device Picker. Select the device on which the problem is occurring and click OK. This displays a list of all processes currently running on the device. 2. Locate the process for which the snapshot is required. Click the menu button and select Generate Snapshot from the pop-up menu.

27 Chapter 2 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data and Reports Choose Normal or Full from the submenu to generate a diagnostic snapshot (dump file) for a process. The snapshot is generated on the selected device and then uploaded to the server as an alert. You can display the resulting dump file from the Alert List. Dump file delivery times depend on the process selected, and on system and network performance. Alerts may appear on the console before the associated dump files are delivered. Important: In most cases, you will select Normal. Keep in mind that selecting Full generates a full process dump, which is generally as large as the selected process. Full snapshots consume system resources and may result in a discernible impact on system performance. 4. Navigate to the Monitor tab and select Alert List. Locate the Snapshot alert associated with the process. Click the menu button and select the type of data you want to view (Crash Details, XML Report, Mini Dump, or Crash CAB). You can also select Remote to display alert data directly from the agent database. Data Displayed By Agent and Device Type The specific data collected and displayed by EdgeSight depends on the type of agent installed on a device and also the type and version of the device being monitored. For example, if a Basic agent is installed on a XenApp system, session-level performance metrics are not collected. See the Citrix EdgeSight Administrator s Guide for information on data availability by agent and device type and version.

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29 CHAPTER 3 Using EdgeSight to Resolve System Performance Problems This chapter provides a general procedure for identifying, investigating, and resolving system performance issues identified by EdgeSight. Performance issues can be difficult to evaluate. Given a users complaint, a support person would have to login to the users machine remotely or locally and run certain tools to track down pertinent information. Task Manager can show current processes and their resource and network usage. System Monitor can be used to evaluate multiple potential performance bottlenecks. Event Viewer can be used to find certain errors. These are useful tools, but they require the support person to login or connect to the system to evaluate the situation, and most only do real-time reporting with no ability to compare to historical data. EdgeSight provides a centralized console for use in investigating performance problems and offers a wide range of both real time and historical reports and troubleshooters. This chapter covers the following topics: System Performance Scenario Displaying Recent System Performance Displaying Recent Alerts Displaying the Historical Performance for a Device Display Asset Changes Display Resource Utilization Information

30 30 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide System Performance Scenario Your Level Two support person receives a ticket regarding a users machine that seems to be running slowly. To track down the source of the problem, he needs the answers to the following questions: What is the general system information for the machine (such as CPU, total memory, operating system version, and make and model)? Have there been any unusual or significant increases in performance counter values recently, either for the system or for specific processes? Have there been any errors or not-responding messages on the machine? If so, which application is encountering problems? To which servers was the application connected at the time? What other processes were running at the same time and were they tying up resources? Were there any changes on the system (software or hardware) before the user started experiencing performance degradation? How much hard drive space is available? Generally, how much memory and CPU has the system been using during the course of a work day? How does this compare to last month when the system was running well? EdgeSight makes gathering all of this information possible from a single console without requiring the support person to login to the users machine. It also provides historical data so that the support person can detect trends in performance data and evaluate where and when things might have changed. The support person should use the Device Troubleshooter to obtain basic system information and look at various aspects of system performance over the last three days. Check the Alert List to see if there are any errors, faults or notresponding alerts. They can then drill into the details of the alerts and connect remotely to the machine to display data from the EdgeSight Agent database.

31 Chapter 3 Using EdgeSight to Resolve System Performance Problems 31 From here they can see process information and network connections as they looked at the time of the error. Use the Asset Changes report to display any changes that have occurred on the system, such as hardware changes or newly installed applications. These changes could give clues as to the source of the performance degradation. The following reports should also be generated in order to check possible performance bottlenecks. These can be compared to the historical data retrieved over the last month. System Disk Usage System Memory Usage System CPU You may also want to check the following reports, filtered by device: New Processes Process Errors (or Process Faults) Compare the errors or faults to those displayed in the real time data. Displaying Recent System Performance If the performance problem reported for a device is currently occurring or has occurred within the last three days, use the Device Troubleshooter to pinpoint specific problem areas. 1. Navigate to the Troubleshoot tab and select Device Troubleshooter. 2. Enter the device name in the Search field. As you type, matching devices are displayed. Optionally, you can browse the department tree to find the device. 3. Select the device from the list and click Go. The troubleshooter displays performance counters and a process list for the device. (The population of the page with data may take some time because data is being read from the EdgeSight Agent database.) 4. Expand the Device Details pane to display basic system information: operating system, processor type, memory, and the version of the EdgeSight Agent.

32 32 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide 5. Change the time frame for the data displayed using the slider. Select the left hand thumb, drag it along the track to a new time, and click Go to refresh the display. The maximum time frame displayed is an eight hour window. 6. Starting with the System Summary tab, examine the performance counter charts for unusual or significant activity. For example, Committed Bytes in Use is an important counter for use in understanding system memory usage. 7. Click on Committed Bytes in Use to expand the associated chart. The granularity of data shown in the chart is dependent on the size of the time window selected, and how far back the time window goes. The agent database consolidates data to ensure minimal impact on device performance. 8. As you move your cursor over the chart, data point labels are displayed with the counter value and a timestamp. Click on a point in the chart to display a data grid with processes, users, and performance counters. Use the Counter drop-down menu to change the counter being displayed. Investigate other counters as required on this tab and the System Network tab. 9. If a particular process appears to be a problem, select the Process List tab, locate the process, and click o the chart icon to display performance counters. You can display network-related performance counters for a process by using the Network Summary tab. Displaying Recent Alerts Alerts are notifications of events or adverse performances trends occurring on managed devices. Check the Current Alert List for errors, process faults, or not responding messages. 1. Navigate to Monitor tab > Alert List. 2. Use the filter to narrow the results to the user s device by selecting the By Device radio button and typing the device name in the Filter field.click Go to apply the filtering. 3. Examine the various alerts for the device and try to determine if any of these might be the cause of performance degradation. Alerts of interest can include process alerts, such as a Thrashing process alert or a Process hung alert, or system alerts, such as a System low resources alert. Expand alerts for more detail. 4. Click the menu icon and choose Remote to connect remotely to the device and display process, performance, network, and memory data as it looked at the time of the error.

33 Chapter 3 Using EdgeSight to Resolve System Performance Problems 33 Displaying the Historical Performance for a Device Use the historical reports to display past performance for the device. By default, these reports provide performance data for the last week. 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Device as the Object Type and Performance as the Data Type. 2. Select a data subtype, such as CPU, to display a subset of reports. 3. Select a specific report to display. Display Asset Changes 4. Expand Optional Parameters and then type or browse for the name of the system in the Device field and click Go. 5. Click on a data point in any chart to display detailed data for the associated performance metric. Gather general information about the system and then find out about recent software and hardware changes: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Assets Changes report. 2. Adjust the start end dates for the report as required. 3. Expand Optional Parameters and then enter the name of the system in the Device field and click Go. The report displays the number of assets changes occurring on the device for the selected time period. 4. Expand the report row to see individual asset change details. The report displays what has changed on a system, both hardware and software. This information is derived from WMI. Display Resource Utilization Information Check memory, CPU and disk performance for potential bottlenecks. In any of these reports, you can change the date range in the filter to compare recent performance to historical performance. 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select Performance > Disk as the data type. 2. Select the System Disk Usage report, expand Optional Parameters, specify the device, and click Go.This report displays what percent of the hard disk is free. Expand the report row to display the disk free space and capacity in gigabytes.

34 34 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide 3. Click Return to browse results and click on the Performance link in the Data Type box. Select Memory as the data type. 4. Select the System Memory Usage report, expand Optional Parameters, specify the device, and click Go. This report shows what percentage of the total system memory is being utilized on average. You can also see here how many processes have been running. Expand the report row to break out the average memory usage and process count by day. 5. Click Return to browse results and click on the Performance link in the data Type box. Select Memory as the data type. 6. Select the System CPU report, expand Optional Parameters, specify the device, and click Go. This report shows the average percentage of CPU usage, broken out by privileged time and user time. Expand the report row to break out the average CPU usage by day. 7. Select any of these reports without filtering for a device to show resource usage for all devices in the department. This allows you to compare the device in question to other devices.

35 CHAPTER 4 Using EdgeSight to Resolve Session Performance Problems This chapter provides general procedures for identifying and investigating XenApp session performance issues identified by Citrix EdgeSight. This chapter covers the following topics: Session Performance Scenario Displaying Recent Session Performance Displaying Round Trip Time Data Displaying Client and Server Session Startup Time Data Session Performance Scenario A user reports problems with the availability and response time of applications provided by XenApp. You have looked at the system performance metrics for the specific server, but have not discovered likely causes for the problems. (See Chapter 3, Using EdgeSight to Resolve System Performance Problems for information on using EdgeSight to evaluate system performance.) The next step is to investigate how the user s sessions are performing: What level of application responsiveness is the user experiencing recently? What is the application round trip time for the user and how has it changed? When the user launched an application, how long did it take to start? How much of the startup time can be attributed to the server and how much to the user s machine? EdgeSight provides session performance data in historical reports, including session startup time for both server and client. Performance data is also available from a network perspective, such as latency, ICA round trip time, and ICA traffic.

36 36 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide EdgeSight also provides end-user experience monitoring (EUEM) metrics which show the health of a system from the point of view of an end user. For example, a XenApp metric may report that the server has reached a high percentage of CPU utilization. From the user s point of view, if their applications remain responsive and their overall experience of using the system is acceptable, then CPU utilization may not actually be a problem. In another instance, the XenApp metrics may not indicate a problem, but a fault between the XenApp system and the end user may be causing severe usability issues. The collection of EUEM data is dependent on the following minimum set of software components: EdgeSight Agent version 4.5 or greater running on the XenApp or Presentation Server system Presentation Server 4.5 Enterprise or Platinum Edition (for EdgeSight 5.0 Agents, the XenApp or Presentation Server must be the Platinum Edition) ICA client version 10 or greater Displaying Recent Session Performance If the performance problems reported for a user s sessions are currently occurring or have occurred within the last three days, use the User Troubleshooter to pinpoint specific problem areas. 1. Navigate to the Troubleshoot tab. The User Troubleshooter is displayed by default. 2. Enter the user (domain\username) and, optionally, a device. 3. Click Find Sessions. The XenApp Session Wizard is displayed. 4. Select which farms you want to search for user sessions. (If default credentials have not been set up for a farm, you must click the button associated with the farm and supply credentials.) 5. Click Next. The detected sessions are listed in the User Troubleshooter. 6. Based on the information in the problem report (for example, the application being used, the server hosting the session, or the logon time), click on the session you want to troubleshoot. 7. Starting with the Session Summary tab, examine the performance counter charts for unusual or significant activity. For example, you may notice a spike in Input Bandwidth Used. 8. Click on Input Bandwidth Used to expand the associated chart. As you move your cursor over the chart, data point labels are displayed with the counter value and a timestamp.

37 Chapter 4 Using EdgeSight to Resolve Session Performance Problems Select the Channel Detail tab to display details about input and output levels on the virtual channel. For example, you may notice a sharp increase in audio input during the session. 10. Select the Process List tab and look for processes that may be used to deliver audio, such as a media player. Click on the chart icon to display performance counters. You can also use a real-time report to display recent session performance data: 1. On the Troubleshoot tab, expand the Real-time Reports menu. 2. Select the XenApp User Summary report. 3. Click the user icon to display the XenApp Session Wizard. 4. Select the Query one or more farms directly radio button. This is the recommended method for locating an active session for a specific user. This method requires existing credentials for logging in to the selected farms. 5. Select the checkbox next to the farm name to select a farm to be queried. If necessary, filter the list of farms by department or group, or farm name. Note that you can only select farms for which default credentials have been defined, as shown in the Credentials column. Click Next. 6. Select a user session from the list and click Next. 7. Click the checkbox next to the devices to be included in the report. Click Finish to display the report. Note that by default, the report only displays the last 15 minutes of data. You can change this time period as required. Click on a data point in the Session Performance chart to display additional details, including client and server startup times. Displaying Round Trip Time Data When using round trip time (RTT) metrics to diagnose session problems, it is important to recognize the two types of round trip time: network RTT and ICA RTT. Network round trip time (RTT) is based on network latency. Network latency is the detected network latency between the ICA client device and XenApp. Unlike the ICA round trip metric, the network round trip is largely independent of processing time on the client or server. The ICA round trip time is the time interval measured at the client between the first step (user action) and the last step (graphical response is displayed), as calculated by the session experience monitoring service. The ICA round trip metric can be best thought of as a measurement of the screen lag that a user experiences while interacting with an application hosted in a XenApp session.

38 38 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide To display round trip time data: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select ICA Session Round Trip Time. 2. Expand Optional Parameters, type or browse for the name of the user, and click Go. The report is displayed, showing average network and ICA RTT. 3. Select Date in the Group By menu to show changes in ICA RTT over a period of time. 4. Expand report rows to break down RTT by average and maximum network and ICA RTT for each session. Displaying Client and Server Session Startup Time Data Client startup time is the time elapsed from the time of the request (mouse click) to the time when the ICA connection between the client device and XenApp server has been established. In the case of a shared session, this duration will normally be much smaller, as many of the setup costs associated with the creation of a new connection to the server are not incurred. Server startup time is the time spent on the XenApp server performing the entire start-up operation. In the event of an application starting in a shared session, this metric is expected to be much smaller, as starting a completely new session involves potentially high cost tasks such as profile loading and login script execution. To display session startup time data: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select Sessions as the object type. Depending on which type of startup time you want to display, select either the Session Client Startup Duration or Session Server Startup Duration report. 2. Expand Optional Parameters, type or browse for the name of the user, and click Go. You can also filter by the device hosting the session. 3. Expand report rows to break down startup time by session. 4. Client and server startup times are high-level metrics and include a number of specific steps in the startup process. To display the component metrics for startup times, click Return to browse results and select Session Startup Duration Details. 5. Expand Optional Parameters, type or browse for the name of the user, and click Go. 6. Expand any row to display startup details. Because of space constraints, abbreviations are used for session experience monitoring metrics. Move you mouse over each heading to display the full name of the metric. For

39 Chapter 4 Using EdgeSight to Resolve Session Performance Problems 39 descriptions of each metric, see the Report Counters Glossary topic in the EdgeSight Server online help. You can also use the User Troubleshooter to display session startup information. Go to the User Troubleshooter and locate the session as described in Displaying Recent Session Performance on page 36. Once you have located the session, select the Session Summary tab and examine the session startup counters.

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41 CHAPTER 5 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Applications Problems This chapter provides a general procedure for identifying and investigating, application issues identified by EdgeSight, in this case, a process fault. Although the scenario is based on a specific problem, the basic steps of the procedure can be applied to a range of application issues. This chapter covers the following topics: Application Problem Scenario Problem Notification and Initial Investigation Using Real-time Data to Discover Problem Context Displaying Recent Hardware and Software Changes Using Crash Reports to Investigate Application Problems Comparing Overall Device Performance to Peers Handling Non-responsive Applications Application Problem Scenario This scenario involves several levels of IT department personnel. The specific titles, responsibilities, and escalation procedures may be different for your business. Help desk Responds to user requests for assistance, gathers problem context, and escalates problems as required. Application support Investigates application problem using devicespecific data and configuration information. Escalates problems as required. Application developer Investigates application problem using detailed application-specific data such as crash reports.

42 42 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide This scenario assumes the following: An alert rule has been created for Process Fault conditions. The alert rule has an associated alert action that results in a notification being sent to the help desk. Refer to the Alert Rules topic in EdgeSight Server Online Help for information on creating alert rules and specifying alert actions. Help desk and/or application support personnel have been granted administrative privileges on the remote device. The steps in the scenario are as follows: 1. Receive Notification A help desk support person receives notification of a crash of a critical application in their business unit. The help desk support person clicks on the link provided in the to go to the Alert List and selects the real-time alert corresponding to the end user s problem. This step provides a starting point for the problem analysis. If the problem resolution is not readily apparent, the issue is forwarded to application support. 2. Collect Historical Context The application support person navigates to the Troubleshoot tab, expands the Real Time Reports menu, and displays the Alert List report for the device. This report provides the system context at the time of the alert. 3. Identify Recent Changes The support person will also go to the Browse tab and display the Asset Changes report to see what recent changes have been made to the device. An additional view of what may have changed on a group level is provided by New Processes. 4. Collect and Forward Data to Application Developer The issue can be forwarded to an application support specialist if required. The crash report (if available) provides detailed contextual information about the state of the device before and at the time of the crash plus a crash file. The following step can be performed if necessary: 1. Compare Device Performance to Peers Support personnel use the Device Summary report as a starting point to compare the device s performance to that of its peers. They can also display specific device performance and stability reports such as Process Memory Usage or Process Faults.

43 Chapter 5 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Applications Problems 43 Problem Notification and Initial Investigation A help desk support person receives notification of a crash of a critical application in their business unit. The help desk collects basic information as specified in the company s problem report procedures to help identify the specific issue. The support person uses the Alert List to display more information about the alert condition. The Alert List displays information about incoming real-time alerts from devices. When an alert condition is detected on a device, the EdgeSight Agent generates an alert and, if a matching alert rule is configured, sends a real-time alert to the server. In this case, the alert rule had an associated action which sends an to the help desk. 1. The help desk support person clicks the link supplied in the to display the Alert List. Alerts are displayed beginning with the most recent. By default, alert notification are retained for three days, after which they are groomed from the database. 2. Filter the alerts by user or device to narrow the number of alerts displayed. You can also filter by alert type or alert name. 3. Locate the alert corresponding to the reported problem. 4. Click the expand (plus sign) icon to expand the alert and display a description of the problem. The Device Time field can help you pinpoint the time of the fault in relation to other events taking place on the device. 5. If access to the agent database is allowed, click the menu icon and select Real-time from the pop-up menu. For more information on using real-time data, see Using Real-time Data to Discover Problem Context on page Forward the issue to application support for more in-depth analysis, as required. To route the alert, click the checkbox in the first column of the alert table and then click Route. The Route Alerts page is displayed. Note that the selected alerts are listed at the bottom of the page. Complete the wizard and click OK to route the alert. You can also navigate to the Browse tab and use the Alert report to display historical alert information. Filter the report by process to see if other users are having similar problems. Using Real-time Data to Discover Problem Context Real-time data is stored in the EdgeSight Agent database. A support person can drill down to an EdgeSight Agent database and execute real-time queries to display the application and device context at the time the problem occurred.

44 44 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Note Unless your EdgeSight Server administrator has changed the default agent settings, administrative privileges are required on the remote device to be able to display a remote report. 1. An alert is routed from the help desk to application support for further investigation. 2. From the EdgeSight Console, navigate to the Troubleshoot tab, expand the Real Time Reports menu, and display the Alert List report. Filter for the specific device. The Alert List report shows the alert information stored in the EdgeSight Agent database for the device. The default time period is the current day, starting at 7:00 AM. Depending on when the problem occurred, you may need to select a longer time period to display the specific alert. 3. Click on an alert to display contextual information, including CPU and memory usage, I/O statistics, network usage, and task history. Click on a data point in the CPU and memory, I/O, or network charts to display additional detail. Each type of contextual information supplies a different view of the system environment leading up to the alert condition. For example, task history can detail user-initiated tasks which may have contributed to the problem, while system performance metrics can expose CPU or memory usage levels which may indicate a poorly performing system. 4. In addition to the contextual information, examine previous related alerts. In some cases, an alert can be preceded by related alerts indicating a problem with an application. For example, application fault alerts are sometimes preceded by application not responding errors. If the alert condition occurred on a XenApp system running an Advanced level agent, you can navigate to the Monitor tab and use the Farm Monitor to investigate the alert. 1. Navigate to the Monitor tab. The Farm Monitor is displayed by default. 2. Browse or search for the device indicated in the alert routing message. 3. Locate and click on the specific alert being investigated. Contextual data is displayed. Which tabs are displayed and the ordering of the tabs is dependent on the alert type. 4. For process-related alerts, performance charts are displayed in the Process and System tabs for the time of the alert and for the current time. Click on any chart to display an expanded version. You can also investigate system changes (both hardware and software), as described in the next section.

45 Chapter 5 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Applications Problems 45 Displaying Recent Hardware and Software Changes Another area for investigation is changes in the system configuration, both hardware and software. In some alert configurations, events such as hardware changes and the running of new applications generate alerts. If this is the case in your environment, navigate to the Alert List and look for Plug and Play Hardware Change and New Process alerts associated with the device. You can also use the asset change reports to display a history of recent system changes. In the case of an application fault, look for anew version of the faulting application or a change to a system or registry setting which may affect the application. 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Asset Changes report and filter for the device. Expand the report row to display the hardware and software asset changes. 2. Optionally, you can display the Hardware Asset Changes and Software Asset Changes reports separately. 3. An alternate view of what has changed in the environment at the group level is provided by the New Process report. Note: If this is a new EdgeSight Server installation, keep in mind that the New Process Grace Period (a default of 7 days) may not yet have expired. To avoid over reporting new applications and modules, there is a lag time after the EdgeSight Server is installed before applications and modules are reported as new. This allows the server to establish baseline data for applications and modules already installed on monitored devices. Using Crash Reports to Investigate Application Problems When a process fault occurs on a device, the EdgeSight Agent captures contextual information for the machine and the application, if available. To access the crash files, navigate to the Alert List and locate the real-time alert corresponding to the end user s problem. Click the menu icon and select the crash report menu item of the desired format. Note that this information is not available in all cases, depending on the nature of the system crash. Also, the alert may appear in the Current Alert List before data collection has been completed and crash reports have been uploaded to the server.

46 46 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Comparing Overall Device Performance to Peers In some cases, it can be helpful to look at the overall health of the device where the problem occurred. Comparing a device s performance to that of its peers can help determine whether the problem was isolated to a single device or is related to factors affecting similar devices. If you use custom groups for comparison purposes, you can use an existing custom group. Custom groups are useful in performing comparisons between a single device and some set of related or similar devices. If you have administrative privileges (particularly the Manage Public Device Groups permission) on the EdgeSight Server, you can create a new custom group. Navigate to Configure > Company Configuration > Device Management > Groups and create a group for comparison, such as a group of machines with the same operating system, or machines performing similar tasks. See the Groups topic in online help, or the Citric EdgeSight Administrator s Guide for more information on creating groups. 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Device Summary report to display an overall view of recent device performance. Filter by department or custom group and click Go. Charts are displayed showing CPU, memory, network delay, event log alerts and process problems (errors, hangs, and faults) for all selected devices. 2. In the Errors, Hangs, and Faults by Day chart, click on a data point in the line showing the number of process faults. The Process Faults report is displayed, with the number of process faults broken out by device. 3. Use the back button on your browser to return to the filtered Device Summary report. From here you can investigate other aspects of device performance. Handling Non-responsive Applications One of the most common software problems is that an application hangs or stops responding. Not responding situations are often caused by resource contention. This can be due to CPU, memory, IO, or network problems, since all these resources are involved in resource transactions. In some cases, these types of alerts precede a process fault. Request that a user with administrative privileges create a process hung alert for processes with frequent, significant problems. (The process hung alert type corresponds to the process not responding alerts shown in reports.) 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Process Not Responding Alerts report. Group by Device and then by Process.

47 Chapter 5 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Applications Problems Identify which processes on the device have a significant number of not responding alerts. Expand the table row for the device to display processes, ordered by the number of non-responsive processes. Then expand the table row for the process to examine the not responding times. Frequent occurrences of large round numbers can indicate that the application is timing out. 3. Navigate to the Monitor tab and select the Alert List. Locate the process hung alert for the selected application. If access to the agent database is allowed, click the menu icon and select Remote from the pop-up menu. 4. Examine the charts: CPU & Memory, IO Stats, and Network. These charts display data at a five (5) second granularity at the time the alert was triggered, as indicated by the red line in the chart. Look for unusual spikes in the data. For example, you may see the Disk queue length (Disk Q Len) spike at the time of the alert being triggered. This may indicate that the disk could be the cause of the contention. You may see the network throughput is low before the alert and then jumps after the alert. This may indicate that an initiated request was waiting on a backend server to respond. If this is the case, double click a data point in the Network chart to display the real-time network data to see which ports and hosts were being used at the time of the alert. Monitoring Applications Using Active Application Monitoring You can proactively monitor application response metrics for applications delivered by XenApp systems using EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring. EdgeSight Active Application Monitoring is installed and run separately. See the Citrix EdgeSight Installation Guide for installation instructions. See the online help provided with the Active Application Monitoring controller for information on defining tests. Using the Active Application Monitoring Controller, record and create virtual user scripts and define tests. When the tests are run, virtual user ICA sessions are generated on the target XenApp servers. Tests can include monitoring points, one or more instructions with an associated target duration. The results of the tests provide application response and availability information.

48 48 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide You can monitor application response using alerts or reports. The following alerts can be configured to notify you of application response issues: Application Response Failure A monitored transaction has failed. Application availability information is created through Active Application Monitoring tests. Application Response Time The time to execute a monitored transaction has exceeded the specified threshold. Application response and availability information is created through Active Application Monitoring tests. The following historical reports display Active Application Monitoring data: Application Response Failures Use this report to display application response failure and success counts for tests and monitoring points. Application Response Time Use this report to display the test and monitoring point durations. Application Response Time for a Test Use this report to display the duration and status for a test

49 CHAPTER 6 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Network Problems This chapter provides a scenario for using Citrix EdgeSight data to identify, investigate, and resolve network problems. Supporting the network can be difficult when all too frequently we are left with little or no information about the performance of the network, such as metrics on where the most traffic is being generated from, what the average delay is from a branch office to a server at headquarters, or which applications are most responsible for network volume. In addition, this information is rarely in a central location. With EdgeSight, network performance metrics are continually being measured. This makes it easy to retrieve historical network activity and compare that to recent data to help determine the source of network delay or other issues. Additionally, tools such as Trace Route can be initiated on any device from the EdgeSight Server Console. This chapter covers the following topics: Network Problem Scenario Identifying Network Problems Comparing Current and Historical Network Delay For a Single Device Comparing the Network Delay for a User with Other Users Finding Machines with High Network Volume Finding Network Segments with Slow Response Times Network Problem Scenario The network administrators team at a large company just received a call from one of the users in a branch office. They are complaining that the response time when trying to connect to a server at the home office is unusually slow. The network administrators know that there are some bandwidth limitations on that connection, but that network performance should not be as bad as the user describes.

50 50 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide The network administrators want to answer the following questions in order to help isolate the problem: Does the user s network delay differ today compared to a week ago? Are other users in the branch office experiencing delay to that same server? Are other users in other offices experiencing delays to that server? Are any machines at the branch office generating an unusual amount of network volume that could be restricting bandwidth? If so, which application is responsible for the volume? Of all of the segments between client and server, which seems to be especially slow? Identifying Network Problems EdgeSight can provide network performance information from the server console without having to visit the various machines in question. For example: To determine whether the user is indeed experiencing more delay today than during any previous time, display the Site Network Delay report and group by Device and then by Date. Expand the report row for the device and date to see which servers the user was connecting to that were experiencing the greatest delay. To determine if other users from the branch office are experiencing delay to the same server, display the Session Network Delay for a User Group report. The user group that is used to filter these reports should be the user group that represents the branch office. Run the same reports for the user groups in other branches to determine if the delay is isolated to a single branch. To determine if any machines in the branch office are generating an unusual amount of network volume, display the Session Network Volume for a User Group report. To determine which application is responsible for the network volume, run the Process Network Volume report. To determine which segments between client and server are responding slowly, run the Trace Route utility from the EdgeSight console.

51 Chapter 6 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Network Problems 51 Comparing Current and Historical Network Delay For a Single Device One of the first tasks is to place the current performance of a device in context. Finding out when the poor network performance started to occur, or finding a pattern of poor network performance over time, can help isolate likely causes.to determine if the device is experiencing an unusual amount of delay, perform the following steps: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Site Network Delay report. 2. Group by Device and then Host. 3. Expand Optional Parameters and filter by the specific device. 4. Specify a time rage using the Start and End fields. 5. Click Go to generate the report. 6. The resulting report shows average network delay for each day in the specified time range. Compare the average delays to the most recent day to determine if the users complaint seems legitimate. 7. Expand any date to display detailed network delay metrics. This allows you to determine what sites are associated with the longest network delays. Comparing the Network Delay for a User with Other Users Once you have determined that the user is experiencing excessive network delays, it is useful to determine if the problem is shared by others at the same branch office. 1. Return to the Browse tab and select the Session Network Delay for a User Group report. 2. Select the target user group. (If no user group maps to the branch office, you may need to ask an EdgeSight Administrator to create a user group as described in the Citrix EdgeSight Administrator s Guide.) 3. Specify a time rage using the Start and End fields. For ease of comparison, you may want to use the same time period as when displaying the report for the single device. 4. Group by Date and then by User. 5. Click Go to generate the report.

52 52 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide 6. Expand any date to display delay by user. This allows you to determine which users were experiencing significant delay and whether the delay can be attributed to the server, client, or network. 7. You may also want to display this report against other groups of users to determine if the problem is isolated at the branch office, or is occurring in other offices as well. Finding Machines with High Network Volume It can be useful to identify machines with a high network volume that may be contributing to network delay. 1. Return to the Browse tab and select the Session Network Volume for a Group report. Use same user group, data grouping, and time period parameters are used as in the last report. 2. The report indicates which machines are generating the most volume. This can help determine if any machines are directly responsible for any delay on the WAN connection. 3. If you wish to determine which applications are generating the volume on a specific device, display the to Process Network Volume report and filter by device. Finding Network Segments with Slow Response Times Once you have identified devices of interest, you can run the Trace Route utility against a device and a host to see which segments are responding slowly. This utility allows you to initiate a Trace Route from any device monitored by EdgeSight to any destination host without having to visit the command line of the device. Trace Route provides the return times on each segment along the way to the destination. 1. Navigate to the Troubleshoot tab and select Device Trace Route. 2. Enter the target device name in the Device field, or click the device icon and select the device name from the list. This is the device from which the Trace Route will originate. 3. In the Host field, enter the name or IP Address of the server that will be the target for the Trace Route. 4. Place a check in the box next to Lookup Names if you wish to resolve the names of each of the routers/servers along the trace route. Leaving this unchecked will perform the trace more quickly.

53 Chapter 6 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Resolve Network Problems Click Start Trace. The results give you the average return time of each segment. This information can be used to help determine if there is a particular segment along the path between the device and the host that may be causing the delay.

54 54 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide

55 CHAPTER 7 Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation This chapter provides scenarios for using Citrix EdgeSight data to manage software and hardware changes in your environment. This chapter covers the following topics: Using EdgeSight for Capacity Planning Managing Application Rollout Managing Multiple Application Versions Managing Licensing and Compliance Using EdgeSight for Capacity Planning Proper capacity planning ensures a healthy computer network that can grow to meet future needs. Each team or business unit in an organization will have different needs, both current and future. They should have the tools available to evaluate existing performance and utilization and be able to determine if certain machines need to be upgraded or if the entire hardware base can handle the deployment of a new application. Capacity planning can be difficult to gauge accurately, but with EdgeSight performance and availability monitoring, this process is greatly simplified. Capacity Planning Scenario The Sales division of a bank wants to evaluate the current capacity of their Windows desktops for two purposes: 1. In the short term, to be proactive in supporting the user base. A. If any systems show near maximum resource usage of memory, CPU, or disk, then they can proactively upgrade those systems. 2. Longer term, they want to evaluate the ability to handle the deployment and usage of a new CPU and memory-intensive application.

56 56 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Having already evaluated the new application and determined the CPU and memory requirements, the IT support team for the Sales division needs to determine which users, if any, will need more memory or faster CPU s in order to comfortably use the new application. They can do this by adding the resource requirements of the new application to the current average resource usage on each machine. Compare that to the determined minimum baseline and you can easily extrapolate which machines do not have the required capacity. EdgeSight can give the IT support team the current average resource utilization for each machine in the Sales division. This is most often the key missing piece of information. The IT team may have the requirements of the new application and know what the minimum baseline resource usage is, but do not always have the real usage data from desktops. To display the required information on actual resource usage, navigate to the Browse tab and go to the summary report for the resource (CPU, memory, or disk).the summary reports (System CPU Summary, System Memory Summary, and System Disk Usage Summary) are particularly useful in displaying an overall view of resource usage. Filter the results of these reports by choosing the Sales department from the filter drop-down list. Displaying the Current Resource Utilization of Machines To see how a group of machines are currently utilizing resources, perform the following steps: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab. To refine the list of reports, select Performance as the Data Type, Device as the Object type, and Summary as the Report Type. 2. Select the System CPU Summary report, filter by the appropriate department and click Go.The report categorizes devices by CPU speed. Notice that the machines are grouped by processor speeds such as 1 to 2 GHz and 2 to 3 GHz processors. 3. You can see which devices are running at or near capacity by expanding the Processor Speed items in the report. 4. Run the System Memory Summary report using the same department filter. Notice that this report also categorizes the devices by capacity, such as 512 MB to 1 GB and over 1 GB. 5. Once again, expand items in the report to view the devices in a particular category and determine which devices are running at or near capacity. 6. Run the System Disk Usage Summary report using the same filter. This report shows devices categorized by Disk Capacity and will quickly show you which devices are running out of hard disk space.

57 Chapter 7 Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation 57 Managing Application Rollout During deployment of new applications, a project manager needs to progress carefully. It is never advisable to simply deploy the application to all desktops without proper testing. It should be a phased approach that includes testing, pilot deployment, partial production deployment and then full deployment. Throughout each phase, the systems should be monitored for stability and performance, ensuring that the eventual full deployment does not have a negative impact on either user productivity or on the corporate network. Traditionally, monitoring performance and stability during pilot phases has been a manual process of communicating with pilot users who report on any perceived issues. In responding to these issues, the project manager may have someone visit the desk and run monitoring tools on that specific system. This process does not provide optimal data and can leave the picture incomplete. EdgeSight provides the capability of evaluating performance and stability across a group of machines over a given period of time. The following scenario demonstrates how EdgeSight can be used to analyze a specific set of machines that are the pilot for a new application. Performance and stability can be evaluated before, during, and after the deployment of the application, allowing you to make an informed decision about the impact on the environment. Application Rollout Scenario John is the project manager for the deployment of a new Line of Business (LOB) application. In a laboratory situation, he tested the application on corporate Windows Vista machines and has seen that the application behaves well with other corporate applications. It is now time to deploy the application to a group of 50 pilot users who constitute a representative sample of the company s job functions. The goal is to ensure that the application does not adversely affect system performance or stability during the course of a regular work day. John plan is to perform the following tasks: From a central location, monitor the CPU and memory of the pilot machines after deployment of the new application Compare this performance to what it was before the deployment From a central location, monitor the stability of the pilot machines after the deployment of the new application Compare this stability to what it was before the deployment Gather specific error messages or other data related to instability in order to solve the issues.

58 58 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide EdgeSight collects all the data that John is planning to use in his evaluation. The historical performance and stability metrics are already there for his pilot machines and EdgeSight will continue to gather this data throughout the duration of the pilot. John now needs to organize the data and generate the right reports to meet his needs. Start by creating a custom group that contains all of the machines in the pilot. This can be done by either creating a query based group that automatically places any machine with the LOB application installed into the group, or by manually adding the machine names to the group. See the Groups topic in online help or see the Citrix EdgeSight Administrator s Guide for more information on creating custom groups of devices. Note You will require the Manage Public Device Groups permission in order to create a new group or edit an existing group. Using the System Memory Summary report, show average memory usage for the group before the deployment of the application and then again to show average memory usage for the time period after deployment. Using the System CPU Summary report, show average CPU usage for the group before the deployment of the application and then again to show average CPU usage for the time period after deployment. Using the Alerts report, show alerts generated from the group during a time period before deployment and then again for the time period after deployment. Displaying Current and Prior Resource Usage Once the custom group has been created, he next step is to display the average CPU and memory usage for the group before and after the deployment. 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and run the System CPU and the System Memory Usage reports. 2. In the filter box at the top of the page, select the Group radio button and then choose the pilot group from the drop-down menu. 3. Select a date range that starts and ends before deployment of the new application. 4. Group the report data by Date and display the top 50 devices. Click Go to display the report. 5. The results will categorize machines by their capacity: processor speed or physical memory, depending on the report.

59 Chapter 7 Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation 59 Displaying Prior and Current Alerts In order to gauge the stability of the application, you can display alerts generated by the group before and after deployment. 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Alerts report. 2. In the filter box at the top of the page, select the Group radio button and then choose the pilot group from the drop-down menu. 3. Select a date range that starts and ends before deployment of the new application. 4. Group the report data by Date and display the top 50 devices. Click Go to display the report. 5. The results show the alert count for each machine in the group for the given date. Expand the date to display alert counts by device. 6. Expand the device to view actual alert messages and times. Managing Multiple Application Versions Multiple versions of applications can be difficult to track down in a large client environment. Issues can be specific to a particular version of the application and so it becomes necessary to determine the version running on a users machine when trying to troubleshoot problems. EdgeSight allows you to determine application versions without visiting the users machine or displaying their registry. Also, EdgeSight allows you to compare historical performance and stability between different versions running in the environment. Multiple Application Version Scenario A user calls complaining about a particular application. The performance seems slow and it crashes periodically. Knowing that issues existed with prior versions of the application, the support person wants to quickly determine which version is running on the users machine. If it is not the latest, then the easy fix is to upgrade the application. However, if it is the latest, then the support person may want to compare the performance and stability of this machine with other machines running the same version of the application.

60 60 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide EdgeSight contains information about applications that have run in the environment, including version numbers. There are a number of ways to find what version of an application is running on a users machine. The following ar two of the most direct ways to display application versions: Use the Device Process List to display process properties, including the version number. If the process is not currently running, you can use the Process Usage report, filtered by process and device. You may need to adjust the time line to include the application in question. To find other machines running the same version of an application, use the Process Usage report, filtered by process and version rather than by device. Displaying the Process Version Find the version number of a running process: 1. Navigate to the Troubleshoot tab and select the Device Process List. 2. Enter or browse for the name of the target machine. 3. The page displays a list of all processes currently running on the target machine. 4. Find the process you are interested in, click the menu icon, and select Properties. The resulting information includes the version number: Displaying Machines Running the Same Process Version To find other machines that are running the same application version: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Process Usage report. 2. Expand the optional parameters and click on the selection icon to choose a process. 3. In the Process Picker, select the Show Version checkbox. and click Filter. This adds a version column to the result set. Picking a process without this selection will search for all versions of the process. 4. Find and choose the version of the application you are searching for and click OK. Then click Go. The report displays the devices that are running this version of the application. 5. Given this information, you can start to compare performance and stability of these machines with respect to the specific process.

61 Chapter 7 Using Citrix EdgeSight for Planning and Implementation 61 Managing Licensing and Compliance Software vendors conduct process with their clients to license new and incremental PCs above the initial volume license agreement. In large organizations, it can be difficult to control the installed base of applications and the dollar amount owed to the software vendor can be significant. While there are many ways of determining where an application is installed, it is typically not so easy to determine which of those instances of the process is actually being used. Many of them may have been installed initially for a particular user and then that user decides he does not need it after all; or the user moves to another machine and the application does not get removed from the old machine. Using EdgeSight, you can determine which installations of an application are actually being used and which are not. Armed with this information, you can uninstall the application from all desktops where the application is not being used. This process will help keep you in compliance with your volume license agreements. You can also use EdgeSight to monitor the usage of Citrix licenses, as described in Chapter 8, Using Citrix EdgeSight to Track Usage. Licensing and Compliance Scenario Joan is responsible for licensing and compliance at a financial firm that has 6000 users. They have a volume license for 500 installations of a stock trading application called TraderApp. The software vendor for TraderApp is due for its annual audit of the installed base, and Joan knows there have been quite a few extra, unused installations of the application. Using their software deployment tools she currently sees 700 installations in total. The extra 200 will cost her firm a significant amount of money. She wants to evaluate which installations are not being used so she can have them uninstalled. Joan wants to accomplish the following: Generate a report showing all machines where TraderApp has been used during the last quarter. Generate another report showing all machines where the application has been used during the last month. Compare these reports to the installed base to determine which machines have not run TraderApp during the last quarter and which machines have not run it for at least the last month. Use software deployment tools to uninstall the application from some machines and get back into compliance with their volume license agreement.

62 62 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide EdgeSight maintains application usage data. This data can be archived over the course of the year so reports will be easily accessible. To display the required application usage information. Joan will use the Process Usage report to show all usage of a particular version of an application during the course of a quarter or month. Note This report can be generated for any time frame for which data is available. A quarter and a month are used for the sake of this scenario. Keep in mind that the default is to groom process usage data after 90 days. If longer periods are required, data should be archived or warehoused as described in Chapter 9, Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping. Displaying Application Usage View the usage of a particular process for a given time frame: 1. Navigate to the Browse tab and select the Process Usage report. 2. Choose a time frame within which you would like to view usage data. 3. Group the report data by Device then User. 4. Select the process you want by clicking the selection icon and finding the process using the Process Picker. You can also filter by process version. Click OK. 5. Click Go to generate the report according to the selected parameters. 6. The report displays both Active Time and Running Time. Active Time tells you how long the application was in the forefront. Running Time tells you the total time the application was in memory. 7. Expand a report row to show which users have run the application during the selected time period.

63 CHAPTER 8 Using Citrix EdgeSight to Track Usage This chapter provides scenarios for using Citrix EdgeSight data to track the usage of Citrix licenses and published applications in your environment as well as monitor session durations. This chapter covers the following topics: Monitoring License Usage Monitoring Published Application Usage Monitoring Session Duration Monitoring License Usage EdgeSight can monitor Citrix License Servers and display license usage information for all license types. An EdgeSight user with the role of EdgeSight Administrator or License Server Monitor Administrator must specify one or more Citrix License Servers to monitor before data is displayed. If you do not see a specific license server listed in the reports, this could be due to the following: monitoring has not been enabled for the license server or no configuration was added for the license server. Contact your EdgeSight Administrator to either enable or add the license server configuration. Monitoring license usage can help you make decisions about when to purchase additional licenses, based on usage or license expiration dates. For example, you are asked to help forecast the potential need for new XenApp licenses. You may want to start by looking at a snapshot of current license usage and then identify license usage trends using the following reports: License Usage Summary Displays the most recent license usage information. License Usage Trending Displays historical license usage information. For additional information on using these reports, see the License Usage Summary and License Usage Trending topics in online help.

64 64 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide 1. In the EdgeSight Server Console, select the Track Usage tab. Links to the Citrix Licensing reports are displayed. 2. Click the License Usage Summary link to display the report. 3. When the report is initially displayed, it is organized by product groups and all product groups are selected for display. In this case, you only want to display XenApp license usage. Select the Individual products radio button. Click the Select All checkbox to remove all product group selections, then scroll down and select the Citrix XenApp product checkboxes. 4. By default, license usage information is displayed for all license servers for which monitoring is enabled. You can position the mouse over each license server to display when the license server was last polled for usage information. 5. Click Go to display the report data. The data is displayed as a bar chart, with a separate bar for each XenApp license type. Click on any bars to display the license version detail. 6. Select the View in Grid icon at the top of the report to display the data in a table showing in use, available, and total license counts. (If selected products have a license type of user/device (_UD), data is displayed for user and device licenses in use. You can print this report or save it to a CSV file using the icons at the top of the report. Now that you have a current snapshot of license usage, you can use the License Trending Summary to display historical usage information. This allows you to identify peak license usage during the previous year. 1. In the Metering and Measuring navigation tree to the left of the report, select License Trending Summary. 2. Select the Citrix XenApp product checkboxes as you did when displaying the License Usage Summary report. 3. Note that the report may contain license usage data from license servers for which monitoring has since been disabled. You may want to deselect these license servers to keep that data from being displayed. 4. Click Go to display historical license usage information. The report shows the number of total and in use license over time. Click on a point in the chart to display license version detail. 5. Select the applicable timeframe from the Zoom buttons at the top of the report. You can also use the previous and next buttons to move to display a different time period. 6. To isolate a trend line for a single XenApp product, click the magnifying glass icon next to the product name at the right of the report.

65 Chapter 8 Using EdgeSight to Track Usage 65 Use the data in the License Trending Summary report to identify increased license usage which, along with changes in your environment such as the addition of XenApp users, may indicate the need for more licenses. Depending on usage patterns, you may also reduce the number of licenses for older products or products with declining usage. You can also export user/device licensing information for a single license server as a CSV file. The resulting file provides a snapshot of the user/devices licenses currently checked out 1. In the Metering and Measuring navigation tree to the left of the report, select Export User/Device License List. The User/Device License Export page is displayed. 2. Select the license server from the License Server drop-down menu. Only license servers configured for user/device licensing are displayed. 3. Click Export. A Save As dialog is displayed. 4. Select a location in which to store the exported CSV file and click OK. The file is formatted as follows: <license server>,<feature code>,<version>,user,<user name> <license server>,<feature code>,<version>,device,<device name> Note that if the file is very large, you may need to use a 64-bit application when opening the file. Monitoring Published Application Usage When managing published applications, you may need to answer the following questions about application usage: What are the most frequently used published applications? Who is using specific published applications and for how long? Who are the most active users and what published applications are they using? EdgeSight provides reports on the Track Usage tab which provide the information to answer these questions. These reports, plus additional detail reports, are also available from the Browse tab.

66 66 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Note Data for streamed published applications is not included in these reports. For general published application usage monitoring, you can use the following summary reports: Summary for a Farm Displays bar charts showing the published applications with the most launches and the most unique users, and trends for launches and users over time. The data is in relation to a department or group of machines. Summary for a User Group Displays bar charts showing the published applications with the most launches and the most unique users, and trends for launches and users over time. The data is in relation to a group of users. You can click on any subreport in these summary reports to drill down into detailed data. For example, you display the Summary for a Farm report filtered for a specific farm and notice a sudden increase in the number of published application launches. You want to know if the increase is due to a specific application or to increased usage of all applications. 1. Position the cursor over any data point in the Published Applications Launches subreport. The Published Application Launch Count - Details report is displayed. 2. Use the default settings for the Group By and Then Group By drop down menus that group by date and then published application. 3. Locate the date of the increase and expand the day before the increase and the day on which the increase occurred. 4. When you examine the list of applications, you notice that the increase is mostly due to a specific published application. 5. Expand the entry for the published application to display a list of launches by user with information on launch times, session start and end times, and client address, name, and version. The launch and users summary reports display a list of launches or users, broken down by date. You can filter these reports to display data for a specific device or application. Monitoring Session Duration By monitoring the duration and frequency of sessions across a farm or a user group, you can determine how XenApp and XenDesktop resources are being used in your environment. The Session Duration for a Farm and the Session Duration for a User Group allow you to display which users or devices have the highest total session duration for a period of time. For example, you want to determine which user has the highest session duration on a specific farm and what:

67 Chapter 8 Using EdgeSight to Track Usage Display the Session Duration for a Farm report. 2. Filter the report for a specific farm by selecting the Department radio button and choosing the farm from the drop-down menu. Click Go to filter the report. 3. Expand the user to show the associated device, and then expand the device to show details about each session, including the initial published application, session start and end times, client address and name, and the duration for the session.

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69 CHAPTER 9 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping Archiving Data This chapter provides guidelines for transferring Citrix EdgeSight data to long term storage for using in analysis and record keeping. Archiving and warehousing data provides continued access to large amounts of data while ensuring optimum performance from your EdgeSight Server. This section describes how to archive Citrix EdgeSight data for use in long-term reporting and record keeping. Citrix EdgeSight collects a wide range of performance, availability, and usage data about end-user systems, applications, and the network. Citrix EdgeSight Agents collect data from XenApp, XenDesktop, and end-user systems and upload it to a Citrix EdgeSight Server. On the server, it is stored in a database which serves as the data source for a report server. Because of the large amounts of data collected, data is groomed from the database after a configurable number of days, depending on the type of data. Data required for long-term use, such as trend analysis, compliance documentation, and capacity planning, should be archived in preference to relaxing the grooming configuration. Data archiving ensures that required data is available for long-term reporting without compromising the performance of EdgeSight Server in day-to-day operations. Archived data can serve a number of purposes. For example, Citrix EdgeSight tracks application usage for use in calculating how long an application is active, collecting active tasks and applications for crash reports, and usage counts for license tracking. Archived application usage data can be used as follows: document compliance with license agreements plan application license purchases provide data for use in software audits and compliance programs Note Depending on your reporting needs and the data retention policies of your enterprise, you may want to consider data warehousing. See Warehousing

70 70 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide EdgeSight Data on page 71 for more information on defining a data warehousing strategy. Defining Archive Requirements There are a number of considerations to be taken into account when planning your data archive: What data needs to be archived? Determine what reporting and analysis is to be performed on the data. Once requirements are defined, relevant data can be specified. How frequently does data need to be archived? Determine how often application usage data is groomed from the production database. Report archiving schedules must take into account the grooming schedule to avoid introducing gaps in data. How much data storage is required? Determine how much the selected data contributes to the daily growth of the archive. Selecting Data for Archiving Data should be selected for archiving based on a specific and repeatable business need. For example, memory and CPU usage data is critical for analyzing trends used in capacity planning. Application usage data is required for some license compliance records. Some data, such as that stored for incoming real-time alerts, has little relevance past the immediate problem response time. Historical alert data, those alerts collected by the agent and uploaded daily, is stored in a separate table and is more relevant for the analysis of problem trends. Once the required data is identified, use the SQL views to select the individual data items to be warehoused. (For a complete description of the views, see the SQL Views topics in the EdgeSight Server Online Help.) Use the inserted_date field in a SQL view to select records inserted after a specific date and time. SQL views provide both stability and ease of use, as compared to selecting data based on the database schema. While the underlying database schema may change, Citrix Systems will make every effort to only extend the views by the addition of columns. When selecting data based on views, it is best practice to select the specific columns you want to archive. When writing SQL scripts for archiving EdgeSight data, do not use a statement with SELECT *. As the views are extended, this could cause the script to fail. By selecting specific columns, you avoid problems if columns are added to views at a later date.

71 Chapter 9 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping 71 Determine Archiving Frequency The frequency with which you choose to archive data will be determined by the data selected and the grooming schedules for data of that type. To prevent data loss, the archiving frequency should be less than the shortest grooming parameter. Note that the grooming parameters are configurable and may be different in your environment. To display the current grooming schedules for EdgeSight data along with the views associated with each data type, navigate to Server Configuration > Data Maintenance > Grooming. Once you have defined the set of data that need to be archived, you can determine how much data storage is required. The size of the production database can vary greatly depending on the number of managed devices, the number of applications running, and the number of network transactions performed. The first step to determining the storage required for the archive is the average amount of data collected over a specific time period. This allows you to estimate the amount of data collected for longer periods. Another factor to consider is how long data is to be maintained in the archive. To manage the size of the archive, define a grooming strategy or transfer data (or a subset of the data) to a long-term archive at scheduled intervals. Warehousing EdgeSight Data This section includes information about designing a strategy for warehousing historical data collected by EdgeSight. Once warehoused, data can be used for reporting on and analyzing long-term trends and performing capacity planning. This information is meant to be used in conjunction with the documentation for your data warehouse system. Citrix EdgeSight collects a wide range of performance, availability, and usage data about end-user systems, applications, and the network. Citrix EdgeSight Agents collect data from end-user systems and upload it to a Citrix EdgeSight Server. On the server, it is stored in a database which serves as the data source for a report server. Because of the large amounts of data collected, data is groomed from the database after a configurable number of days, depending on the type of data. Database grooming is critical for maintaining optimum server performance. Although database size is subject to multiple factors (the number of agents, the number of processes, the amount of network traffic, and the data collection hours), the grooming schedule allows administrators to effectively control database size. Data required for long-term use, such as trend analysis, compliance documentation, and capacity planning, should be warehoused in preference to relaxing the grooming configuration. Data warehousing ensures that required data is available for long-term reporting without compromising the performance of Citrix EdgeSight in day-to-day operations.

72 72 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Data Warehousing Components The warehousing architecture for Citrix EdgeSight data includes the following components: Citrix EdgeSight production database Provides storage for current performance and availability data and for alerts. Data is subject to regular grooming. The database resides on the production Citrix EdgeSight Server. Data transfer mechanism Tools used to transfer data from the production database to the data warehouse. These tools may include, but are not limited to, SQL Server Data Transformation Services (DTS) for SQL Server 2000, SQL Server Integration Services (SIS) for SQL Server 2005, or custom SQL scripts. Note that SIS is a component of SQL Server 2005 that provides all basic ETL (extract, transform, and load) capabilities as well as advanced integration and data transformation functions. SIS is also well integrated with Reporting Services. The optimum tool will depend on your environment and the type of data warehouse. Data warehouse Provides storage for historical data used in long-term reporting and analysis. The production server should be on a dedicated server with the warehouse database on a separate server. The report server used to create reports from the data warehouse can either be on the same server with the warehouse database, or on a separate server. The following figure shows the components involved in the data warehousing solution.

73 Chapter 9 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping 73 Citrix EdgeSight Data Warehousing Strategy There are a number of considerations to be taken into account when planning your data warehouse: What data needs to be warehoused? Determine what reporting and analysis is to be performed on Citrix EdgeSight data. How frequently does data need to be warehoused? Determine what data is selected for warehousing and how often that type of data is groomed from the production database. How much data storage is required? Determine what data is selected for warehousing and how much this data contributes to the daily growth of the production database. What operations will be performed on the data? Determine how the data will be used. If data analysis is to be performed, storage in a database is required. If data is stored for record keeping purposes only, it may be sufficient to archive reports to a file share as CSV files. Reports can be loaded into a database as required.

74 74 Citrix EdgeSight User s Guide Select Data for Warehousing Data should be selected for warehousing based on a specific and repeatable business need. For example, memory and CPU usage data is critical for analyzing trends used in capacity planning. Application usage data is required for some license compliance records. Some data, such as that stored for incoming real-time alerts, has little relevance past the immediate problem response time. Historical alert data, those alerts collected by the agent and uploaded daily, is stored in a separate table and is more relevant for the analysis of problem trends. Once the required data is identified, use the accessible SQL views provided by Citrix EdgeSight to select the individual data items to be warehoused. (For a complete description of the views, see the Accessible EdgeSight SQL Views and Accessible Citrix SQL Views topics in the Citrix EdgeSight Server Online Help.) The views provide both stability and ease of use, as compared to selecting data based on the database schema. While the underlying database schema may change, every effort will be made to only extend the views by the addition of columns. The views intended for use in data warehousing: are the same as those intended for archiving, as listed in Selecting Data for Archiving on page 70. When selecting data based on views, it is best practice to select the specific columns you want to warehouse. When writing SQL scripts for warehousing Citrix EdgeSight data, do not use a statement with SELECT *. As the views are extended, this could cause the script to fail. By selecting specific columns, you avoid problems if columns are added to views at a later date. Determine Warehousing Frequency The frequency with which you choose to transfer data to the warehouse will be determined by the data selected and the grooming schedules for data of that type. To prevent data loss, the warehousing frequency should be less than the shortest grooming parameter. Note that the grooming parameters are configurable and may be different in your environment. See Determine Archiving Frequency for the default grooming schedules for Citrix EdgeSight data along with the views associated with each data type.

75 Chapter 9 Using Citrix EdgeSight Data for Analysis and Record Keeping 75 Determine Data Storage and Disk Configuration Needs Once you have defined the set of data that need to be warehoused, you can determine how much data storage is required. The size of the production database can vary greatly depending on the number of managed devices, the number of applications running, and the number of network transactions performed. The first step to determining the storage required for the data warehouse is the average amount of data collected over a specific time period. This allows you to estimate the amount of data collected for longer periods. Another factor to consider is how long data is to be maintained in the warehouse. To manage the size of the data warehouse, define a grooming strategy or transfer the database (or a subset of the data) to a long-term warehouse at scheduled intervals.

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77 INDEX Index A ActiveX Control 17 administrative privileges 17, 44 Alert List 43 alerts displaying 32 application using EdgeSight to manage rollout 57 applications using EdgeSight to manage versions 59 archiving data 69 asset changes displaying 33 B browsing for reports 15 C capacity planning using EdgeSight to manage 55 client session startup time 38 compliance using EdgeSight to manage 61 CPU displaying usage 33 crash reports 45 D disk displaying usage 33 E end-user experience monitoring (EUEM) 36 EUEM See end-user experience monitoring H hardware asset changes 45 historical reports 15 I ICA round trip time 37 L licensing using EdgeSight to manage application licenses 61 M memory displaying usage 33 memory usage displaying 58 N network delay comparing current and historical 51 comparing devices 51 network problems resolving 49 network round trip time 37 network volume identifying 52 P performance evaluating systems 30 process fault data 26 process snapshot 26

78 Index 78 R real time reports customizing 25 displaying 24 saving 24 real-time reports 21 remote reports customizing 25 displaying 24 saving 24 reports browsing for 15 historical 15 real-time 16 searching for 15 resource usage displaying 56 resources displaying usage 33 round trip time (RTT) 37 RTT See round trip time S searching for reports 15 server session startup time 38 session performance 35 software asset changes 45 SQL views 70 T Trace Route 52 V views, SQL 70 W warehousing data 71 X XenApp Session Wizard 37