Lab 8 User name: Administrator Password: Password1 Contents Exercise 8-1: Assigning a Custom Load Evaluator... 1 Scenario... 1 Configuring a Custom Load Evaluator... 1 Assigning a Load Evaluator to a Server... 2 Exercise 8-2: Creating a Failover Situation... 3 Scenario... 3 Implementing Failover Settings... 3 Testing a No Service Situation without Failover... 4 Exercise 8-3: Handling Failover with a Load Balancing Policy... 4 Scenario... 4 Adding Failover to the Load Balancing Policy... 5 Testing a No Service Situation with Failover... 5 Restoring to the Default Load Evaluator... 5 Exercise 8-1: Assigning a Custom Load Evaluator Scenario The Citrix Engineer is working on creating a load balancing and failover policy for the San Francisco and New York datacenters. He needs you to create a custom load evaluator to test the behavior of a failover policy when a server or site shows a full load. Estimated time to complete this exercise: 10 minutes Configuring a Custom Load Evaluator Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the XenApp\administrator user for this Use the following procedure to configure a custom load evaluator: 1. Log on to the XenApp1 virtual machine as the XenApp\administrator user. 2. Use Citrix AppCenter on the XenApp1 virtual machine to view the default load evaluators. a. Click I will enter the URL later in the Citrix Receiver pop-up window on the XenApp1 virtual machine.
b. Click Start > All Programs > Administrative Tools > Citrix > Management Consoles > Citrix AppCenter. c. Navigate to Citrix Resources > XenApp > MyCTXFarm > Load Evaluators. d. View the existing load evaluators. 3. Create a new Load Evaluator called "[Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server" that uses the application user load indicator to report a full load when the number of users running the Notepad application equals 1. a. Right-click Load Evaluators and select New > Add load evaluator. b. Type [Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server in the Name field. c. Select Application User Load and type 1 in the Report full load when the number of users for this application equals field. d. Click Browse, select Notepad and click OK in the Select an Application window. e. Click OK in the Add Load Evaluator window. Assigning a Load Evaluator to a Server Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the XenApp\administrator user for this Use the following procedure to assign a custom load evaluator to a server: 1. Use the Group Policy Management console on the XenApp1 virtual machine to edit the XenApp Domain Policy and access the Citrix Computer Policies node. a. Click Start > Administrative Tools > Group Policy Management. b. Navigate to Forest: Xenapp.com > Domains >XenApp.com. c. Right-click XenApp Domain Policy and select Edit. d. Navigate to Computer Configuration >Policies > Citrix Policies. 2. Create a new Citrix computer policy called "[Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server on San Francisco Servers" and add the Load Evaluator Name policy to assign the [Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server load evaluator to San Francisco worker group servers. a. Click New, type [Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server on San Francisco Servers as the policy name and click Next. b. Click Server Settings and select Load Evaluator Name. Click Add. 3. Retrieve the List of Load Evaluators from the XENAPP1 server and use the "[Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server" load evaluator. a. Click Retrieve List and type XENAPP1 in the Computer name field. Click OK. b. Select the [Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server load evaluator from the Load evaluator drop-down menu. Click OK. 4. Create a filter that applies this policy to the San Francisco worker group. a. Click Next to continue to the filters screen. b. Select Worker Group and click Add. c. Click Add in the New Filter window.
d. Verify that Allow is selected in the Mode drop-down menu and click Browse. e. Double-click Worker Groups, click By Location, and double-click the San Francisco worker group. f. Click OK. 5. Finish creating the policy and verify that it will be enabled when created. a. Click OK to close the New Filter screen. b. Click Next to finish adding filters. c. Verify that Enable this policy is selected and then click Create. 6. Force a Group Policy update on this server from a command prompt. a. Click Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt. b. Type gpupdate /force and press Enter. XenApp1 begins updating the group policy for the server. c. Close the command prompt when the update is completed. Exercise 8-2: Creating a Failover Situation Scenario You recently created a custom load evaluator that limits how many users can run a specific application on server in a worker group. You need to create a load balancing policy to force failover when the threshold identified in the load evaluator is reached. You need to create a policy that applies the custom load evaluator to the servers in the San Francisco worker group and test the policy to see if failover works. Estimated time to complete this exercise: 15 minutes Implementing Failover Settings Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the XenApp\administrator user for this Use the following procedure to create a load balancing policy: 1. Use Citrix AppCenter to create a new load balancing policy called San Francisco Failover to New York. a. Right-click the Load Balancing Policies node in Citrix AppCenter and select Create load balancing policy. b. Type San Francisco Failover to New York in the Load balancing policy name field. 2. Create a filter for the San Francisco Employees group. a. Navigate to Filters > Users and then select Filter based on user. b. Click Add and click OK in the warning dialog box. c. Type XenApp\San Francisco in the Enter object names to select field, click Check Names, and then click OK if the name is validated successfully. If the names were not validated successfully, make sure that they are spelled correctly and are in the Xenapp\AccountName format. 3. Configure the application connection preference by adding the San Francisco worker group. a. Click the Worker Group Preference node.
b. Select Configure application connection preference based on worker group and click Add. c. Double-click By Location, double click San Francisco and click OK in the Select Servers window. d. Click OK to finish and save the new load balancing property. Testing a No Service Situation without Failover Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the XenApp\Administrator user for this Use the following procedure to test a service failure situation without a failover specified: 1. On the XenApp1 virtual machine, configure Citrix Receiver to use http://dc.xenapp.com as the server address. a. In the Windows notification area of the XenApp1 virtual machine, rightclick the Citrix Receiver icon and click Preferences. b. Right-click Online Plug-in and click Change Server. c. Typehttp:// dc.xenapp.com in the Server address field and click Update. ClickOK. The Citrix Receiver logon window appears. 2. Log on to Citrix Receiver as the xenapp\citrixuser and launch Notepad. a. Log on to Citrix Receiver using the xenapp\citrixuser credentials and click OK. b. Click Start > All Programs > Notepad. After a few moments, Notepad will appear. 3. Switch to the XenApp2 virtual machine and log on as the xenapp\administrator user. 4. Log on to the Web Interface using the xenapp\administrator account and launch the Notepad application. a. Click Cancel in the Citrix Receiver pop-up window. b. Click Start > Internet Explorer and navigate to the Web Interface site athttp://dc.xenapp.com. c. Log on to the Web Interface as the xenapp\administrator user. d. Launch the Notepad application. CAUTION: An error appears. The load evaluator that was created and applied to XenApp1 is reporting a full load and is no longer accepting connections. 5. Log off of the Web Interface and close Internet Explorer. Exercise 8-3: Handling Failover with a Load Balancing Policy Scenario You recently created a load balancing policy and applied it to the San Francisco worker group. Through testing, you discovered that the policy is working. Now you want to update the policy to have users failover to servers in another worker group when the threshold in the custom load evaluator is met. After you verify that the policy is working correctly, the Citrix Engineer wants you to assign the Default load evaluator to each server so that more than one instance of the Notepad can run on the servers. Estimated time to complete this exercise: 15 minutes
Adding Failover to the Load Balancing Policy Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the xenapp\administrator user for this Use the following procedure to add failover to the load balancing policy: 1. Switch to the XenApp1 virtual machine. 2. Close Citrix Receiver on the XenApp1 virtual machine. a. Right-click the Citrix Receiver icon in the notification area and click Exit. b. Click Close All. 3. Use Citrix AppCenter to edit the San Francisco Failover to New York load balancing policy. a. Click the Load Balancing Policies node in Citrix AppCenter. b. Right-click San Francisco Failover to New York, and select Modify properties. 4. Add the New York worker group to the Load Balancing Failover Group. a. Navigate to Load Balancing Policies > Worker Group Preference and click Add. b. Double-click By Location, double-click New York and click OK. c. Confirm that the New York worker group priority is set to 2 and then click OK. Testing a No Service Situation with Failover Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the Xenapp\administrator user for this Use the following procedure to test a failover policy: 1. Launch Citrix Receiver and then launch the hosted Notepad application. a. Click Start > All Programs > Citrix > Receiver. b. Log on using the XenApp\Citrixuser credentials. c. Click Start > All Programs > Notepad to launch the hosted Notepad application. Wait for the application to launch before continuing. 2. Switch to the XenApp2 virtual machine. 3. Use Internet Explorer to log on to the Web Interface and launch the Notepad application. a. Launch Internet Explorer and navigate tohttp://dc.xenapp.com. b. Log on to the Web Interface as the xenapp\administrator user. c. Click Notepad from the Web interface to launch the application. The application should launch normally indicating that the failover is in effect. 4. Close Notepad, log off of the Web Interface and close Internet Explorer on the XenApp2 virtual machine. 5. Close Notepad, and exit Citrix Receiver on the XenApp1 virtual machine. Restoring to the Default Load Evaluator Use the XenApp1 virtual machine, logged on as the xenapp\administrator user for this Use the following procedure to restore the load evaulator back to the default:
1. Use the Group Policy Management Editor on the XenApp1 virtual machine to edit the "[Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server on San Francisco Servers" computer policy. a. Open the Group Policy Management Editor on the XenApp1 virtual machine. b. Click [Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server on San Francisco Servers and click Edit. 2. Disable "[Test] Max 1 Instance Per Server on San Francisco Servers" and close the Group Policy Management Editor window. a. Deselect Enable this policy and click OK. b. Close the Group Policy Management Editor and Group Policy Management windows. 3. Force a Group Policy update on this server from a command prompt. a. Click Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt. b. Type gpupdate /force and press Enter. XenApp1 begins updating the group policy for the server. c. Close the command prompt when the update is completed.