Is Presentation Server 4.5 a dead end?

Written on Feb 17 2008 6,182 views, 2 comments

by Brian Madden

Now that Citrix has announced the new "XenApp" name, a lot of people are wondering why this book is still called "Presentation Server 4.5," and indeed whether PS 4.5 has a future?

The short answer is that as long as there is Windows Server 2003, there will be Presentation Server 4.5. The future versions of Presentation Server, beginning with Project "Delaware," will be Windows Server 2008 only. These are the versions that are being renamed to "XenApp."

If you want to use Presentation Server on Windows Server 2003, then PS 4.5 is your product. In fact, Citrix even plans to continue to develop new features for PS 4.5, with plans for Feature Pack 2 and Feature Pack 3 in the 2008 / 2009 timeframes .

So yes, eventually you will move to XenApp. But that will only happen as you move off of Windows Server 2003. In other words:

As time moves on, this will become very confusing, because Citrix is planning to use the "XenApp" branding in all marketing and sales efforts. But the product that this book is about, Citrix Presentation Server 4.5, will continue to be called "Citrix Presentation Server 4.5" even as it's updated with Feature Packs throughout 2008 and 2009.

If you're interested in learning about XenApp and ultimately migrating to XenApp in your environment, then you're in luck! XenApp and Presentation Server 4.5 are basically the same product, just each built for a different underlying platform.

Comments

Craig Miller wrote Now everything makes sense, and now everything confusing.

on 03-03-2008 6:21 AM

Brian you did a great job here explaining the versions and history to the point where everything seems to make sense and serve a purpose.  What this alos does is project even louder at just how badly Citrix in confusing everyone with the name change.  I'm fine with doing the name change thing, but if you going to do a search and replace on your website and documentation replacing PS fro XenApp, when in fact XenApp is not available yet, nor is tit the same thing; well then your just confusing everything (I'm not point the finger at you Brian, just Citrix's marketing department, hope fully the read these posts and undo what the did with the replacements).

Guest wrote PS vs XenApp

on 06-18-2008 8:46 AM

If XenApp isn't really XenApp until W2k8 then what are people talking about when they refer to XenApp 4.5?

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