<?xml version='1.0' encoding='iso-8859-1'?><rss version='2.0'><channel xmlns:xsd='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema' xmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance'><title>BrianMadden.com - Feed Items Rss</title><link>http://www.brianmadden.com//</link><description>Feed Items RSS</description><copyright>All rights reserved</copyright><language>en-US</language><managingEditor>brian@brianmadden.com</managingEditor><image><title>Your Independent Application Delivery Resource</title><url>http://www.brianmadden.com/logos/brianmaddenmedshadow.gif</url><link>http://www.brianmadden.com</link></image><item><category>The Official Citrix Blog</category><title>Citrix Blog Wordle</title><link>http://feeds.citrix.com/~r/officialcitrixblog/blog/~3/412814843/Citrix+Blog+Wordle</link><description><![CDATA[
         A few weeks ago I came across an interesting new web site called Wordle. A Wordle is "a toy for generating "word clouds" from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text." Wordles give the both the author and reader a different perspective on a document or blog site. 

After looking at the wide variety of Wordles available in the Wordle Gallery, I was curious to see how a Wordle of the first page of the Citrix blog would look (Wordle pulls the rss feed which only includes the first page). See the results below -









There is no surprise works like "Citrix", "XenApp", "Presentation", "Applications" and "virtualization" figure prominently on this Wordle. I see many other words that are often used when talking about our products such as "savings", costs", "management" and "scalability". 


One big thing that stands out to me that is missing are the names of applications. I only see one actual application name listed - "AutoCAD". That comes from a recent post by Derek Thorslund.  It seems like we should spend more time on the Citrix blog writing about how to use our products to deliver specific applications, instead of applications in general.


But that is just my opinion. What do you think of this Wordle? What strikes you about this Wordle of the Citrix blog? Which words should figure more prominently, and which should be less prominent? Which words are missing?

Please post your thoughts in the comments.
    
        
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           ]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 06 Oct 2008 19:55:55 GMT</pubDate><guid>3422</guid></item><item><category>The Official Citrix Blog</category><title>Geek Speak at Summit</title><link>http://feeds.citrix.com/~r/officialcitrixblog/blog/~3/413278370/Geek+Speak+at+Summit</link><description><![CDATA[
         Those of you who attended Synergy this year may have taken part in our first ever Geek Speak Live, where we ran an "unconference" in parallel with the main event. Folks like Shawn Bass, Doug Brown and Rick Dehlinger got up and spoke about the technical topics on their minds and yours. We also had some open mike sessions as well as Q&amp;A.

Well, the good news is that we will be repeating Geek Speak at our upcoming Citrix Summit that is being held in Orlando on October 26 - 29. A number of the Synergy Geek Speakers have kindly agreed to speak again, and we have agreed on the following topics:

	VDI vs TS: Rick Dehlinger
	Pros and Cons of Virtualizing XenApp : Doug Brown
	The reality of implementing "Green IT": Charles Aunger
	Best Practice implementations for Tele-commuters, Home Workers and other "Virtual Workers" - Steve Greenberg



In the true spirit of Geek Speak, I and the speakers would like to hear from you on what you think of these topics, and are there other topics you would want to hear in an unfiltered way? Even if we cannot fit them into the Summit schedule, or you can't attend Summit because you aren't a Citrix Partner, they could be added to some upcoming live and virtual Geek Speaks that I am planning. But I'll keep you in suspense by leaving more on those in an upcoming blog  .

So please let me know what you think of the topics we could discuss by posting a reply to this blog. 
    
        
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           ]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 06 Oct 2008 19:55:17 GMT</pubDate><guid>3424</guid></item><item><category>The SoftGrid Team Blog</category><title>New App-V downloads available</title><link>http://blogs.technet.com/softgrid/archive/2008/10/06/new-app-v-downloads-available.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[I'm not sure if you saw these already or not but in case you didn't you'll definitely want to check these out. The first is the Microsoft Application Virtualization 4.5 Security Configuration Wizard roles that contain hardening definitions for: Microsoft...(read more)]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:53:28 GMT</pubDate><guid>3419</guid></item><item><category>The Official Citrix Blog</category><title>Reduce Rollout Risks for XenApp</title><link>http://feeds.citrix.com/~r/officialcitrixblog/blog/~3/409569540/Reduce+Rollout+Risks+for+XenApp</link><description><![CDATA[
         In my eight and a half years at Citrix, one constant I have seen in successful large rollouts is extensive detailed testing both during a pilot and prior to final rollout. In my opinion, it is essential to test the applications running with actual work flow processes (including file transfers and printing) over the same networks as production (or a simulated network with the same characteristics). 

Ideally, after a detailed pilot program is completed and a final architecture design is built, the entire load should be simulated prior to moving into production. This approach reduces the risks of a rollout by identifying the strengths and weaknesses of the design prior to putting real users on the system. In the past, many companies avoided this step because load simulation tools were often very expensive. In many cases the available tools were extremely difficult to script to work with applications running on Citrix XenApp.

EdgeSight for Load testing is designed to overcome these issues to allow you to reduce the risks of your production rollouts of XenApp. EdgeSight for Load Testing is built  specifically for Citrix XenApp and simplifies the process to build workflow scripts with a wide variety of applications.

The presentation below gives you a brief overview of EdgeSight for Load Testing.






(click here to see the presentation in full screen)



You can find the EdgeSight for Load Testing Installation Guide here and the User Guide here. You can get troubleshooting help for EdgeSight for Load Testing at this link.
    
        
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           ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2008 19:30:27 GMT</pubDate><guid>3408</guid></item><item><category>Terminal Services Team Blog</category><title>Virtualization Road Show across the US</title><link>http://blogs.msdn.com/ts/archive/2008/10/02/virtualization-road-show-across-the-us.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[  TS Blog readers may be interested in a Virtualization Road Show that Microsoft is putting on. It?s free, but you must register.  The agenda includes discussion of server virtualization and management, Microsoft?s use of virtualization in data centers, and desktop virtualization. There will also be hands-on labs.                       Date                                                                  City                                                                            October 10, 2008                                                                  Anaheim , CA                                                       October 13, 2008                                                                  Santa Clara , CA                                                       October 15, 2008                                                                  San Francisco , CA                                                       October 21, 2008                                                                  Minneapolis , MN                                                       October 24, 2008                                                                  Dallas , TX                                                       October 27, 2008                                                                  Chicago , IL                                                       October 31, 2008                                                                  Boston , MA                                                       November 3, 2008                                                                  New York , NY                                                       November 10, 2008                                                                  Washington , DC                                                       November 13, 2008                                                                  Philadelphia , PA                                                       November 17, 2008                                                                  Atlanta , GA                                    ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2008 18:51:55 GMT</pubDate><guid>3407</guid></item><item><category>The SoftGrid Team Blog</category><title>Application Virtualization 4.5 for Terminal Services available November 1</title><link>http://blogs.technet.com/softgrid/archive/2008/10/02/application-virtualization-4-5-for-terminal-services-available-november-1.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[For those of you anxiously waiting to get your hands on Microsoft&#174; Application Virtualization (App-V) 4.5 for Terminal Services you'll be happy to know that it will be available to customers as of November 1, 2008 through licensing.microsoft.com...(read more)]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2008 16:52:06 GMT</pubDate><guid>3406</guid></item><item><category>The SoftGrid Team Blog</category><title>New version of Process Monitor available</title><link>http://blogs.technet.com/softgrid/archive/2008/10/02/new-version-of-process-monitor-available.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[If you've done much troubleshooting of SoftGrid/App-V virtual applications then Process Monitor is probably one of your most highly valued tools.&#160; It'll quickly and easily tell you what's being accessed, who's doing the accessing, and is a quick...(read more)]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2008 13:21:57 GMT</pubDate><guid>3405</guid></item><item><category>The SoftGrid Team Blog</category><title>App-V 4.5 Release Notes</title><link>http://blogs.technet.com/softgrid/archive/2008/10/01/app-v-4-5-release-notes.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[Just a quick FYI that the App-V 4.5 Release Notes are now available online at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc817171.aspx .&#160; We recommend that you read these Release Notes thoroughly before you install the Application Virtualization...(read more)]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 01 Oct 2008 11:22:07 GMT</pubDate><guid>3398</guid></item><item><category>Terminal Services Team Blog</category><title>TS Session Broker Extensibility (Part 2)</title><link>http://blogs.msdn.com/ts/archive/2008/09/25/ts-session-broker-extensibility-part-2.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[  In a previous blog post, Christa gave a high level explanation of the extensibility points we introduced to Session Broker (SB) in Windows Server 2008. In this post, we will dive a bit deeper to see how we can use SB Extensibility to build our own load balancing logic.  As Christa mentioned, when a new incoming connection is received by a terminal server, the terminal server contacts the SB for directions on where to redirect this new user. To answer this question, the SB must go through its load balancing logic. Our implementation of this logic consists of:     The SB looking through its database and picking the terminal server with the least number of sessions. (This is a slight simplification as the SB takes some other factors into account, but for now it is safe to ignore them for this discussion.)     The SB then returns that information to the terminal server to which the user initially connected.     The terminal server uses the returned data to execute the actual redirection.    Since the debut of Windows Server 2008, we?ve received some feedback regarding SB load balancing logic, labeling it too simplistic. While this may or may not be the case, with the extensibility points we?ve provided, you can fully replace the SB load logic with your own to load balance based on what might be important to you in your organization.  To implement your own load balancing logic and make use of these extensibility points, you will have to construct a COM server which implements the IWTSSBPlugin interface. This COM server (which I?ll refer to as an ?extensibility plug-in?) will be called by the SB for passive notifications as well as requests to make load balancing decisions.  The IWTSSBPlugin interface has five methods which SB calls at different points. We will temporarily ignore WTSSBX_GetUserExternalSession and revisit it in a later blog post.  Let?s quickly review the four methods and when SB calls them:  · Initialize ? called by SB when the SB service starts to allow the plug-in to do its initialization.  · Terminated ? called by SB when the SB service shuts down to allow the plug-in to do its termination cleanup.  · WTSSBX_GetMostSuitableServer ? called by SB when a load balancing decision needs to be made. We can use this method to override the SB?s default load balancing logic.  · WTSSBX_MachineChangeNotification ? called by SB when a change occurs in one of the servers in the farm. We can use this method to get information on new terminal servers that have joined or left the farm.  · WTSSBX_SessionChangeNotification ? called by SB when a change occurs in a session on a terminal server that is part of the farm. We can use this method to detect session state changes (such as when a user disconnects from his session).  The order in which these methods are called depends on what is happening in the farm. Let?s first look at the machine notifications:  When a server joins a farm the following notifications are called on the plug-in in the following order:     WTSSBX_MachineChangeNotification is called with WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_TYPE set to WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_ADDED. This notification also provides the unique Machine ID which SB will use to identify this terminal server in all subsequent calls to the plug-in.     WTSSBX_SessionChangeNotification is called with WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_TYPE set to WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_RESYNC. This notification reports the state of the sessions already existing on the terminal server joining the SB.     WTSSBX_MachineChangeNotification is called with WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_TYPE set to WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_CHANGED. This notifies the plug-in that the terminal server is now part of the farm and is ready for incoming connections.    Similarly, when a server leaves the farm WTSSBX_MachineChangeNotification is called with WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_TYPE set to WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_REMOVED.  The session notifications are also quite simple:     When a user connects to a terminal server in the farm, a WTSSBX_SessionChangeNotification is called with WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_TYPE set to WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_ADDED.     Similarly, when a user logs off a session WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_REMOVED is used.     Session state changes are called through WTSSBX_SessionChangeNotification with WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_TYPE set to WTSSBX_NOTIFICATION_CHANGED.    These notifications provide the plug-in with enough information to make load balancing decisions.  The actual decisions are communicated to the SB via the WTSSBX_GetMostSuitableServer method. Let?s look back at the original explanation of how the SB load balancing logic is invoked to see where in that process WTSSBX_GetMostSuitableServer is called.  When a new connection comes to a terminal server, the server asks the SB to provide the Machine ID of the terminal server which has an existing session for the user. The SB queries its database and if no such session exists, the SB uses its standard load balancing logic to determine a Machine ID to which the user should be redirected. At this point, instead of returning this ID to the terminal server, the SB calls into the plug-in via the WTSSBX_GetMostSuitableServer method and passes the Machine ID it has just calculated as one of the parameters. The plug-in can then change this parameter to redirect to a different terminal server than the one originally intended.   So we see that by returning a different Machine ID in response to a WTSSBX_GetMostSuitableServer method call, we can override the default SB load balancing logic and provide our own.  In the next blog post, I will provide some design guidelines on how to construct your plug-in as well as an example of a plug-in that does resource-based load balancing.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Sep 2008 18:51:53 GMT</pubDate><guid>3374</guid></item><item><category>The SoftGrid Team Blog</category><title>App-V: Application packages disappear when installing Standalone MSI packages to a 4.5 App-V Client</title><link>http://blogs.technet.com/softgrid/archive/2008/09/25/app-v-application-packages-disappear-when-installing-standalone-msi-packages-to-a-4-5-app-v-client.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[Here's an interesting issue our very own John Behneman ran into the other day.&#160; If you're currently investigating a case of missing icons then check this out.&#160; ======== Issue: When distributing App-V 4.5 standalone packages to a 4.5 Application...(read more)]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Sep 2008 17:21:52 GMT</pubDate><guid>3372</guid></item></channel></rss>