Yellow Bricks

by Duncan Epping

view

VMware View Open Client 4.0 Beta 1

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Just noticed that a new version of the VMware View Open Client has been released:

Latest Release: 4.0.0 Beta 1 (October 2, 2009)

VMware View Open Client version 4.0.0 Beta 1 is now available on the Downloads page.

Please see the release announcement for a summary of what’s included in this release.

Features

Some of the features included are:

The following features are NOT included in this release:

For a full list of features please refer to the README.txt file available with the distribution.

Compatibility

This release is compatible with VMware Virtual Desktop Manager (VDM) 2.0, 2.1, and VMware View Manager 3.0 and 3.1.

If I have some time on my hands I will try to make a bootable stripped Linux CD that holds this client, or maybe a USB key is a better idea…. let me think about it.

VMware View Manager 3.1.2

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VMware just released VMware View Manager 3.1.2:

View Manager Version 3.1.2 | 04 September 2009 | Build: 188088 (View Manager), 161885 (View Composer)

VMware View Manager 3.1.2 is a maintenance release that resolves some known issues in the previous releases. Refer the Resolved Issues section for more details.

This release also includes one new feature.

Virtual Printing Multi Session Support

In this release, the virtual printing (ThinPrint) feature is updated to provide support to the users connected to multiple virtual desktops. With this update, the ThinPrint client enables users to map the printers on each virtual desktop that you are connected to.

Full release notes.

VMware View 3.1 and new hot blog “That’s My View”

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A brand new version of View has just been released. You can find the download and the release notes here: VMware View 3.1 Download, Release Notes. There are a whole bunch of enhancements which definitely make this new release worth checking out. I’m not going to post them, just read the release notes.

Another thing I wanted to let you guys know about is this great “new” blog called That’s My View. That’s My View as the name already suggests mainly deals about Desktop Virtualization. Christoph Dommermuth started this blog but since then recruited multiple co-writers. If you want to keep up to date and get the latest tips and tricks I suggest you head over and subscribe to their RSS feed or just bookmark it.

VMware View Open Client

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I’ve been using the VMware View Open Client for a while now. One of the things that the VMware View Open Client is still lacking is USB redirection. I just received a cool workaround for this “problem” from Attila Bognár.

In short: VMware View Open Client calls rdesktop, if you add a script with the name rdesktop to your path you can add several commandline options:

  1. Create a script called /usr/local/bin/rdesktop
  2. The script needs to contain the following:
    #!/bin/bash
    /usr/bin/rdesktop -r ‘disk:media=/media’ “$@”
  3. Add “/usr/local/bin/” to the PATH variable and make sure it’s inserted before the original location of the rdesktop(usually /usr/bin) binary.

The -r option adds USB redirection, but you could use any of the other rdesktop commandline options to achieve the desired functionality.

VMware Technical papers

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VMware lately published a whole bunch of must read technical papers:

Storage Design Options for VMware Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

Companies planning to deploy VDI face decisions about the use of both local and shared storage,
and in the case of shared storage solutions, choosing between differing technologies available in
today’s market. Selecting the appropriate storage model is important for both performance and costs reasons. Certain solutions require less overhead than others, as do different implementations of the same technology. Costs can vary greatly depending on which storage options are chosen. Fortunately organizations can leverage a myriad of best practices to help drive these costs down, while improving performance. This paper provides information on technical concepts related to storage implementations in a VMware ® Virtual Desktop Infrastructure ( VDI) environment.

VMware View Reference Architecture Kit

This reference architecture kit is comprised of four distinct papers written by VMware and our supporting partners to serve as a guide to assist in the early phases of planning, design and deployment of VMware View based solutions. The building block approach uses common components to minimize support costs and deployment risks during the planning of VMware View based deployments.

SQL Server Workload Consolidation

Database workloads are very diverse. While most database servers are lightly loaded, larger database workloads can be resource-intensive, exhibiting high I/O rates or consuming large amounts of memory. With improvements in virtualization technology and hardware, even servers running large database workloads run well in virtual machines. Servers running Microsoft’s SQL Server, among the top database server platforms in the industry today, are no exception.

Using IP Multi Cast with VMware

IP multicast is a popular protocol implemented in many applications for simultaneously and efficiently delivering information to multiple destinations. Multicast sources send single copies of information over the network and let the network take responsibility for replicating and forwarding the information to multiple recipients.