Wannabe Sequencer

How to sequence vSphere 5.0 with App-V 4.6.1.30091

Jan 302012

You will need Orca installed. Please read this article for more info: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/255905

Open up the Vmware-viclient.exe file with WinRAR or whatever utility you use.
Browse into Bin, copy out VMwareviclient.exe.
Browse into redist, and copy out the dotnet and vjredist install media.

Go to your sequencer. Click Start and Run. Write %temp% and delete everything in the temp folder.
Start the installation of vSphere, click OK on the language question. Pay attention on the Temp folder and look for an .msi file. Copy out the .msi file onto your local computer.

In Orca, open the MSI file. Click Transform and New Transform.

In the left hand pane, click on InstallExecuteSequence.
In the right hand pane, right click the following lines and choose “Drop Row”

-          VM_InstallUSB
-          VM_InstallUSB_SetData
-          VM_InstallHCmon
-          VM_InstallHCmon_SetData
-          VM_InstallUSBArbitrator
-          VM_InstallUSBArbitrator_SetData
-          VM_StartUSBArbSvc

Click on Transform again, then Generate Transform and call it vSphere5.mst (or whatever you want)
During sequencing, make sure to install the prerequisite (from the dotnet and vjredist folder).
I copied the .msi and .mst file onto Q:\, so open CMD and type in the following command.

msiexec /i nameofmsi.msi TRANSFORMS=nameofmst.mst

Aaaand, install the vSphere client by following the wizard.

Thanks to…

http://www.redshiftsolutions.ca/sequencing-vmware-vsphere-client-5-0-in-app-v/
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/appvgeneralsequencing/thread/f3589260-02f0-4ef4-bcad-4c0cb7a8ffd3

Are your apps taking forever to load?

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Jul 072011

Troubleshooting problems related to loading and caching speed is tricky because there are just too many factors involved and when you think you have a good overview there is always something which is overlooked.

In this article I want to share my experience around the different issues we have had while going from App-V 4.5 installed on server 2003 to 4.6.1 on server 2008 R2.

So let’s start at the beginning, we had version 4.5 installed and wanted to upgrade to 4.6 as soon as possible. Both clients and management server were running server 2003 at this point. In the beginning we did not have any issues; this was because all of our packages were sequenced with a 4.5 sequencer. But as we created more and more packages with the new 4.6 sequencer we noticed an increase in cache time. This could be an Adobe package weighing in on 700Mb taking 15 minutes from clicking on the shortcut till it opens. At this point we created a support ticket with Microsoft as well as ask the community if someone else had the same problem.(1)

Microsoft were quick to respond and really interested and helpful which we appreciate, so thank you Microsoft. We started looking at our network, which components could interfere and of course driver versions. Long story short, this issue was caused by the change of default block size from version 4.5 to 4.6. As you might know, the default block size was changed from 32KB to 64KB. We used a tool called Application Virtualization Explorer to change the block size back to 32KB just to see if that really make any difference. With positive results, we were excited to have found the cause. Microsoft quickly came up with a solution which involved changing the value of a registry key called EnableTCPChimney. TCP Chimney is a stateful offload. TCP Chimney offload enables TCP/IP processing to be offloaded to network adapters that can handle the TCP/IP processing in hardware.(2) After you install Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 or Windows Server 2003 Scalable Networking Pack on a computer that has a TCP/IP Offload-enabled network adapter, you may experience many network-related problems.(3) In other words, extensive testing is a very good idea if you are considering this change. I’m happy to inform we successfully upgraded all our clients to 4.6 with no further issues.

A couple of months later we agreed we had too much uptime and started looking into the possibility of upgrading to Windows Server 2008 R2. This was when Microsoft released App-V 4.6 service pack 1, which left us with a completely new environment really. We quickly sequenced up some apps with the new and awesome 4.6.1 sequencer, just to get started testing. During testing however we noticed that apps kept hanging upon launch and the duration of “checking for updates” was too long. Yet again we opened a ticket at Microsoft. They could not help us with this issue and it was only when I installed a new management server with windows server 2008 R2 the problem went away.

This next issue occurred after we had installed App-V 4.6 SP1 in our Windows Server 2003 environment. We received complaints from users who had issues with apps started from a mapped network drive. This problem occurs with UNC paths as well and only happens on Windows XP and Windows Sever 2003 where the App-V 4.6 SP1 client is installed. Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 / R2 and 4.6 RTM clients are not affected. Microsoft quickly acknowledged the problem(4) and came out with a fix this august(5).

Well, that is all I wanted to share. Below are some links where you can read more about what I have been talking about. I have marked the different events with a number in brackets so it’s easier to see which link belongs to which event.

Thanks for reading.

Related posts and more info about what this article discusses:

1: http://www.appvirtguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=3598&start=15

2: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/912222

3: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/948496

4: http://blogs.technet.com/b/appv/archive/2011/06/01/app-v-4-6-sp1-issue-running-a-virtualized-app-v-application-that-is-started-from-a-network-location.aspx

5: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2307495

Edited 09/08/2011

Issues to be aware of when installing WordFinder 10 on server 2008 R2

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May 262011

WordFinder is a dictionary application that just released version 10.
I have customers who use this application so I was asked to upgrade from version 9.
Also, this was the first time I had installed WordFinder on 2008 R2.

The installation itself is pretty straight forward. I noticed in version 10 you are not asked to type in the codes that unlock different dictionaries, in other words when you launch the application it has no content. I asked WordFinder support about this, and they told me to use the CD for version 9 and import the dictionaries that way. I don’t have CD’s, just installation media stored on a file server, so I ended up installing version 9 first, then upgrade to version 10. Luckily every single dictionary was included.

After completing the wizard and a bit of testing (clicking around at random things to see if it crash…), I saved the package and published it to a server 2008 R2 client for testing. This is where it gets interesting. An error shoots up saying “Cannot create directory, …\windows\appdata\Software\WordFinder\WFFiles\TGrFiles”. It is well known now that appdata is located in the windows folder…

This seemed like an easy fix. Check if this TGrFiles folder is there, if not, re-sequence and make sure it is included. As it turns out, it was included. At this point I was suspicious about the OS and that suspicion was strengthen after testing on a 2003 server where it worked. But it works on the sequencer where 2008 R2 are installed and the app vendor confirmed that it was supported for 2008 R2, so I had to figure out what exactly is going on when I get the error message. The perfect tool for this is Process Monitor and fortunately Process Monitor could tell me that WordFinder 10 was looking for a folder called “Temp Group Files”. This folder is not included in the installation as far as I can tell, so I edited the package with Application Virtualization Explorer, renamed TGrFiles to Temp Group Files and that seemed to resolve the problem.

Problems with your apps after upgrading to 4.6 SP1?

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May 052011

Earlier this week Microsoft released a HotFix 1 for App-V 4.6 SP1 and in that regard we felt bad about being behind since we had not yet installed service pack 1. As always we pick out a few chosen servers and installed service pack 1 plus HotFix 1.

The following day we got calls for users who got weird error messages saying

” is not a valid integer value.

This was not an App-V related error, usually it appeared before or after login in the program itself.
We quickly connected the dots and had the user moved to another server.
At this point I figured the HotFix had caused the problem, since it was new and all but this turned out not to be true. After just installing 4.6 SP1 I still got the error.

This problem has been recognized and reproduced at Microsoft and we are eagerly awaiting a fix.
Microsoft say it only affects those who run Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 RDS environment which I can confirm after testing in my Windows Server 2008 R2 environment where it works.
The apps we had issues with were all installed to network shares. It looks like some file paths are being corrupted when they are network shares, according to this TechNet thread.

We can only wait and see what Microsoft find out and hope they fix it soon

Read more about this issue over at Microsoft App-V Blog. Hopefully the fix will be released any day now.

The requested operation requires elevation

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Apr 082011

I’ve been using App-V in stand-alone mode on my laptop for a while now and I am glad I do.
Running App-V on Windows 7 has given me some new challenges that I’ve not seen before in my usual server 2003 TS environment.

One of them were this error:

The requested operation requires elevation
Error Code: 4513CDC-1B40212C-000002E4

The quick fix is to right-click and run as administrator, but if you want to avoid the problem overall, you can add this to the OSD file:

<ENVLIST>
<ENVIRONMENT VARIABLE=”__COMPAT_LAYER”>RunAsInvoker</ENVIRONMENT>
</ENVLIST>

Thanks to Justin Zarb for the tip

Error 25120. The installation program was unable to create the required ISS virtual directory

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Mar 292011

Quick post! I’m installing App-V 4.5 SP2 Management Server on a Windows 2008 R2 environment.
During the installation I got this error:

Error 25120. The installation program was unable to create the required ISS virtual directory

The solution is to Install “IIS Management Console” and “IIS Management Script and Tools”.
These features can be added in the Server Manager tool under Roles.

(Ref: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb397374(EXCHG.80).aspx)

Source: Justin Zarb

Also, after the installation is complete and you are about to connect to Application Virtualization System, you might get an error saying:

Unable to log into the SoftGrid System.
Invalid user name or password.
Error code: 0000C801

This can be solved by opening Server Manager and click “Add Role Services” under “Web Server (IIS)”.

Failed unregistering callback tracking connected process termination (error: 997).

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Feb 252011

This is something that caught my eye in the sftlog as I was troubleshooting a problem.

[02/25/2011 09:22:21:562 SRVC WRN] {tid=1A64}
Failed unregistering callback tracking connected process termination (error: 997).

Explanation:

When a front-end component connects to the Listener, the Listener opens a process handle to the front-end component, and calls a system API that will automatically monitor for that process handle being signaled (i.e. the process exited), and invoke a callback function in the Listener if that occurs. If the front-end component disconnected normally, we cancel the monitoring of the handle with another API call. It appears that when we tried to unregister the callback function in this case, the callback function had already been queued up or was in the process of executing which caused this warning to be reported.

This issue was forwarded to Microsoft’s engineering team for further investigation and the team found no evidence that this warning had any impact on the user or product functionality and it does not require any action from you to either correct it and/or prevent it. As a result of that, this issue will be postponed for future consideration to prevent this warning from being reported.

Source: Microsoft Technet

How I sequenced Project 2010

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Feb 162011

I don’t have a whole lot of experience with Office 2010 in regards to sequencing. That is perhaps the reason why I feel like sharing my accomplishment. So this is how it all went down.

Make sure Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 SP1 is installed
Add to registry:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\
Microsoft\SoftGrid\4.5\Sequencer\SxSAppExtensions]
“vsl”
Download and extract the Office deployment kit for App-V (Here)
Launch CMD as admin, browse to the folder you extracted Office deployment kit
Run this command: (MAK key, see ‘MAK Activation‘ for more info)

msiexec /i OffVirt.msi ADDLOCAL=Click2runMapi,
Click2runOWSSupp,Click2runWDS,OSpp,OSpp_Core,
OSppWoW64 PROJECTPRO=1
PIDKEYS=XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX USEROPERATIONS=1
Make the Q:\8.3 format folder and start monitoring
Start the installation, accept license agreement, customize file location and start installing.
Once done, start the app to see that it works.
Stop Monitoring; make preferred changes in the sequencing wizard.
Edit the .OSD file and add:

<POLICIES>
<LOCAL_INTERACTION_ALLOWED>TRUE
</LOCAL_INTERACTION_ALLOWED>
</POLICIES>
Log on the client as admin and do step 3 to 6, but use this command:

msiexec /i OffVirt.msi PROJECTPRO=1 PIDKEYS=XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX USEROPERATIONS=1
Log on as a user and test that everything works; you need to activate Project at this point. ‘

Thanks for reading, and any comments or improvement suggestions are welcome.

Note: You might not want to copy paste the quoted text above. I added spaces to make it all fit on the page. Be aware of that =)

Cache time problem App-V 4.6

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Feb 152011

I’ve seen that some in the App-V community has reported problems with slow cache time. Just to clarify, when I say slow cache time, I’m talking about a 700MB package taking 15 min to cache.

We had a case with Microsoft about this and learned that they really didn’t have any information about the error in their internal knowledge bases, so we started troubleshooting together.

After a couple of days with troubleshooting and updating pretty much every driver we could find. We found the cause is related to the App-V package block size. You see, the default block size was changed from 32KB in 4.5 to 64kb in 4.6.

The solution is to change a registry key called ‘EnableTCPChimney’ which I was told had been changed in a newly released update, newly released in September 2010 at least. The change has to be done one the client.

TCP Chimney is a DWORD reg key and the value has to be set to ’1′ on the client.
In other words, it should look like this:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters]
“EnableTCPChimney”=dword:00000001

I would like to clarify that this solution may only work for 2003 servers. I’ve seen the same cache problem on 2008 R2 servers, and the TCP chimney fix didn’t work.

Sorry to pick up a problem I had in September 2010, but I just realized I had forgotten to blog about it.

Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2010

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Feb 152011

Microsoft SharePoint Designer (SPD) is easy to sequence, but keep in mind that you will need to configure the Microsoft Office 2010 Deployment Kit for App-V even though SPD is pre-pidded.
If you don’t use the deploy kit for App-V, you will get an error message saying

Microsoft Office has encountered a problem with licensing and will need to close. If this problem persists, uninstall and reinstall your product.

The installation\sequencing itself is pretty straight forward, remember to start up SPD and turn off automatic updates before you stop monitoring.

The deploy command I used was

msiexec /i OffVirt.msi SPD=1

Other than that, I don’t really have anything to add.

Next on the list is Microsoft Project 2010. Let’s hope that is just as easy as SPD.

Prescriptive guidance for sequencing Office 2010 in Microsoft App-V
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/983462

Microsoft Office 2010 Deployment Kit for App-V
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=479f12f2-5678-493e-bce1-682b3ece5431&displaylang=en

Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2010 (32-bit)
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=d88a1505-849b-4587-b854-a7054ee28d66&displaylang=en

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Wannabe Sequencer

How to sequence vSphere 5.0 with App-V 4.6.1.30091

Are your apps taking forever to load?

Issues to be aware of when installing WordFinder 10 on server 2008 R2

Problems with your apps after upgrading to 4.6 SP1?

The requested operation requires elevation

Error 25120. The installation program was unable to create the required ISS virtual directory

Failed unregistering callback tracking connected process termination (error: 997).

How I sequenced Project 2010

Cache time problem App-V 4.6

Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2010

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