View Agent Compatability with W2008

[Cameron2007]

Hi, long time since I've been on here all looks quite different. Anyway I have a View setup where the connection server etc was 3.1.2. this services a VDI environment on a 3rd party site  but also I publish some terminal services servers. The TS servers are W2008 R2 64 bit. These seem to work OK but then intermittently the agent hangs within this server. Is this the view agent version 3.1.2 supported with W2008 or will I need to upgrade the whole setup ?

Thanks in advance

[mittim12]

I don't think the 3.1 line of View supported Windows 2008.   Here is a link to the old admin guide for 3.1 and as you can see on page 17 2008 isn't listed at all.

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/view31_manual.pdf

[MauroBonder]

View 4.6 that have support to W2008 http://www.configuresoft.net/pdf/view-46-upgrades.pdf (Page 19). And have a issue solved in this versions.

May is very interesant for you do upgrade to 4.6

[Cameron2007]

That's what I thought would be the case and upgrading the end to end solution is my preferred solution to alleviate any issues as I remember when putting this solution in the software was pretty clunky. The underlying infrastructure at that time was VI3 based I have now upgraded to ESXi throughout.

The issue I have with the end to end upgrade is that I have users who access virtual desktops (XP) through this system from 3rd party sites where I have no control over their firewall connections etc and they are live 24/7. They also have locked down desktops so I will have to get the new agent version packaged and added to their SMS implementation. Then go through the upgrade process anyway.

Thanks for your help

[MauroBonder]

Complicated. But it will come a time you'll be stuck in the problem of your current version and will be forced to migrate.

You'll know the right time to migrate, you may expect version 5.0 of View, which will come with many improvements.

Please, don't forget the awarding points for "helpful" and/or "correct" answers. 

Mauro Bonder - Moderator

[Cameron2007]

OK so I basically have 2 options now. As I can't upgrade the VSS and View Composer server right now as it will affect the 3rd party XP users. I can either

1. create a W2003 TS server to replace the W2008 TS server as this should be OK with the  3.1 based agent

2. and this is where it gets more interesting , is there a version of the 4 agent (i.e supports W2008) that I can put onto the W2008 TS that will be able to talk back to the VSS and VCOMP servers (3.1)?

[mittim12]

In my experience a lot of the older clients (your 3rd party XP machines)  can still connect up to the newer infrastructure.   You could test an older 3.1 client on a 4.X infrastucture to make sure they can still connect.    You don't get PCOIP or USB redirection on Terminal server anyway so no big deal from a client side in my opinion.

Also keep in mind you don't have to update composer right away.  You would just need to update it whenever your going to start provisioning or updating linked clone pools.

[Cameron2007]

I have a W7 laptop that I use the View 4.6 client to connect to the View even though the back end is still 3.1 so i am not too bothered about that as it seems to work.

What I am now checking is if I install the 4.6 agent to a server if it will talk back to the View (3.1) backend. Looks unlikely though ;-(

The agent did install and I could see that TS server within the View Admin page. Published it, set up my entitlement to it, connected across the client, looked as if it was going to connect but then failed. It was worth a try but will probably have to just put in a W2003 TS server as a quick temp fix

[Cameron2007]

guys, finally managed to get a working solution to this. Removed the agent from the W2008 servers Have installed the view agent 4.6.0 Build 366101 to the W2008 Terminal Services STD (x86) version (RDS) servers.

readd the agent so the View Admin v3.0.1, changed the startup of the View agent in ServerManager. Restart the whole thing check the agent is functional an add back to the View admin server. As some of this stuff was forced to run in DMZ areas, telnetted etc then checked with network guys for drops run netstat etc a have added host file entries where neccesary (yuch).

So it seems that it is possible to get this all to talk to each other after all.

As ever had to do the whole thing in live environment so confirmation it was a possibility. Thanks as ever to everyone who contibuted answers to me

[mittim12 · Accepted solution]

Thanks for reporting back on your findings.