VMware Horizon Community
jqvm
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Appstack and Horizon USB issues when UEM in installed but not configured

Word of warning for anyone starting a UEM migration, it appears that UEM can mess with PCoIP USB if it is left in a running but unconfigured state.

We installed UEM in a Gold master image and left the service to automatic startup, with no UEM GPO's were applied to the linked clone pools.  (We were preparing for UEM migration/testing)

USB devices fail to attach in the initial login session, a reconnect on PCoIP allows the devices to pass through from the Zero client.   The issue also seems to delay the attachment of Appvolumes appstacks.  PCoIP server log reports:

LVL:1 RC:   0        SOFT_USB :VHUBLIB(error): GetUemStatus : Failed to open key path is Software\VMware, Inc.\VMware UEM\SessionData\1

LVL:1 RC:   0        SOFT_USB :VHUBLIB(error): The UEM component is still not ready yet

Workaround is to set the service to manual/disabled until UEM is required for a desktop pool.   If UEM is enabled at login (say via the GP extension method), the issue does not occur.   We didn't raise a case for this, but an interesting one anyway.

(UEM 9, Appvol 2.9, Horizon 7)

Josh

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Pim_van_de_Vis

Hi,

Please feel free to create an SR or PR for this, since this requires a code change (probably) if we want to solve this.

Or reach out to the Horizon team. Michael Shen is responsible for 'redirection'.

Pim.

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VDIMega
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

USB redirection was working fine for me with W10 1607, UEM 9.0, App Volumes 2.12, and View 6.2.1.

However, after upgrading to View 7.0.3, USB redirection stopped working.  We observed the same log events that the OP described.  If we  stop the UEM service, and reconnect the PcoIP session, then the USB redirection works fine.

Our workaround is to set UEM to disabled by default, and have a user logon script enable the service AFTER the PCoIP session has been connected.  This seems to allow USB redirection to work.

However, its less than ideal because it takes an extra 10-15 seconds for UEM to load all user environment settings so its a bit jarring to the user to see their taskbar, file type associations change AFTER they log in.

We tried upgrading to UEM 9.1 and the problem persists.

We tried uninstalling both the View 7.0.3 and the UEM 9.1 agent, and re-installing them in that order to no avail.

The next thing we want to try is seeing if somehow putting UEM 9.1 in NoAD mode helps at all.

I never even knew that UEM had anything to do with USBR...

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VDIMega
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

I realized that there is a particular appstack that obscures the HKLM\Software\VMware, Inc.\VMware UEM\SessionData tree!  If that appstack is not mounted, you can see the "1" key underneath, which contains a value with the data "UEM Done".

So for some reason this appstack is not liking the relationship with UEM, but this only happens with the View 7.0.3 agent installed.

I believe that if I modify the snapvol.cfg in that particular appstack to exclude the HKLM\Software\VMware, Inc.\VMware UEM\SessionData registry tree from virtualization, the updated appstack will not cause this issue.  I will test and get back to you.

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Pim_van_de_Vis

What application do you have in that AppStack?

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VDIMega
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Many apps, I'd have to get a list.  The most important one is Bloomberg Professional.

We tested and with the updated appstack excluding "HKLM\Software\VMware, Inc.\VMware UEM\SessionData", the problem is resolved.

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Raymond_W
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Hi VDIMega,

Side question, you are working with Bloomberg Professional in an appstack, this application has an auto-update functionality right ?

How do you handle this in your environment, capture them with an writable volume or did your turn of  the auto-update ?

Raymond

Kind regards, Raymond Twitter: @raymond_himself
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VDIMega
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

I don't know if there's a supported way to do that, but in our appstack, we just renamed "C:\blp\Wintrv\blpupd.exe" to "C:\blp\Wintrv\blpupd_disabled.exe"

We don't use writable volumes.  Updates are done by an admin via appstack update.

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Raymond_W
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Thank you, let me try that

Raymond

Kind regards, Raymond Twitter: @raymond_himself
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Raymond_W
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Hi VDIMega,

I've send you a personal message, can you please check ?

Thanks Raymond

Kind regards, Raymond Twitter: @raymond_himself
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VDIMega
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

reply sent

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eccl1213
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Just to add, we just discovered this same issue.  But we do not use AppVol.

We installed UEM but left the service set as manual in hopes to use in the future.

But Teradici devices stopped passing through USB.  Logs showed the same error:

SOFT_USB :VHUBLIB(error): GetUemStatus : Failed to open key path is Software\VMware, Inc.\VMware UEM\SessionData\1

Starting, Stopping or disabling the UEM service did not help.

But if you uninstall UEM from the control panel, the USB devices will instantly connect.

We also had to delete the "HKLM\Software\VMware, Inc.\VMware UEM\" regkey.  Some of our master images left the key behind even after an uninstall and remove this key did the trick.

You can see in the log it checks for the key, then says UEM is not installed and then proceeds to load the USB channel.

This only affects our Teradici clients, Windows and Linux clients are not affected.

DEMdev
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

2018-01-25 UPDATE: This post used to describe a workaround from the UEM side, which has the side effect of breaking Horizon Smart Policies.

In the mean time, changes have been made on both the UEM and Horizon side (for different variants of the issue), so this workaround no longer applies, as long as you're on Horizon 7.3+ and UEM 9.2.1+.

dkasal
Contributor
Contributor

How did you disable UEM after the fact? Are you using a GPO to disable the service, or did you do something different?

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chulerico
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thanks,

Registry worked like a charm

Had issue with view agent 7.2 uem 9.2 app volumes 2.12.1

both usb printers and flash drives, zero clients wouldn't redirect,

"Not Supported - a device is connected to a host that doesn't support USB Redirection"

Thanks

Sam

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chulerico
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Just wanted to add that the key is good for windows 7, in windows 10 1607 key breaks usb redirection, without it usb works

thanks

Sam

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DEMdev
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Hi Sam,

Just wanted to add that the key is good for windows 7, in windows 10 1607 key breaks usb redirection, without it usb works

Can you provide a bit more info on this (Horizon agent version, UEM version, anything else that might be relevant)? Adding this UEM registry value disables UEM's Horizon Smart Policies feature, meaning that UEM won't be able to control USB redirection (among other remote experience features), but it should not affect USB redirection per se.

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chulerico
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Hi,

The pool was configured with UEM Agent 9.2, View Agent 7.2, and Windows 10 1607, adding HorizonLogic makes USB not being detected, un-plugin and re-plugin doesn't help, as soon as I removed key and login with a test user, USB went back to normal. (mouse and keyboard are ok with and without key, just affects printers/flash drives, endpoint used Zero Client Teradici Tera2 firmware 4.8)

Also had a few issues as reported above with UEM Agent, if an account doesn't have a UEM share to save settings, it creates issues, usb redirection issues, also one of our application was crashing. (we have some general accounts that we don't want settings to be saved, to solve issue a different pool was created for these accounts without UEM agent).

thanks

Sam

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mtkelly01
Contributor
Contributor

We've just upgraded to UEM 9.2.1 from 9.2 on our base image. Rebuilt the instant clone - floating pool and still having issues with USB redirection

Were using Horizon View agent 7.2

App Vol Agent 2.12.3

I do have 1 single Smart Policy to enable USB redirection with no conditions on it and that has not made a difference.

Any other suggestions to try - short of Registry edit, which breaks smart policies ?

Matt

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xMAGx
Contributor
Contributor

Hello!

Our users also have a problem with usb flash drives.

We use:

-AppVolumes 2.12.1

- UEM 9.2.1

- Horizon Instant Clones 7.2

- Windows 10 LTSB x64 v1607

- Tera1 and Tera2 zeroclients

The problem does not occour when connecting from a notebook or workstation to horizon and not every session on the zeroclients is affected - its kind of random and not user specific.

We have UEM configured and use it for many things.

Thank you!

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