VMware Horizon Community
smidley
Contributor
Contributor

Horizon View - Agent status "Disconnected"

I have a dedicated linked clone pool for about 50 users. The pool is set to refresh on logout. When a user logs out, the status of their desktop in View administrator changes to "Disconnected." The machine doesn't refresh itself, it just sits there in that state. If the user tries to log back in, they get an error message stating that there are no available desktops in the pool (since they are assigned only that one). I have to manually reset the VM in order for it to become available again. Has anyone run into this before?

Server is running version 6.1, and agent version is on 6.0.2

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h3nkY
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Seems that logoff process was not finish. When the status stays as "Disconnected", it might be cause View agent didn't get logoff notification from Windows and it didn't send logoff notification to connection server. You can check the console screen using vSphere client to see what is happening. If you can't determine what is happening, then collect agent and connection server and file support ticket to VMware.

Ref. this KB on how to collect log bundle.

http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1017939

Thanks.

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jallis83
Contributor
Contributor

Hi did you solve this problem?

I have the same problem, how did you solve it?

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mchadwick19
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Sounds like you are running into instances where a program/app isn't closing automatically when the user logs out. I've seen this a lot in the past and is usually solved by implementing a combination of AutoEndTasks and it's corresponding timeout registry keys in the default user profile. These are HKCU keys so they need to be implemented by GPO, DEM (or other product), or baked into the image.

This article has the AutoEndTasks key in it: https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/97821-turn-autoendtasks-restart-shut-down-sign-out-windows-10-a....

This article has the timeout key: Control How Long Windows Waits Before Killing Apps at Shutdown

VDI Engineer VCP-DCV, VCP7-DTM, VCAP7-DTM Design
LukaszDziwisz
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Thank you for a great information here. Is it safe to say that implementing AutoEndTasks registry in HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop and setting it to 1 should take care of all. Or do you guys still set the timeouts for applications and services?

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mchadwick19
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Don't make the change in .DEFAULT, common misconception is that this hive is for the default profiles, it's actually not. .DEFAULT is used by the "SYSTEM" user account. Changes you make there most likely won't cause issues, but I've seen some weird stuff.

What you need to do is unhide files/folders in explorer. Open regedit and click on HKU (this will allow the menu item to not be grayed out). File > Load Hive. Browse to C:\Users\Default\ and use the NTUSER.dat file from there you can call it whatever you want, this is just what it will show up in regedit as. Then browse through this loaded hive, and make the change there. Then click on the HKU\<default hive name> and go to File > Unload Hive. This will commit the changes to that .dat file.

Recomposing/publishing the pool, your users will now all have that key.

VDI Engineer VCP-DCV, VCP7-DTM, VCAP7-DTM Design
LukaszDziwisz
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Thank you @mchadwick19.

If I understand it right, we would do that if we use Default Profiles, right? In our case, we are not using them. My bad, I should have mentioned it. We are using Instant clones and master images are being configured using local account and then we are utilizing AV writable volumes with profile only and DEM.

In our case I'm guessing I actually would need to add it to the Current User Hive right? If so, would the AutoEndTask be sufficient or should we also do those for Apps and Services?

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mchadwick19
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

If you go the way I described above, in your instance, yes the key would be implemented for all users. This is because the user profile does not exist at the time they log in (as is the case with instant clones). When the user profile is created, Windows takes a copy of the "Default" user profile and uses that as a basis for the user that is logging in. Since you made the change in the Default ntuser.dat file that is now copied to the user's profile, that dat file is now the user's HKCU.

I've tried implementing this with DEM but I believe the processing handling this particular setting is already started before DEM/GPO can put the key in place and I've seen it not take affect when implemented in that way.

VDI Engineer VCP-DCV, VCP7-DTM, VCAP7-DTM Design
LukaszDziwisz
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

mchadwick19

OK that makes sense. Would you recommend adding all keys from the second link and setting them with recommended minimal values or would AutoEndTask take care of it all when switched to 1?

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mchadwick19
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I would add them, but not set them to minimum values. Give the user a little bit of time to confirm/deny the log out just in case.

If those values aren't set there are default values, I believe the default timeout for both App and Service are 20 or 30 seconds.

VDI Engineer VCP-DCV, VCP7-DTM, VCAP7-DTM Design
LukaszDziwisz
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Thank you very much for your help with this.

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