Windows 10 UWP Applications and Taskbar

[curttc]

After a long trial and error process of configuration in DEM, I have finally been able to successfully get UWP Apps to provision on non-persistent (instant clone) desktops in my VDI environment. All of the UWP Apps work fine, only now the end users are reporting issues when pinning them to the taskbar. I have observed the following:

When trying to pin a UWP App to the taskbar, the option to pin to the taskbar is not available until after the UWP App has been run once on the profile (using calculator in this example):

After the Calculator App has been run:

After this, I can successfully pin the app to the taskbar.

I have configured a DEM personalization config to retain user pinned taskbar items (I have confirmed it works). When logging out of the session and back in, I'm presented with the following:

Not only does the icon not display, but the app won't even launch when clicked. I have to go back into to windows search, run the calculator UWP from there, and then the icon will populate and launch from the taskbar.

Anyone else experience this behavior from the UWP apps? My DEM config for UWP apps includes the following:

[IncludeFolderTrees]

<LocalAppData>\Packages\

[IncludeRegistryTrees] 

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts 

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Associations

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ApplicationAssociationToasts

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\CapabilityAccessManager\ConsentStore

HKCU\Software\Classes\ActivatableClasses\Package

HKCU\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\AppModel

HKCU\Software\Classes\Extensions\ContractId\Windows.Protocol\PackageId

HKCU\Software\Classes

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\BagMRU

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags\

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags\1\Desktop

[IncludeIndividualRegistryValues]

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\UserSignedIn

[ExcludeRegistryTrees]

HKCU\Software\Classes\Local Settings

[hschimpf · Accepted solution]

Hi,

when you say provision, do you mean as AppStack? I've had a similar issue with the new Chromium Edge. I've installed it to the base image but had the same issue that the Icon would only show up in the pinned shortcut after being started once. My best guess is that something went wrong during install. As Edge is part of Windows, I think this has something to do with user initialization during login. Unfortunately I wasn't able to fix this issue before scrapping the test and concentrating on 1909, with hopes that it might be fixed when installing the new browser via updates.

And just to rule it out, is DEM configured to use DirectFlex for this config? If not, I've run into issues where DEM applies settings before Windows user initialization is finished so the DEM settings get overwritten by Windows again. In those cases I've built workarounds where I use simple batch jobs to wait before applying certain settings like printers and such. Maybe this could help you as well.

Best regards,

Raetke

[curttc]

For what it's worth I figured I'd post my solution,

What ended up working for me was close to what you were recommending. I had to create a custom logon task in the User Environment portion of DEM that pointed to a powershell script that contained this:

Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted

Add-Appxpackage -register "C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\Microsoft.WindowsCalculator_10.1805.1201.0_x64__8wekyb3d8bbwe\AppxManifest.xml" -DisableDevelopmentMode

Essentially, that command can be run for any of the UWP apps you experience the issue with, just have to substitute the correct app name for the one you're dealing with. Once you have that, you can place that powershell script on any network location, head over to DEM and create a Logon Task like this:

Once the user logs in, the icon for the UWP app should be there and should launch without issue. Not necessarily the cleanest way to remedy the problem, but it works. These UWP apps are an absolute pain to deal with in Horizon...

Thanks for your recommendation. I'll mark you for a correct answer.

[hschimpf]

Hi,

thanks for the mark up and hope I could help you with this. Windows 10 is a weird beast sometimes.

Best regards,

Raetke