EUC News and Updates - November 2024
Latest News and Updates in EUC.
EUC News and Updates November 2024 Permalink
Here’s a roundup of News and Updates from November 2024.
EUC News Permalink
The following are some of the key news items in EUC for the month of November 2024:
Microsoft Permalink
Microsoft Ignite 2024
Microsoft Ignite 2024 is a four-day hybrid event that took place between November 18–22, 2024, in Chicago at the McCormick Place West, as well as online. The event covered new technology and capability, with an overarching theme of expanding generative AI’s summarisation and rewriting capabilities.
There’s so much to cover off from the event. The “Azure Update - IGNITE 2024 SPECIAL” video by John Savill provides a comprehensive overview of the latest Microsoft developments announced during the conference. This includes various updates and enhancements such as Azure Local (Azure Stack HCI), new Azure VM SKUs, CoPilot, Windows 365 Link, Server 2025 and more. As always, if you’re looking for a more detailed breakdown of all Ignite announcements, check out Microsoft’s official Book of News for Ignite 2024.
During the event Microsoft announced Windows 365 Link, which is a thin client device, dedicated to Windows 365. The focus of this device being for Windows 365 rather than Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) is to be noted, as Windows 365 emphasizes a Cloud PC approach that is simple, personal, and predictable—a “desktop in the cloud” experience. At the same time, Citrix also announced changes to their SKUs to support Windows 365 customers.
Work of EUC Permalink
EUC World Independence 2024 Keynote
Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get there in person this year, but during the keynote, Gabe Knuth, Shawn Bass and Brian Madden discussed the state and developments around EUC. Some of the key takeaways they discussed were:
- Desktop Virtualization is Surging: While SaaS dominates, desktop virtualization (VDI/DaaS) is set to grow sevenfold, bridging legacy Windows apps and modern SaaS tools.
- VDI/DaaS Enhances Security Resilience: Recent incidents, like the CrowdStrike outage, highlight how VDI/DaaS ensures faster recovery and business continuity against ransomware and other threats.
- Windows Apps Remain Essential: Despite the shift to SaaS, most organizations still depend on Windows apps, solidifying the role of desktop and app virtualization in IT strategies.
- AI Drives EUC Innovation: AI agents are streamlining routine tasks and enhancing productivity, often leveraging persistent virtual desktops to maintain operations even offline.
The full session can be seen here.
EUC Updates Permalink
The following are some of the EUC Updates for the month of November 2024:
Cloud Software Group Permalink
Citrix Cloud
- Citrix DaaS What’s New – Support for Windows Server 2025; provision persistent Windows Server OS VMs using Full Copy Clone – Citrix Docs
Citrix Director / Monitoring
- uberAgent for VDI – new entitlement added to all Universal Hybrid Multi-Cloud, legacy Universal, and legacy DaaS subscriptions, with entitlements to deploy across Citrix VDI and DaaS workloads as well as Citrix connected endpoints – Citrix Blog Post
Citrix Gateway
Citrix SPA
- Citrix Secure Private Access hybrid deployment – on-premises StoreFront and NetScaler Gateway components but Citrix Cloud for managing the configuration – Citrix Docs
Citrix VDA
- New entitlement for current Citrix customers to integrate Citrix with an unlimited number of Windows 365 Cloud PCs at no additional cost – Citrix Blog post
Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops
Citrix WEM and Profile Management
- Citrix WEM Cloud UI improvements – secondary navigation menu for Monitoring and Enrollment; Navigation breadcrumbs; drop-down menu on the top right for Legacy console, Utilities, or Web console – Citrix Docs
Citrix Workspace app
- Download Citrix Workspace app 2405.12 for Windows
- Download Citrix Workspace app for Windows LTSR 2402 Cumulative Update 1 Hotfix 3
- Citrix article on Microsoft Teams optimization using SlimCore updated with Information about Plugin updates – Citrix Knowledgebase article
NetScaler ADC
- Download NetScaler Release (Feature Phase) 14.1 Build 34.42 – new policy tracing: lists the applied policies and actions taken; Zero Touch Certificate Management from NetScaler Console; HTTP/3 on back-end; XenServer 8 on SDX
- NetScaler Policy tracing using the CLI – NetScaler Docs
- XenServer 8 upgrade is included in NetScaler SDX version 14.1-34.x onwards – all VPXs must be 13.1 or newer; SDX must be 13.0 or higher – NetScaler Docs
- NetScaler Monthly Webinar for October is now available on demand
- Upgrading NetScaler LOM version to 3.11.0 – addresses multiple functional issues – 2 reboots required; run the upgrade_bmc.sh script on Build 14.1- 34.42; reconfigure upgraded LOM – NetScaler Docs
- Deploy a NetScaler VPX HA pair in Azure using secondary IP configurations – eliminates the need for the Azure Load Balancer (ALB); secondary private IP addresses are migrated to the secondary node – NetScaler Docs
NetScaler Console (formerly ADM)
- Download NetScaler Console (formerly ADM) 14.1 Build 34.43
- Demo of Zero Touch certificate management feature on the NetScaler Console is available as on demand webinar
- NetScaler Console Security Advisory File integrity monitoring is now available on-premises – NetScaler Docs
Microsoft Permalink
- Microsoft 365 Apps is supported on Windows Server 2025 while it’s in Mainstream Support. Mainstream Support for Windows Server 2025 ends in October 2029 – Microsoft Docs
- Deliver applications from partner solutions to Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop with app attach – Liquidware; Numecent; Omnissa – Microsoft Docs
- Microsoft AVD Dynamic autoscaling – creates and deletes session hosts to adjust to the available capacity in a host pool; requires pooled host pools with session host configuration – Microsoft Docs
- Windows 365 Frontline in shared mode – When a user signs out from the Cloud PC, all user data is deleted and the Cloud PC is released for another user to start using – Microsoft Docs
Nerdio Permalink
Nerdio Manager for Enterprise (NME)
- v6.4.4 GA (Release Date November 18, 2024) – RBAC fixes
- v6.5.1 GA (Release Date 11 November 2024) – Proximity Placement Groups and Resolved Issues for AVD and UAM
- v6.5.2 GA (Release Date 18 November 2024) – Resolved issues for RBAC and Azure Stack HCI
NVIDIA Permalink
- NVIDIA Delegated Licensing Service vulnerability: partial denial of service and confidential information disclosure – High severity; fixed in version 3.4 – NVIDIA Answers
- NVIDIA GPU Manager for VMware vCenter 1.6 – security updates – NVIDIA Docs
Omnissa Permalink
- Omnissa App Volumes Manager Integration with Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) – An App Volumes application maps to an App attach package which is an Azure resource in Azure Virtual Desktop – Omnissa Docs
- Windows Server 2025 is not yet supported with Horizon Connection Server – Omnissa Knowledgebase article
