Hanessa Tech – Technical tips and musings within the End User Computing area

Pointers for setting up, optimizing and customizing a Windows 11 Multi-Session image for Citrix DaaS

Introduction

In order to run Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops with Multi-Session machine catalogues, one requirement has always been that the target machines must run a Windows Server operating system. Besides correct Citrix licenses, RDS CAL licenses were necessary as well for allowing the multi-session setup to come into existence.

Enter the dawn of Azure Virtual Desktop and the fact that a majority of my Citrix DaaS clients have already resorted to Azure as their resource location of choice, the playground has changed.
You see, when AVD released together with the Windows 10/11 multi-session SKU’s (unique to the Azure platform) the license requirement included the Microsoft 365 E3/E5 licenses, in which almost all of my Citrix DaaS clients already had for ensuring that their employees could use Microsoft 365/ Office apps.
To put it simply, it virtually became a no-brainer to migrate these clients’ Citrix DaaS workloads to a Windows 11 multi-session SKU, therefore cutting license costs by not needing to renew the expensive RDS CAL licenses anymore.

Having worked intensely with both Azure Virtual Desktop and Citrix DaaS with Azure as the resource location, I figured I would share some pointers, tips and lessons learned on what a baseline configuration of the Windows 11 multi-session image could consist of. This with the perspective of the image being used primarily in a Citrix MCS catalogue and in a non-persistent scenario.
Keep in mind that this is not a complete outline and that some recommendations could be irrelevant depending on your case. I have personally not seen a similiar writeup and merely want to share a guideline to lean against should this be a new type of setup for you! 🙂

A lesson when relying on the FQDNs allowlist for Citrix Cloud Connectors

INTRODUCTION

If you are working regurlarly with Citrix Cloud it may be common knowledge by now that the fundamental connectivity requirement of the Cloud Connectors, on each resource location, is to open up port 443 for outbound connections towards the Internet.

In my experience this is fine and dandy and all, however this won’t be enough for a client’s criteria sometimes. Occasionally we need to jot down the explicit domain names (FQDNs) in which the Cloud Connectors accesses, thus only open up the standard HTTPS port towards these known FQDNs.
This very demand was something I was recently met with so in this post I will share a lesson on pursuing this route.

My Windows 98 setup in VirtualBox for old-school gaming

INTRODUCTION

Besides computers and tech, it generally comes natural to have a fond interest of gaming, at least for me. While Nintendo GameCube and GameBoy Advance was a huge part of my upbringing, and still is with the banging games on Nintendo Switch, my initial foray into gaming actually began with our family computer running Windows 98. I have vivid memories here as a five year old kid playing various obscure CD-ROM games such as Lego Loco, Moomin, Pippi Longstocking, Woodii, a majority of them developed by former Swedish gaming companies dissolved since long.

Even before I knew I would work professionally within IT, around the 2010’s, the realization hit that being able to play these older games again are a hassle. Newer processor architecture, modern operating systems not supporting 16-bit applications anymore and you bet that the demand of remastering these abandoned games are next to non-existent.
You see, it was this specific conundrum that made me even touch upon the subject of virtualization for the first time. So essentially at the age of 13, I did indeed dabble with VirtualBox and running a Windows 98 VM all for the sake of experiencing gaming nostalgia. Boy, if only teenage me knew what was in the works…

Sentimentality aside, this itch of re-playing these bizarre games recently came back to me this autumn and apparently this is more straightforward nowadays. So here’s what I’m thinking, why not share an outline of my personal Windows 98 VM setup used for old-school gaming? Perhaps you’ll visit your family during the forthcoming holidays, rediscovering your old PC games and want to actually experience the warm hug of nostalgia?

Hello world… Again!

Animal Crossing avatar based on me. Image credit to my colleague and friend Cim Swärd.

Here we go, again. If you are reading this it means that I finally stopped procrastinating and purchased that sweet sublime “.tech” top-level domain together with my given name as the domain name.
That’s right, having an unique name ain’t too shabby for once!

It also means that I have successfully deployed an Azure Web App with WordPress, configured DNS records using CloudFlare, found the most minimalistic WordPress theme to utilize and, in the end, managed to restore some of my older technical blog posts for some content padding at least.
It’s kind of funny realizing now that I went ahead with this quest almost precisely five years since I produced any blog content whatsoever. Might’ve been a subconscious calling, who knows.

Rantings aside, welcome to a fresh start of my new tech blog! My name is Hanessa Milaszewski and I’m an Expert Engineer in Sweden specializing in End User Computing solutions. My heart leans primarily towards products called Citrix DaaS and Azure Virtual Desktop, but in this blog you can expect tips and musings for anything I’ve come across in my technical field of expertise or perhaps even in my personal lab projects.
I’m very glad you found your way here and do hope you return regurlarly for any upcoming content in store! 🤗

Microsoft Access Driver Query is corrupt

INTRODUCTION

Today I was involved in a particular incident where Windows Updates did its thing and broke something. This time it involved an update for Access, a database program provided by Microsoft, causing specific queries to output that they are corrupt.
Due to its unclear nature at first, I thought I would write a quick blog post and hopefully spare other system administrators from at least some amount of head scratching.