App-V: Current Recommended Practices for using App-V with Azure RemoteApp

In recent blogs posts, I’ve been discussing the topics of how to leverage App-V for software delivery and management to custom Azure RemoteApp images joined to a hybrid collection. I’ve discussed what is supported and demonstrated a few walk-throughs regarding image setup and targeting. While there are many particular variances for each facet of configuration, I would like to shed some light on some recommended practices that we have found in the early stages of testing and implementing these scenarios.

Isolate ARA App-V Publishing Servers to ARA OU

Azure RemoteApp is a PaaS (Platform as a Solution) in the Azure cloud for non-persistent session-based applications. Like any other implementation of non-persistent session and VDI solutions, there will be provisioning and de-provisioning of Azure VMs depending on the amount of connected users combined with the particular subscription plan. Since the collection number will vary in size (as well as potential App-V client configuration changes) it is recommended that you create a specific OU (organizational unit) for the ARA images as it will allow you to control targeting and configuration more easily through GPO (Group Policy Objects) and GPP (Group Policy Preferences.)

When Possible, Leverage GPO’s for App-V Client Configuration

The App-V 5.1 client can have the vast majority of the client configuration controlled and modified through group policy. Controlling images via GPO allows for the extra insurance that newly provisioned ARA images will inherit the same client configuration the existing images also have. Group policy also ensures that changes in Publishing servers or Reporting servers will also properly propagate to the images.

Path Publishing Gives More Flexibility – Path Publishing Requires Integration Path

If the applications are not pre-published within the image, then advanced knowledge of the App-V integrated path to the application executable must be known in advance. This also means package information (Package GUID) must be known prior to targeting.

• User Paths (%LOCALAPPDATA%MicrosoftAppVClientIntegration<GUID>Root<EXE>)

• Machine Paths (%SYSTEMDRIVE%ProgramDataMicrosoftAppVClientIntegration<GUID>Root<EXE>)

As with other VDI scenarios, you could consider devising a custom launcher and pre-install that within the image.

Preserve Package Lineage (Sequencing) to Prevent OS Image Updates

One of the primary use cases for App-V streaming with ARA (be it pre-publishing or management server targeting) is the capabilities of streaming package updates for applications. This prevents the need to re-upload custom OS images when the application is updated. In order to take advantage of this feature, it is necessary to preserve the package lineage where the base package GUID always remains constant as packages are updated. In order to do this, you must always open the package for editing or upgrade in the App-V Sequencer as oppose to just simply re-sequencing a new version or “saving as new package.”

Use an App-V Reporting Server with Frequent Agent Upload Intervals

One of the most convenient features of the App-V infrastructure is the capability of configuring the client’s reporting agent to upload application usage data per user to a reporting service. This has been especially helpful for tracking package and application usage history in on-premises non-persistent environments and is just as valuable with Azure RemoteApp. It is recommended to customize reporting configuration on the images via GPO.

Have an RSDH Host in Azure IaaS for Testing Publishing and Targeting prior to ARA deployment

Prior to joining your ARA images to the existing VNET and domain, it is a great idea to have an RSH VM within Azure on the same VNET in order to test publishing and targeting in advance. That way you can confirm things are working right with regard to the entitlement and publishing of applications – especially if the App-V infrastructure is based in Azure IaaS.

 

As mentioned, these are CURRENT recommended practices. As App-V and ARA evolve (and they have,) so may these.

 

App-V: On Targeting Azure RemoteApp Images with the App-V Management & Publishing Server

There are two types of Collections with Azure RemoteApp: A Cloud Collection and a Hybrid Collection. App-V requires that the client must exist on domain-joined machines in order to be supported. Azure RemoteApp Custom Images can be part of a Hybrid RemoteApp collection where the images are joined to the local domain. This now entails App-V and Azure RemoteApp the possibility of integration with the App-V Management & Publishing Server using a cloud-based or on-premises App-V Infrastructure scenario:

Cloud-based App-V Infrastructure: This is where the App-V Management, Publishing, and Content Sources are based in Azure IaaS (with the content being also available with extended Azure PaaS services as well.) In this scenario the Hybrid Collection must be associated with an existing VNET that also contains the App-V back-end resources. This scenario also requires that the Azure RemoteApp clients and the App-V infrastructure are joined to the same local domain either hosted in Azure IaaS or via the forthcoming Azure AD Domain Services (In preview – https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/active-directory-ds/) The Azure RemoteApp images are pre-configured for the Publishing Server or controlled via GPO (group policy.)

The Cloud-based App-V Infrastructure can easily service both cloud-based resources (RDSH in Azure IaaS, Azure RemoteApp) as well as traditional on-premises clients (via the web, through Site-to-Site VPN’s, or ExpressRoute.)

On-Premises App-V Infrastructure: This is where the App-V Management and Publishing Servers are based in an on-premises network servicing primarily on-premises clients. In this scenario the Hybrid Collection must be associated with a VNET attached and routed to the on-premises App-V infrastructure through a site-to-site VPN or ExpressRoute. The Azure RemoteApp images are joined to the local domain and pointed to the Publishing Servers via pre-configuration or GPO. In this scenario, it is recommended to still leverage Azure-based content sources for content even though streaming over the on-premises connection would be possible – but not recommended.

Walking Through the Process:

For the sake of this conversation, we will assume that an existing App-V 5.1 infrastructure has already been provisioned, be it cloud-based or on-premises. Obviously, before you would start the process of setting up a custom image, you will want to make sure you have this in place.

1.)    Create a custom operating system image that has the App-V RDS 5.1 Client installed –  then import image into Azure RemoteApp. This is an oversimplification of a process that is further outlined in a previous blog post on configuring and preparing an image for use with App-V and Azure RemoteApp: http://blogs.technet.com/b/gladiatormsft/archive/2015/04/29/app-v-on-app-v-applications-hosted-in-azure-remoteapp.aspx.) You can pre-configure the client and even pre-publish some applications prior to upload. I would advise skipping the client pre-configuration and instead, leverage AD GPO’s to configure the client.

2.)    Create an Azure RemoteApp domain-joined (hybrid) collection and leverage the OS image as the template image for the collection. When you go to join the domain, you will want to join the domain to a specific OU (organizational unit) within your local domain. It will be much easier to administer and control the configuration of your ARA images if they are contained within a specific OU. NOTE: This step is massively simplified here in the explanation. More specific ARA information on joining Hybrid Collections can also be found here (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/remoteapp-create-hybrid-deployment/)
 

3.)    The image upload may take a while to provision. Once the image has been provisioned, the status will show as ready.

     

4.)    Once the images have been provisioned, you will start to see computer objects appearing in the OU you specified for the domain join.

      

5.)    At this point you can begin to configure a Group Policy Object and link it to the OU for the ARA images.

      

Within the GPO, you can leverage the ADMX templates for App-V via the MDOP ADMX template download package (available here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=41183) to control the App-V 5 client settings including App-V Publishing server targets, shared content store mode, scripting configuration, etc.

6.)    Now the interesting part begins: The App-V management console allows you to target packages to user AD (Active Directory) groups or machine AD groups.  When it comes to targeting groups, GPO’s only allow you to control local group membership. As a result, the targeting options available for machine groups that affect ARA machines is pretty much the Domain Computers Group. However, if you wanted to target the ARA images for machine groups (global publishing) you can effectively use the Domain Computers group coupled with the OU configuration for the specialized publishing server. User Targeting is a more flexible option as there are no restrictions with regards to the non-persistent provisioning of the ARA images.

   

In this example, I have targeted both the Domain Computers machine group as well as a custom user group within the App-V Management Console.

   

7.)    Publish App-V apps in ARA (using path option or pre-published discovery.) Within ARA, you can publish applications by querying the Start Menu of the image or by using Path Publishing. App-V applications will not show up via a Start Menu query unless they have been pre-published globally in the image. For this reason, it is better recommended to Path Publish the App-V applications. This requires juuuuuuust a bit of a workaround. If you plan on publishing an App-V application by path, you will need to be able to know the actual integration path to the executable in advance.

For machine-targeted (globally published) packages, they will begin with:

%SYSTEMDRIVE%ProgramDataMicrosoftApp-VClientIntegration<Package_GUID>Root

For user targeted (user published) packages, they will begin with:

%LOCALAPPDATA%MicrosoftApp-VClientIntegration<Package_GUID>Root

If you do not know the package GUID from sequencing, you can easily retrieve it from the package details within the App-V management console.

Any additional path information beyond the root folder must also be obtained in order to complete the path. Since the APPV format is a ZIP format, you can easily view this information within the APPV package file itself.

8.)    Once you have this information, you can proceed to publish the App-V applications n the Azure RemoteApp publishing console.

  

9.)    Upon logon using the ARA RDP client, you should then see your App-V applications appearing just like any other normal application.

      

App-V: More on App-V with Azure RemoteApp

Last April, we gave a little bit of information on the limited use of App-V applications with Azure RemoteApp (http://blogs.technet.com/b/gladiatormsft/archive/2015/04/29/app-v-on-app-v-applications-hosted-in-azure-remoteapp.aspx.) This piqued the curiosity of many and over the past several months, we have been validating several scenarios involving the integration of App-V with Azure RemoteApp images within hybrid collections. 

As you might have heard, Eric Orman – the Program Manager for Azure RemoteApp, announced at Ignite Australia that App-V *IS* supported with Azure RemoteApp within specific scopes. (https://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Ignite/Australia-2015/WIN336.)   This is a significant development for companies that want more options for bringing their desktop applications to Azure as well as the birth of another chapter in the story of App-V in Azure. In the three months since that announcement, one of the most common question I have been getting is “Why? How is this significant?”

Why App-V for Azure RemoteApp?

I would say the three most important aspects about being able to use App-V with Azure RemoteApp are the following:

Keeps Custom Images Thin: Custom Images with Azure Remote App have to remain beneath the 127GB maximum for VHDs. In addition, the more applications pre-installed to ARA images translates to a longer upload time. Customers embracing App-V will have the ability to quickly bake an image for upload with minimal pre-publishing (or NO pre-publishing if leveraging path publishing the with the App-V Publishing Server or Configuration Manager.) In addition, App-V clients baked into Azure RemoteApp images can have those applications stream to memory using the App-V Shared Content Store rather than to disk also preserving permanent storage consumption on the ARA images. It is important to note that Premium Plus subscriptions coupled with a high-end storage back end (Azure Files) would be recommended for Shared Content Store use in ARA.

Allows for Streamed Application Updates: When a company decides they would like to move a LOB application to the Azure cloud using ARA, it involves an image upload. Periodically, the application may require maintenance and patching. Without a demand technology such as App-V, this would require re-uploading and re-provisioning of ARA images. With App-V, applications that have been sequenced for streaming can be dynamically updated to the ARA images without the need to re-upload any new custom images.

On-Premises, Azure IaaS, and Azure RemoteApp resources can share application Content Sources: If your organization is currently leveraging App-V and streaming content from content stores – be it on-premises or in Azure IaaS, these same resources can also be leveraged by your ARA-provisioned images as well.

Scenarios for App-V with Azure Remote App

When designing a strategy for delivering App-V applications with Azure RemoteApp, you will pretty much follow along the same lines as you would when you are designing App-V for any other target. The exceptions in the world of App-V involve the current existing gaps between the App-V IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) and the Azure RemoteApp PaaS (Platform as a Service.)

The following table outlines the pros and cons of the different options for App-V delivery, application storage, and publishing and targeting with Azure Remote App:

 

Configuration options		Pros		Cons
Delivery method	Streaming (on demand from content server)	Application is always the latest and fresh		Possible first time latency upon initial application launch
	Mounted (Pre-cached into the ARA image.)	Fastest 1st launch – all of the application assets are already present on the ARA virtual machine.		Potential Image Bloat – applications take up additional image space (remember the 127gb limit)
Primary Application location storage	Shared Content (Stream-to-memory)	App runs in memory of Azure RemoteApp instance		Eats memory and requires good connection to streaming (file) server where the app resides. Affects baseline.
	Disk (Cached)	Fast execution App not dependent on availability of Content Source		Bloat – takes up image space (127gb limit)
Targeting	User*	*Requires full standalone App-V infrastructure or Configuration Manager 2012 R2 or later
	Global (machine)	Pre-publish or target using Publishing server	Need to update your Azure image if you want to update the app.  (huge) Takes up some space on image

* In addition, User targeting also requires that the App-V application be pre-published via a path Publishing rule for the Azure RemoteApp collection.

 

More to come . . . 🙂