Citrix - 1.1.1 Introduction

This lesson covers application launch behaviour in XenApp and XenDesktop 7.6. Two features improve the perceived speed of Citrix sessions: session pre-launch and session lingering. Pre-launch establishes the user session in advance, before any application is requested. Lingering keeps the session open for a few minutes after the user closes their last application. A second click on an icon then reuses the existing session and the application appears almost instantly, giving users the impression of a local launch.

In XenApp 6.5 these behaviours were configured through Citrix policies. In 7.6 the configuration moves to the broker: it can be enabled per delivery group through the Studio console. The same screen also lets administrators allow anonymous access to applications, so users reach published apps through StoreFront kiosks without supplying credentials. Anonymous access is configured at the delivery group level by allowing unauthenticated or anonymous users; you then provide a StoreFront URL tuned for that audience.

Connection leasing

• Each controller caches the connections to the applications and desktops users have used recently.
• If the site database becomes unavailable, controllers switch to connection leasing mode.
• Users can still launch their most-recent resources even when the central database is down.
• Once the database is back, full operation resumes.

Connection leasing is a best practice promoted by Citrix to deliver high availability of published apps and desktops even during database outages. The feature is enabled automatically and works in the background: every controller keeps a copy of the connection metadata users need most often, so they keep working through transient database issues without noticing any disruption.