VMware View Manager 3.0 Release Notes

• What's New
• Before You Begin
• Known Issues

What's New in View Manager 3.0

View Manager 3.0 includes the following improvements and new features:

• View Composer - Dramatically reduces the amount of storage consumed. Images can be provisioned in a few seconds in a fully automated manner by the VMware View Manager for rapid rollouts or as an immediate response to everyday support issues.
• Unified Access - View Manager now brokers connections to physical PCs, terminal servers, and blade PCs in addition to virtual desktops hosted on VMware Infrastructure 3.
• Virtual Printing - Provides end users the ability to print to any local or network printer. Virtual Printing includes a universal print driver, compression for print jobs, and auto detection of local printers from View Client.
• Enhanced User Experience - Extends MMR (multi-media redirection) to all Win XP and Win XPe based clients. Provides increased support for the following critical codecs: MPEG1, MPEG2, MPEG4 part2, WMV 7/8/9, WMA, AC3, and MP3. Provides granular policies for USB redirection.
• Offline Desktop (Experimental) - Provides the flexibility to intelligently and securely move virtual desktops between the datacenter and local resources. Users can check out their virtual desktops onto physical clients, use the virtual desktop locally, and then check it back in.

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Before You Begin

Before you begin to install and configure VMware View Manager, see the following guidelines.

General Installation Guidelines

The following guidelines apply to all installation types (new installations and upgrades).

• View Client with Offline Desktop cannot be installed on the same machine as VMware Workstation, VMware ACE, VMware Player, or VMware Server.
• View Client, the View Client with Offline Desktop, and View Agent cannot be installed on the same machine.
• Install VMware Infrastructure 3 Version 3.5 update 3 - Installing VMware Infrastructure 3 Version 3.5 update 3 is recommended in order to use the Desktop Composer and Offline Desktop features.
• Synchronize time - Make sure that you have synchronized time across View Connection Server and desktop virtual machines.  By default, virtual machines pick up the time from the ESX host at boot, and you might have to synchronize time on the ESX hosts through the ntpd service.
• Validate your Internet Explorer settings - View Client uses Microsoft Internet Explorer Internet settings, including proxy settings, when connecting to View Connection Server. Ensure that your Internet Explorer settings are accurate and that you can access the View Connection Server URL through Internet Explorer.
• Before creating an automatically provisioned desktop pool, do the following:
  • Validate the VirtualCenter guest customization specification if you intend to use one - Make sure that the guest customization specification in VirtualCenter is accurate. You should use VirtualCenter to deploy and customize a virtual machine from your template by using that customization specification and fully test the resulting virtual machine (in other words, DHCP, authentication) before using that customization specification in View Administrator.
  • Validate network ports on ESX - Make sure you have a sufficient number of ports on the virtual switch that is used for the guest virtual machines. The default value for ESX is 24; it might not be sufficient when creating a large pool of desktop virtual machines.
• Install required Microsoft Windows patches - For Windows XP desktop virtual machines, make sure you have RDP patches referenced by Microsoft Knowledge Base (KB) articles 323497 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/323497) and 884020 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/884020).  Failure to do this might result in a Windows Sockets failed error message on the client. 
• Upgrade View Client machines to use Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection (RDC) 6.x - This recommendation applies to machines running Windows XP and Windows XPe. Windows 2000 does not support RDC 6.x.Windows Vista comes with RDC 6.x installed. RDC 6.x can be downloaded at the following Microsoft download site: Microsoft downloads
• View does not support using link-local (169.254.x.x) addresses for virtual desktops - Configure virtual desktops to use DHCP or static IP addresses.
• Install the VMware View Client with Offline Desktop if you are going to use Offline Desktop.
• VMware View 3.0 provides Common Access Card (CAC) support for customers who use Actividentity or Gemalto smart cards. View does not currently offer SSO support from a client device to a virtual desktop without requiring a user to re-enter a pin.

Backing Up Configuration Data (VDM 2.1 and later)

For information about backing up configuration data, see the VMware technical note at http://www.vmware.com/pdf/viewmanager_data_exp_imp.pdf

Upgrading VMware View

VMware View supports upgrading to the released build of VMware View 3.0. Keep in mind the following issues when upgrading VMware View Clients:

• Upgrading from VDM 2.1 to View 3.0 using a clustered setup (1007773)
• Direct connect to virtual desktop is no longer a global setting (1007788)
• Upgrading from VDM 2.0 Agent build to the current View Agent generates a runtime error (1007789)
• VDM 2.0 Agent builds can be installed when later release builds are installed and it does not generate an error message (1007791)

Upgrading VMware View Beta Builds

• When upgrading the View Composer, the upgrade may sometimes fail asking you to try again later (1007766)
• Upgrading from beta builds of View Client with Offline Desktop to View Manager 3.0 requires that you manually uninstall the beta build and then install the new build (1007767)
• With beta and release candidate builds, replicas for the master clones are created in the VMwareSviReplicaFolder or the VMWareSviReplicaFolder (1007769)
  

Known Issues

The Known Issues are grouped as follows:

• General
• Unified Access
• Offline Desktop
• View Composer

General

General Issues include the following categories:

• View Administrator
• View Client
• Installer
• Common Access Card
• General - Miscellaneous

View Administrator

• The wizard for creating and editing desktop pools permits you to enter pool sizes that exceed the capacity of selected datastores (1007559)
• If the desktop display name is removed, it still displays in the desktop list (1007589)
• Power off and delete after first use setting may not work correctly when used in combination with a desktop reset (1007590)
• Removing a View Manager ADAM instance (Adam Instance VMwareVDMDS) generates an error message if no other directory service servers can be contacted in a multi-connection server setup (1007591)
• View Administrator and VirtualCenter display the amount of free space for a datastore inconsistently (1008492)
• No snapshots are listed in View Administrator when you are creating a desktop pool using linked clone technology (1008377)
• Adding a VirtualCenter Server in View Administrator and accepting error message "Unable to connect to View Composer" disables OK button (1008550)

View Client

• When hard drive space is too limited on the computer, an error message stating that there is not enough hard drive space to proceed is displayed (1007579)
• Disconnect and Logoff options from the View client menu do not work when the virtual machine is set with "password protection" option (1007580)
• Setting the "Automatic logoff after disconnect" policy for an individual desktop or desktop pool results in unexpected behavior when a user is already connected to that desktop through another client (1007581)
• Logging into a View Connection Server from a Wyse thin client device when either the View Server is disabled or RSA SecurID authentication is enabled generates the "Bean must be used in a Portal context" error message (1007582)
• Single sign on does not work when connecting from View Portal on Mac OS to a Terminal Server desktop back end (1007583)
• View Portal on Mac OS does not support connection to Windows Vista desktops (1007584)
• View Portal on Mac OS cannot connect to Windows Terminal Servers when using a tunneled connection (1007585)
• View Manager does not support connecting to desktop sessions on operating systems configured to require Network Level Authentication (NLA) for remote desktop connections (1007587)
• Switch Desktop option behaves incorrectly when a user is connected to more than three desktops at the same time (1007601)
• Lenovo ThinkPad T61 laptops may fail to a blue screen with BSOD STOP: 0x40000080 when disconnecting a network cable (1007821)
  
• The connection to the View Connection Server may be lost if the user immediately cancels the opening a desktop (1008306)
  
• Attempting to cancel a check-in after disconnecting and quickly restoring the network puts desktop virtual machine into an invalid state (1008312)
  

Installer

• Installing the View Agent on Windows XP disables the Welcome Screen and Fast User Switching (1007602)
  
• Registry entries are not removed in Windows Terminal Servers when uninstalling the View Agent is complete (1007603)
• If the View Connection Server installation path contains too many characters, an error message displays (1007604)
• No warning message is generated that desktops are checked out when you uninstall the View Client with Offline Desktop (1007607)
  
• Clean installation of the Connection Server fails when the default security on the parent directory of the installation directory is altered (1008425)
  
• Unmanaged View Agent installation fails if computer description is zero length (1008432)
  

Common Access Card

• View Client with Offline Desktop does not work with CAC authentication (1007608)
• Users connecting to the View Administrator or View Portal through a View Connection Server that has CAC Authentication enabled are prompted to select a certificate even though it will not be used or there is not a certificate to select (1007609)
• When using both CAC and SecurID, users can change the SecurID user name when "Enforce SecurID and Windows user name matching" is selected (1007610)
• Entering an invalid PIN for CAC authentication redirects to the wrong login screen (1007618)

General - Miscellaneous

• The View Connection Server does not distinguish between original and cloned virtual machines (1007823)
  
• If users lose network connectivity from View Clients to a guest virtual machine running Windows Vista Service Pack 1 or Windows XP Service Pack 3, they may not regain connectivity automatically (1007619)
• The View Agent installation may show the virtual printing component but actual printing support may not be available (1007621)
• USB redirection performance is affected by processing speed (1007622)
• Renaming or removing a datastore in ESX after creating a pooled desktop causes unexpected behavior (1007623)
• On some Windows XP embedded devices, the "Auto-connect to this desktop" menu setting is unchecked when in fact that setting is enabled (1007624)
• If a user is entitled to two or more local desktops and is running them simultaneously, all error messages and dialogs are associated with the first desktop that you open (1007625)
• RDP connections to machines running View Agent that are not initiated through View Manager are no longer blocked by default (1007626)
• Passwords cannot contain high-ASCII characters. Only characters 0-127 can be used for passwords (1007628)
• Power off tasks in VirtualCenter fail during pool deletion because the virtual machines are already powered off (1007629)
• Virtual desktop with display names ending with a backslash (\) cannot be launched from View Portal (1007631)
• If the master virtual machine contains a domain user profile and the that profile is used to log into a clone as the first user, data redirection is affected for other domain users (1007633)
  
• Provisioning operation fails when the desktop pool name is not unique in that VirtualCenter location (1008430)
  
• Support Diagnostic Collection Tool fails with error "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest: The URL is invalid" when run on a Security Server (1008531)
  

Unified Access

• Uninstalling the View Agent will not remove registry entries, stop services, or remove directories when there is an active View Session on Windows Terminal Server (1007636)

Offline Desktop

• Offline Desktop does not work if the virtual machine resides in an NFS datastore (1007639)
• Hitting Alt+Ctrl+Delete while on the login screen for a checked-out desktop freezes the keyboard in the guest (1007640)
• If the session timeout expires while Offline Desktop is running, the desktop selection dialog cannot be reopened (1007641)
• Non-ASCII characters in the default check out folder name cause check out to fail (1007642)
• By default, the check out folder uses the desktop display name (1007643)
• When connecting to a local desktop, the View Client with Offline Desktop will show a message that says "Preparing to run desktop locally..." (1007644)
• When running a desktop locally for the first time, the Windows guest will ask to restart the operating system (1007645)
• All offline sessions associated with a View Connection Server are displayed after a rollback (1007646)
• After a rollback is performed using the View Administrator, the desktop becomes unavailable in the desktop selection dialog (1007647) .
• Desktop check out only works when the client and server are located in the same locale (1007660)
• Offline SSO fails for checked out desktops (individual or pooled) if the last user who logged on was not in the current domain used for the current check out (1007661)
• View Client with Offline Desktop may not work in some locations that use non-ASCII characters (1007664)
• Non-ASCII file names are not supported (1007666)
• A "No available servers for this transfer" error is sometimes generated when the number of concurrent transfers is in fact within the transfer slot limit (1007689)
• BIOS versions older than 2.21 cause a failure to a blue screen in a Lenovo Thinkpad T61 after a network interruption when running Offline Desktop (1007690)
  
  

View Composer

• If a user data disk is added to a linked clone Windows might relocate the CD-ROM to a different drive letter than the original drive letter the CD-ROM was assigned in the parent virtual machine (1007691)
• If a Netware client is installed on the master virtual machine, the user profile will not be redirected during the first log on (1007692)
• Local user persistent disk is displayed as a network drive in My Computer (1007693)
• If a snapshot is taken on a linked clone, refresh and recompose operations are not supported (1007694)
  
• The Edit Image operation fails with the error "Specified AD container partial distinguished name is not valid" after performing a recompose if you have recently changed the AD container in the pool (1007695)
• View Composer server does not support credentials from trusted domains (1007697)
• Recompose operation from Windows XP to Windows Vista generates a warning message from ESX (1007698)
• If linked clones are created on one ESX server's local storage and you change the storage to another ESX server's local storage by editing the desktop, the rebalance operation results in a failure for the virtual machines that have already been created (1007699)
• Under certain conditions, the View Composer Agent may initiate a reboot of the clone immediately after the clone was created, refreshed, or recomposed (1007700)
• If the administrator's Active Directory password is changed on the Active Directory server but is not changed on the View Composer server, the administrator will receive an AdOperationErrorFault instead of an AdAuthenticationFault error message (1007701)
• Non-ASCII user names for VirtualCenter are not recognized by View Composer (1007702)
• "Active Directory Server is not available" message is generated if AD credentials provided for QuickPrep are not valid (1007703)
• If a refresh operation is initialized on a group of linked clones and the View Composer server is down, the refresh operation will fail and leave some of the clones in an error state and some in the "Task halted" state (1007704)
• Recomposing a linked clone with one controller type to a Master clone of another controller type results in all disks attaching to the new controller type (1007705))
• View Composer uses first available disk slot to add disks which may result in "user data disk" getting added before "system disk." (1007706)
• Static DNS server setting is lost when a recompose is performed from a Windows XP virtual machine to a Windows Vista virtual machine (1007707)
• When a user profile is redirected to a user data disk, the DACLs of the "Default User" and "All Users" profiles are not the same as the DACLs of the files in the original directory (1007708)
• The distinguished name of the Active Directory container where the computer accounts of the linked clones will be created is not validated when creating a deployment group (1007709)
• During the creation of linked clones, the following message may appear in the VirtualCenter client: "The MAC address (xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx) of vm2 conflicts with MAC assigned to vm1." (1007710)
• View Composer cannot remove replicas that are powered on (1007711)
• The View Composer disk mounting subsystem may fail when the target ESX host cannot contact a server providing shared NAS storage (1007713)
• Sometimes a recompose or refresh operations can fail in some cases with the message VcUnexpectedErrorFault(reason='Incompatible device backing specified') (1007714)
• The View Composer server shuts down after losing a DB connection (1007715)
• Linked Clone Desktop creation or recompose operations can fail with the message VcUnexpectedErrorFault(reason=DuplicateNameFault) when the replica folder is not present in VirtualCenter (1007716)
  
• While a View Composer pool is being provisioned, the user and OS disk columns are empty until all the virtual machines in the pool exist and if a virtual machine in the pool is missing, the OS and user datastore columns are empty (1007720)
• The template list is not refreshed if the administrator returns to the VirtualCenter selection page and checks the "Use linked clone technology to create desktops in this pool" checkbox while creating a pool (1007721)
• Pool wizard only shows one datastore in View Administrator when the template for the selected pool is created using a "convert to template" operation on a virtual machine with snapshots (1007722)
• Attempting to add an automated desktop pool using linked clone technology fails after re-initializing the View Composer database and generates an "Invalid value for parameter vcConfigId passed to SVI function" error message (1007723)
• Linked clones may end up in an error state after a reset, recompose, refresh, or rebalance, due to transient failure of networks, datastores, services, and the View server (1007820)
• The first attempt to add a domain administrator to the VirtualCenter configuration in View Manager fails (1007837)
• Desktop Composer installation fails when the VirtualCenter server language is set to Swedish (1007915)