Introduction #
When troubleshooting Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops issues, it is important to be able to determine if the underlying issue is caused on client-side or Citrix VAD server-side.
Real world experience as well as surveys conducted by respectable consulting firms in the EUC industry have shown that most of the Citrix VAD reported issues fall under one of the following categories:
- Hosted applications and desktops throw an error message before or during logon
- Hosted applications and desktops are slow to launch
- Hosted applications and desktops experience crashes or there is some other inconsistent behavior during hosted resource operations
- Citrix VAD user profile issues
Citrix Virtual apps and Desktops troubleshooting tips #
In order to minimize troubleshooting time, Citrix VAD administrators should always apply the process of elimination/isolation. Eliminating or isolating a Citrix VAD issue means to be able to pinpoint the actual root cause of the issue by taking organized steps to eliminate potential root causes, one at a time. The following checks should always be carried out to improve the isolation process:
- Look at the logs, look at all available sources of Citrix VAD troubleshooting information. Check the exact error/warning messages, avoid doing guesswork. Do not assume, instead test and verify.
- Based on feedback from Citrix Director and any available error/warning messages, quickly try to determine it is a server-side or a client-side issue.
- Determine the scope of the issue, i.e. which users, VDA servers, applications, delivery groups is the issue occurring to?
- Does the issue occur when the same user tries the same action from a different client endpoint?
- Does the issue occur when another user tries the same action from the same client endpoint?
- Does the issue occur when the same user tries the same action from the same client endpoint but form a different WAN/LAN link?
- Is the user making use of a VPN, proxy or other remote connection method and not a direct Internet connection to the Citrix VAD delivery group?
- What is the exact flow of actions which a user follows before the issue occurs? Can any other user replicate this issue by following the same flow or other flows?
- Do you have a reference/lab environment with identical configuration in which you can replicate the issue? If not, what are the differences / deltas between your reference environment and the environment being troubleshooted? Being able to compare all configuration aspects of your reference environment vs the actual production environment can in many cases point you to the right direction to detect the root cause.
- What are the permissions granted to the user(s) which have the issue? Permissions can refer to a variety of application and system components, including local OS user permissions, AD domain user permissions, NTFS/SMB permissions, registry permissions and Citrix VAD object permissions.
- Could the issue be related to Citrix VAD / Microsoft RDS or Citrix Gateway licensing?
- Could the issue be related to an expired TLS certificate?
- Could the issue be related to misconfigured antivirus/antimalware software?
- If the issue is not occurring in a consistent manner, could it be related to other infrastructure inconsistency recently introduced in the environment? For instance, network interface flapping, new firewall rules/policies, new networking/storage/server firmware update or TCP/IP stack misconfiguration or packet loss?
- Was any system-wide infrastructure configuration change introduced recently in the environment? For instance, an operating system upgrade, a new Group Policy or existing Group Policy configuration change, a Citrix component update/patch or a Windows or application software update which may have caused instability?
You can find more detailed guidance and step-by-step procedures for analyzing and troubleshooting Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops organized by category in my Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops Troubleshooting e-book.
