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Foglight for Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp 6.3.0 - User Guide

Getting started Setting up data collection agents Monitoring the performance of your XenDesktop environment

Exploring and managing monitoring agents

The Agents area contains several tabs that allow you to explore and manage the agent instances that monitor your integrated XenDesktop® environment. Each tab provides information about the agents of a specific type.

Figure 5. Agents tabs

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XenDesktop Agents and NetScaler Agents tabs: These tabs list the existing instances of the XenDesktop and NetScaler type, and allow you to manage them. These agents are provided with Foglight™ for Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp. For more information, see Managing XenDesktop and NetScaler Agent instances.
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VMware Performance Agents tab: This tab lists any existing VMware Performance Agent instances, provided with Foglight® for VMware, if you have Foglight for VMware installed and deployed.
 
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TIP: Foglight for VMware allows you to monitor VMware virtual centers by tracking resource consumption of individual physical and virtual elements in your integrated environment, and alerts you of issues that are likely to compromise your system stability. For more information, see your Foglight for VMware documentation.
For each VMware Performance Agent instance, the list displays its name, the address of the monitored virtual center, and the monitored XenDesktop site name.
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Host Agents tab: If you have Foglight for Infrastructure installed and deployed, this tab lists any existing Host Agent instances.
 
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TIP: Foglight for Infrastructure monitors physical hosts and helps you analyze and prevent potential performance bottlenecks. Use it to understand the state of your system health, and to track the levels of resource utilization such as CPU, network, and memory consumption for individual objects in your integrated environment. For more information, see your Foglight for Infrastructure documentation.
The list displays the hosts in your XenDesktop environment, and for each monitored host it shows the name of the Host agent, the host name, and its type. If a host is not monitored, a link is provided to launch the Add Monitored Host wizard and create a Host Agent instance. For more information about this wizard, see your Foglight for Infrastructure documentation.
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Multi-Desktop Process/Session Collection tab: This tab lists XenDesktop sites.
For each XenDesktop site, the list displays its name, the site name, indicates if the XenDesktop Agent monitors processes and sessions, the number of desktops, when it was last updated, and the duration of the most recent collection.
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To enable or disable the collection of process or session metrics for a site, click the Process Collection or Session Collection column, as required.
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To see which desktops are associated with a site, click the Desktops column.

Managing XenDesktop and NetScaler Agent instances

The XenDesktop Agents and NetScaler Agents tabs list the existing agent instances of these agents and allow you to manage them. Each tab contains a set of columns that indicate various states of individual agent instances, along with several commands that you can issue to manage them. For example, to see if an agent instance is collecting data, look at the agent’s Data Collection column. A green check mark a green check mark in this column indicates that the agent is collecting data.

With the exception of the Alarms column that only appears on the XenDesktop Agents tab, the type of information appearing on these two tabs is identical.

Figure 6. XenDesktop Agents tab

 
Table 1. XenDesktop Agents and NetScaler Agents tab contents
Agent Name

The name of the agent instance.

Foglight Agent Manager Host

The name of the machine on which the Agent Manager process is running.

Active

Indicates if the agent process is running.

Data Collection

Indicates if the agent is collecting data from the monitored environment.

Alarms

The total numbers of Warning, Critical, and Fatal alarms generated against the agent instance.

NOTE: This column only appears on the XenDesktop Agents, but not on the NetScaler Agents tab.
Edit Properties

Click to make changes to the agent’s properties, as required.

 
XenDesktop Agent

Edit one or more of the following properties, as required.

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XenDesktop Domain: The name of the domain to which the monitored XenDesktop® system belongs.
NOTE: The XenDesktop Domain, User Name, and Password boxes should only be populated if you need to change these values. Otherwise, they can remain clear.
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Storefront Servers: A comma-separated list containing the names of StoreFront servers that provide access to desktops and applications. This step is optional.
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XenDesktop Host Name: The name of the machine hosting the XenDesktop site.
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User Name: The user name the agent instance needs to connect to the XenDesktop site.
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Password: The password associated with the XenDesktop user.
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Collect Processes: Select this check box if you want the XenDesktop agent to collect process metrics.
 
NetScaler Agent

Edit one or more of the following properties, as required.

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NetScaler Management IP: The NetScaler IP address.
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User: The user name required to access NetScaler.
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Password: The password of the user account required to access NetScaler.
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AppFlow Source IP: A comma-separated list containing the AppFlow Source IP addresses that NetScaler uses to send NetFlow packets. The agent can handle multiple IPs automatically.
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AppFlow Destination IP, AppFlow Destination Port: The IP address and port number the Agent Manager can use to receive AppFlow data sent by NetScaler.
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Access Gateway Servers: The monitored NetScaler Gateway Server.
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Delete: Select this option if you no longer want to monitor this NetScaler Gateway Server.
Download Log

Click to download the agent’s log file.

Agent Version

Indicates if the agent is running the latest version of the agent package (), or it needs to be updated ().

The toolbar appearing on top of the Agents table provides a set of commands that allow you to manage XenDesktop Agent instances. To issue any of the available commands, simply select one or more agent instances using the check boxes in the left-most column, and click the appropriate button on the tool bar. For example, to start an agent’s data collection, select a XenDesktop Agent instance and click Start Data Collection.

Figure 7. Agents table toolbar

 
Table 2. Agents table toolbar
Add

Launches a wizard that allows you to create a new agent instances:

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Create XenDesktop Agent wizard starts from the XenDeskop Agents tab. For more information, see Creating XenDesktop Agent instances.
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NetScaler Discovery Wizard starts from the NetScaler Agents tab. For more information, see Creating NetScaler Agent instances.
Refresh

Refreshes the list of agent instances and their states.

Activate

Activates the selected agent instances. Activating an agent instance starts the agent process on the machine on which the agent is installed.

Deactivate

Deactivates the selected agent instances. Deactivating an agent stops the agent process on the machine on which the agent is installed.

Start Data Collection

Starts the selected agent instances’ data collection. Starting an agent’s data collection causes the agent to begin monitoring the associated XenDesktop site and to send the collected metrics back to the Management Server.

Stop Data Collection

Stops the data collection of the selected agent instances. Stopping an agent’s data collection causes the agent to stop monitoring the associated XenDesktop site.

Remove

Deletes the selected agent instances.

Update Agent

Updates the agent package to the latest version that is available on the Management Server.

Creating XenDesktop Agent instances

XenDesktop Agents collect information from monitored hosts. When the XenDesktop Agent package is successfully deployed, you can create one or more agent instances, activate them, and start their data collection. To perform these steps in a single operation, use the Create XenDesktop Agent wizard, accessible from the Agents area on the Administration tab of the XenDesktop Environment dashboard.

 
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NOTE: Unlike the Discover XenDesktop Wizard, the Create XenDesktop Agent wizard does not offer to create VMware Performance agents for the detected vCenters, or to create Windows or Unix agents for the discovered servers. For more information about the Discover XenDesktop Wizard, see Discovering XenDesktop sites .
To create and activate a XenDesktop Agent instance, and start collecting data:
1
Log in to the Foglight browser interface.
2
On the navigation panel, under Dashboards, click XenDesktop.
3
On the XenDesktop Environment dashboard that appears in the display area, open the Administration tab.
4
In the Agents area, click Add to launch the Create XenDesktop Agent wizard.
5
Select the host running the Agent Manager that you want to use to manage the agent instance you are about to create, and click Next.
6
On the Agent Properties page, provide the following information.
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XenDesktop Domain: The name of the domain to which the monitored XenDesktop® system belongs.
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Storefront Servers: A comma-separated list containing the names of StoreFront servers that provide access to desktops and applications. This is optional.
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XenDesktop Host Name: The name of the machine hosting the XenDesktop site.
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User Name: The user name the agent instance needs to connect to the XenDesktop site.
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Password: The password associated with the XenDesktop user.
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Collect Processes: Select this check box if you want the XenDesktop agent to collect process metrics.
7
Click Finish.
The wizard closes, and the Agents area refreshes, showing a newly created agent instance.
8
Select the agent instance in the list and click Activate.
9
Click Start Data Collection.

Configuring agent properties

Foglight® uses the following agents to collect information from monitored environments:

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XenDesktop Agent collects information about your integrated XenDesktop® environment. For information about the XenDesktop Agent properties, see the following topics:
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Configuring XenDesktop Agent Base and OData Configuration properties
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Configuring XenDesktop and NetScaler Agent Data Collection Scheduler properties
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NetScaler Agent collects information about user experience data from monitored desktops, using AppFlow extensions. For information about the XenDesktopSession Agent properties, see the following topics:
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Configuring NetScaler Agent Configuration properties
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Configuring XenDesktop and NetScaler Agent Data Collection Scheduler properties

These agents collect data from the XenDesktop infrastructure and send it to the Management Server. They keep track of resource utilization metrics and alerts you when certain pre-defined thresholds are reached.

When an agent connects to vFoglight, it is provided with sets of properties that it uses to configure its correct running state. Each agent is provided with a combination of two types of properties: agent properties and shareable properties.

Default versions of these properties are installed with Foglight for Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp. However, you can edit the default shareable and agent properties, configure agent properties that apply only to a specific agent instance, and create edited clones of shareable properties that are used by a subset of agents of a certain type.

For detailed information about working with agent properties, see the Administration and Configuration Help.

To modify agent properties:
1
Log in to the Foglight browser interface.
2
Open the Agent Status dashboard and navigate to the agent properties.
a
On the navigation panel, under Dashboards, choose Administration > Agents > Agent Status.
b
On the Agent Status dashboard, select a XenDesktop or XenDesktop Session agent instance whose properties you want to modify, and click Edit Properties.
c
Click Modify the private properties for this agent.
The agent properties appears in the display area.
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