Troubleshooting a XenDesktop Environment Using the PowerShell SDK SUM406 Shaun Wendland, Senior Escalation Engineer May 21, 2013

Troubleshooting a XenDesktop Environment Using the PowerShell SDKSUM406

Shaun Wendland, Senior Escalation Engineer

May 21, 2013

© 2013 Citrix© 2013 Citrix

Roadmap for the session

• The PowerShell SDK – what is it and how can I use it?• Cmdlet usage and scripting fundamentals• Advanced configuring/troubleshooting sites using scripts• Citrix tools using the PowerShell SDK• Resources discussed, Q&A

© 2013 Citrix

What is the PowerShell SDK?Working with the XenDesktop PowerShell SDK


• PowerShell SDKᵒ Drives .NET interactions for:

• Desktop Studio • Administrator Actions

ᵒ Installed by defaultᵒ Required for advanced

configurationsᵒ Automates common tasksᵒ Provides a foundation for

troubleshooting issues

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Windows PowerShell

Windows PowerShell is Microsoft’s task automation framework

•Replacement for the command prompt

•Releases:

v1.0 v3.0v2.0


Windows PowerShell

Windows PowerShell is Microsoft’s task automation framework

•Extensible snap-in architecture provides a .NET “bridge” to virtually any aspect of a Windows machine

•Snap-Ins consist of cmdlets, and provide a common scripting environment for both administrators and applications

•Cmdlets represent instances of .NET Framework classes; they are not stand-alone executables


The XenDesktop PowerShell SDK at a Glance

• 7 Snap-Ins with nearly 300 cmdlets in the XenDesktop 5.6 PowerShell SDK

• XenDesktop PowerShell cmdlets perform an action with the XenDesktop environment

• Two “types” of cmdlets – configuring and polling

• Most cmdlets return a Microsoft .NET Framework object

• Parameters allow filtered data to be returned

• Cmdlets can be executed from a remote PowerShell session with the SDK installed


Working with the XenDesktop PowerShell SDK

• The XenDesktop PowerShell SDK is split into separate snap-ins for each service on a Desktop Delivery Controller

• Installable on any Windows computer that supports PowerShell v2.0ᵒ Separate installers for each snap-inᵒ Located on XenDesktop install disc

• \[x86/x64]\Citrix Desktop Delivery Controller- Citrix.Common.Commands- 6 x “PowerShellSnapIn”


Working with the XenDesktop PowerShell SDK

• Cmdlets follow the standard “Verb-Item” syntaxᵒ Get-BrokerSite – Gets the Broker Siteᵒ Get-BrokerDesktop – Gets a Broker Desktop

• Each cmdlet has extensive help text with syntax examplesᵒ Get-Help Get-BrokerSite -Full

• Use Add-PSSnapin to load the snap-inᵒ Add-PSSnapin Citrix.Broker.Admin.V1ᵒ Add-PSSnapin Citrix.Broker*ᵒ Add-PSSnapin Citrix.*ᵒ Alias: asnp

• Executing remotelyᵒ Parameter -AdminAddress $ddcAddress

• ‘ddc01.domain.com:80’

Get- Rename-Set- Update-Add- Reset-Remove-

XenDesktop ScriptingCommon PowerShell SDK cmdlets and scripts


Scripting Essentials

• Integrated Scripting Environments (ISE)ᵒ Script Editor

• Multi-line editing• Syntax coloring• Tab completion• Variables and Console panes

ᵒ Live Debugging• Breakpoints and step-in/out

ᵒ Intelli-sense!


Intelli-sense• Provides context-specific assistance that:

ᵒ Speeds up the process of coding by reducing typo's and other common syntax errors

ᵒ Uses auto-completion popups, populated by querying parameters of cmdlets, as well as each parameter’s possible value.

ᵒ Provides documentation and disambiguation for variable names,functions and methods.


Scripting Essentials

• Integrated Scripting Environments (ISE)ᵒ Free Script Editing Software:

• Windows® PowerShell ISE• Jive PowerGUI• Idera® PowerShell+

ᵒ Paid Script Editing Software:• Sapien PowerShell Studio• Sapien PrimalScript


XenDesktop CmdletsCommon Desktop Cmdlets

DesktopDesktop Delivery

Controller


Common Desktop Cmdlets

• Get-BrokerDesktop• Get-BrokerDesktopGroup / Set-

BrokerDesktopGroup

Desktop


Common Controller Cmdlets

• Get-ServiceServiceStatus

• Get-ConfigRegisteredServiceInstance | Test-ConfigServiceInstanceAvailability

• Get-BrokerSite / Set-BrokerSite

AD Identity ServiceAD Identity ServiceBroker ServiceBroker Service

Configuration ServiceConfiguration Service

Host ServiceHost Service

Machine Creation ServiceMachine Creation ServiceMachine Identity ServiceMachine Identity ServiceDesktop Delivery

Controller

– Get-ConfigServiceStatus

– Get-AcctServiceStatus

– Get-HypServiceStatus– Get-ProvServiceStatus– Get-PvsVmServiceStatus

– Get-BrokerServiceStatus– Instances33

– Instance11

– Instances22

– Instances33

– Instance11

– Instances22

Advanced XenDesktop Configuring / TroubleshootingUsing PowerShell SDK cmdlets to troubleshoot complex issues and automate tasks


Troubleshooting service instance registrations

• Broken or “Missing” service instance registrationsᵒ Clear all service instance registrations but the licensing service before re-registering

• $instance | Unregister-ConfigRegisteredServiceinstanceᵒ Re-register the DDCs to the site

• Get-ServiceServiceInstance -AdminAddress $ddcAddress | Register-ConfigServiceInstance• Get-ConfigRegisteredServiceInstance -AdminAddress $ddcAddress |

Reset-ServiceServiceGroupMembership


Joining a Controller to a Site• Confirm the DDC isn’t already part of a site

ᵒ Get-ItemProperty -Path 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Citrix\DesktopServer\DataStore\ Connections\Controller' -Name ConnectionString

• Generate the T-SQL join script for each serviceᵒ Get-ServiceDBSchema -DatabaseName $dbName -ScriptType Instance

-ServiceGroupName $siteName


Joining a Controller to a Site• Set database connection strings for each service

ᵒ Set-ServiceDBConnection -DBConnection $cs

• Register service instances to the siteᵒ Get-ServiceServiceInstance | Register-ConfigServiceInstanceᵒ Get-ConfigRegisteredServiceInstance | Reset-ServiceServiceGroupMembership


Creating and Configuring a Desktop Group

• Create the new Desktop Group and configuring its settingsᵒ New-BrokerDesktopGroup

• Add the desktop machines to the Desktop Groupᵒ Add-BrokerMachinesToDesktopGroup

• Create a new Broker User for each userᵒ New-BrokerUser

• Create an Entitlement Policy Rule to grant the users accessᵒ New-BrokerEntitlementPolicyRule

DesktopsDesktops

Entitlement Policy RuleEntitlement Policy Rule

Access Policy RuleAccess Policy Rule

Power Time SchemePower Time SchemeDesktop Group


Creating and Configuring a Desktop Group

• Create an Access Policy Rule for the Desktop Groupᵒ New-BrokerAccessPolicyRule

• Create a Power Time Scheme for the Desktop Groupᵒ New-BrokerPowerTimeScheme


Removing Desktops & Deleting Desktop Groups

• Remove desktops from the Desktop Groupᵒ Removing a single desktop from a Desktop Group

• Remove-BrokerMachine -MachineName $machineSamName -DesktopGroup $desktopGroupName

ᵒ Removing all desktops from a Desktop Group• Get a collection of the desktops in the Desktop Group

- $desktops = Get-BrokerDesktop -DesktopGroupName $desktopGroupName• Get the machine UIDs for each desktop

- $machineUids = $desktops | ForEach {$_.MachineUid}• Use the collection of machine UIDs to remove them from the Desktop Group

- Remove-BrokerMachine -InputObject $machineUids -DesktopGroupName $desktopGroupName


Removing Desktops & Deleting Desktop Groups

• Remove the Entitlement Policy Ruleᵒ Remove-BrokerEntitlementPolicyRule -Name $entitlementPolicyName

• Remove the Access Policy Ruleᵒ Remove-BrokerAccessPolicyRule -Name $accessPolicyName

• Remove the Power Time Schemeᵒ Remove-BrokerPowerTimeScheme -Name $powerTimeSchemeName

• Remove the Desktop Groupᵒ Remove-BrokerDesktopGroup -Name $desktopGroupName


Monitoring and Managing Desktops

• Loop through desktops to check power, registration, and summary states of virtual desktopsᵒ Get-BrokerDesktop | Select MachineName, PowerState, RegistrationState,

SummaryState

• Use XenDesktop power actions to manage desktop power statesᵒ New-BrokerHostingPowerAction

• Sends power actions through XenDesktop


Monitoring and Managing Desktops

• Use WMI to check Windows vitals (services, CPU, Memory, Disk, etc.)ᵒ E.g. Get-WMIObject win32_service -ComputerName $name | Select Name, State

• Use methods on WMI objects to perform actions against themᵒ Find methods of an object

• $object | Get-Member -MemberType Methodsᵒ E.g. Restarting the VDA service

XenDesktopSite Checker & WorkerDiagCitrix tools that leverage the PowerShell SDK


Site Checker

• Provides the ability to perform various administrative tasks that aren’t available in Desktop Studio

• Checks that all services are running on all Controllers and manages services to correct problems

• Checks service instance registrations and notifies of registration issues found and can correct them using the PowerShell SDK

XenDesktop Diagnostic Tool


Site Checker

• Builds a treenode view of the site

• Provides properties for the active node

• All PowerShell scripts are logged in the log viewer paneᵒ Scripts can easily be copied/pasted into

a script editor for reuse

XenDesktop Diagnostic Tool


WorkerDiagExtension of Site Checker

• Provides reporting of desktops that combines XenDesktop PowerShell SDK with Windows Management Instrumentation

• Checks workers for common issuesᵒ VDA services ᵒ ListOfDDCs registry valueᵒ Last Deregistration time, Last Power Action Reason

• Right-click context allows quick management of VMs

• Sorting and color coding make it easy to identify problematic VMs

• Allows export to CSV for reporting


Resources Discussed

• ShareFile Download for the Presentation Example Scripts• https://citrix.sharefile.com/d/sf33d6a504d747f0b

• XenDesktop PowerShell SDK Help • http://support.citrix.com/CTX127254

• Microsoft PowerShell Script Center• http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/scriptcenter/powershell.aspx

• PowerShell v2.0 Download• http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968929

• PowerShell v3.0 Download• http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=34595

• XenDesktop Site Checker• http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX133767

• XenDesktop WorkerDiag• http://blogs.citrix.com/2012/11/23/xendesktop-workerdiag

Q&ATroubleshooting a XenDesktop Environment Using the PowerShell SDK


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Troubleshooting a XenDesktop Environment Using the PowerShell SDK SUM406 Shaun Wendland, Senior Escalation Engineer May 21, 2013