VMware View 5.1.1 Release Notes

Released 16 August 2012 | View Manager Build 799444, View Composer Build 691993

Last Updated: 24 October 2012

These release notes cover the following topics:

What's New in View 5.1.1

VMware View 5.1.1 is a maintenance release that resolves some known issues in the previous releases. For details, see the Resolved Issues section.

Although the View 5.1.1 release provides a full set of installation binaries for completeness, the View 5.1.1 fixes relate to the View Connection Server, View Agent, and standalone View Persona Management components. If you are upgrading from View 5.1, you do not have to upgrade View Security Server, View Transfer Server, or View Composer Server components. In View 5.1.1, use View Client releases that are compatible with View 5.1.

A new document, Obtaining SSL Certificates for VMware View Servers, is published in View 5.1.1. The document provides an example that shows how to obtain signed SSL certificates from a Certificate Authority and ensure that the certificates are in a format that can be used by View servers.

Before You Begin

VMware View 5.1.1 includes new configuration tasks and requirements that differ from past releases. Please read the View 5.1 Readme First document. This short overview can help you to avoid potential pitfalls when you install or upgrade to View 5.1.1.

Plan your upgrade transition to View 5.1.1 -

To take advantage of the latest View 5.1.1 enhancements, if you currently run View 5.1, upgrade View Connection Server, View Agent, and the standalone View Persona Management component to View 5.1.1. Be sure you have installed the latest View Client releases that are compatible with View 5.1, as described in the following paragraph. If you currently run an earlier release than View 5.1, upgrade all View components, including View Agent, to View 5.1.1. Upgrade View Client to View Client 5.1.1 for Windows or the latest View Client releases (1.5 as of 5/15/2012) for Linux, Mac, iOS, and Android. This includes installing the latest software/firmware updates for your Thin clients or Zero clients, as appropriate During an upgrade to View 5.1.1, View does not support View Composer provisioning and maintenance operations, local mode operations, or View Transfer Server publish operations. Operations such as provisioning or recomposing linked-clone desktops, checking out or checking in desktops, or publishing View Composer base images are not supported during the transitional period when any View servers are still running the earlier version. You can successfully perform these operations only when all instances of View Connection Server, View Composer, and View Transfer Server have been upgraded to View 5.1.1.

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Internationalization

The View Administrator user interface and View Administrator online help are available in Japanese, French, German, simplified Chinese, and Korean. The following View 5.1 documents are also available in these languages: VMware View Readme, VMware View Administration, VMware View Installation, VMware View Upgrades, and VMware View Architecture Planning.

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Compatibility Notes

VMware View 5.1.1 is supported on the following versions of VMware vSphere: vSphere 5.1 with download patch ESXi510-201210001 or later



The View Storage Accelerator feature is supported only on vSphere 5.1 with this ESXi download patch or later updates. For links to this ESXi download patch, see KB 2035268. vSphere 5.0 or later



The View Storage Accelerator feature is supported only on vSphere 5.0 Update 1 or later updates. vSphere 4.1 Update 1 or later vSphere 4.0 Update 3 or later See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix for more details about the compatibility of VMware View 5.1.1 with current and previous versions of VMware vSphere.

See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix for more details about the compatibility of VMware View 5.1.1 with current and previous versions of VMware vSphere. Both ESXi and ESX hosts are supported.

Supported browsers for View Administrator and View Portal include Internet Explorer 8 and 9 and Firefox 6 and 7. Safari 5 is supported for browsing to View Portal on a Mac.

For more system requirements, see the VMware View 5.1 Installation documentation.

For more compatibility guidelines, see the View 5.1 Readme First document and VMware View Component Compatibility Matrix in the VMware View Upgrades document.

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Prior Releases of VMware View

Features that were introduced in prior releases of VMware View are described in the release notes for each release, along with existing known issues.

Resolved Issues

The resolved issues are grouped as follows:

View Administrator

When the number of View entities managed by one group of View Connection Server instances exceeded 10,000, View Administrator had intermittent problems displaying desktop pools, desktops, and user/group references. The intermittent display problems caused many administrative operations to fail. A View entity can be a desktop pool, desktop, or user/group reference.

View Persona Management

View Persona Management failed to replicate a user profile that contained very large files to the remote profile repository. The incomplete replication could result in data loss or data corruption in the user profile.

User Profile Management in View

The following resolved issues concern desktop session management by View Agent and View Connection Server. In certain situations, View closed sessions prematurely, affecting user profile synchronization. In View 5.1.1, View Agent and View Connection Server wait for user profile replication to be completed before closing desktop sessions.

When a user logged off soon after adding a large amount of data to the user profile, View shut down the View desktop before the user profile had finished being replicated to the remote profile repository. The incomplete replication could result in data loss or data corruption in the user profile. This issue is resolved when PCoIP or RDP is used.

If a user logged off from a View desktop and immediately logged in to a new desktop session within the same pool, user profile data that was created in the new session could not be saved. The user could also lose data that was created in the previous session. This issue applied to desktops running Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008, or later Windows operating system releases.

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Known Issues

The known issues are grouped as follows:

Installation and Upgrade

If you use View Client 4.6 or earlier to connect to a View 5.1.1 desktop, and the Use PCoIP Secure Gateway for PCoIP connections to desktop setting is enabled, View Connection Server must be View 5.0 or later. If the PCoIP Secure Gateway is configured on a security server, the security server also must be View 5.0 or later.

Workaround: Upgrade View Connection Server and security server to View 5.1.1 or disable the Use PCoIP Secure Gateway for PCoIP connections to desktop setting. If you cannot take these actions, contact VMware support.

Note: Upgrade View Connection Server and security server to View 5.1.1 before you upgrade View Agent or View Client components.

setting is enabled, View Connection Server must be View 5.0 or later. If the PCoIP Secure Gateway is configured on a security server, the security server also must be View 5.0 or later. Upgrade View Connection Server and security server to View 5.1.1 or disable the setting. If you cannot take these actions, contact VMware support. Upgrade View Connection Server and security server to View 5.1.1 before you upgrade View Agent or View Client components. The USB HUB device driver might not be installed properly when you install View Agent on a desktop in a manual desktop pool. This issue can occur if, during the View Agent installation, you restart the system before the USB HUB device driver is fully installed.

Workaround: When you install View Agent and you are prompted to restart the system, check the system tray to see if the USB HUB device driver software is still being installed. Wait until the device driver software is completely installed (typically about 30 seconds) before you restart the system.

If you use a command-line script to install View Agent silently, make sure to wait or sleep the script for long enough to allow the driver installation to complete before you restart the system.

If you encounter this issue after View Agent is installed, or you could not delay the system restart during a silent installation, update the USB HUB device driver by taking these steps:

1. In the Device Manager, under Other Devices, right-click VMware View Virtual USB Hub.

2. Click Update Driver Software > Browse my computer for driver software.

3. Go to C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware View\Agent\bin\drivers and click Next to let Windows install the driver.

View Administrator

In the Korean View Administrator, online help links display the help in English.

Workaround : On the English help page (VMware View 5.1 Documentation Center), go to the Language drop-down menu and select Korean.

: On the English help page (VMware View 5.1 Documentation Center), go to the Language drop-down menu and select Korean. In View Administrator, if you enter a non-ASCII DNS server name in the network share path for a ThinApp repository, View fails to access the network path and does not add it as a ThinApp repository.

Workaround: Create a DNS alias (CNAME) with ASCII characters to point to the server name. Use the CNAME in the network path.

Create a DNS alias (CNAME) with ASCII characters to point to the server name. Use the CNAME in the network path. An authentication error is displayed if a non-ASCII value for the external URL is entered when configuring a View Server in View Administrator.

Workaround: Use only ASCII characters in the View Server External URL.

View Client and Remote Desktop Experience

If you have configured USB device splitting, and a USB device such as the Philips Speechmike is physically unplugged from the client system while the device is assigned to View, View Client locks up and cannot access the View desktop. (A device that is assigned to View has a tick beside its name in the View Client USB menu.)

Workaround : Stop the View Client process from the Windows Task Manager and reconnect to the desktop. If the USB device still does not work, restart the client system and reconnect to the desktop.

: Stop the View Client process from the Windows Task Manager and reconnect to the desktop. If the USB device still does not work, restart the client system and reconnect to the desktop. Applications that require 16-bit color depth on Windows 7 guest operating systems are not supported on virtual hardware version 7 or earlier.

Workaround : Configure the application to use 32-bit color depth mode.

: Configure the application to use 32-bit color depth mode. View clients cannot connect to View Connection Server if the server name or fully qualified domain name (FQDN) for View Connection Server contains non-ASCII characters.

If View Connection Server is configured to allow clients to save password credentials, some third-party Zero clients might fail to connect to View Connection Server.

Workaround: Check with your third-party client vendor to make sure that you have the latest software and firmware updates that are compatible with the client password-saving feature. Alternatively, you can disable the client password-saving feature in View Connection Server.

Check with your third-party client vendor to make sure that you have the latest software and firmware updates that are compatible with the client password-saving feature. Alternatively, you can disable the client password-saving feature in View Connection Server. On Japanese systems with the following configuration there is a problem with Japanese proportional fonts in Internet Explorer 9 on a View desktop: The client system can be any number of supported platforms, such as iPad, Windows, zero client. The display protocol must be PCoIP, and the Windows7 3D rendering option must be enabled in View Administrator. This issue is fixed in vSphere 5 Update 1 or later.

On desktops that connect using PCoIP and are configured with multiple monitors, if a user plays a slide show in Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 or 2007, specifies a resolution, and plays the slides on the second monitor, part of each slide appears on each monitor.

Workaround: On the host client system, resize the screen resolution on the second monitor to the desired resolution. Return to the View desktop and start the slide show on the second monitor.

On the host client system, resize the screen resolution on the second monitor to the desired resolution. Return to the View desktop and start the slide show on the second monitor. On desktops that connect using PCoIP, if users play slides in Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 or 2007 and specify a resolution, the slides are played at that chosen resolution and are not scaled to the current resolution.

Workaround: Choose "Use current resolution" as the playback resolution.

Choose "Use current resolution" as the playback resolution. Although you can use multiple monitors for View desktops that have Windows XP and Windows Vista operating systems, some monitor configurations have issues. You must configure the maximum display resolution correctly. For example, to have a 1200x1920 monitor stacked on top of a 1920x1200 monitor, you must configure the maximum resolution to accommodate this combined height. A resolution of 2560x1600 would be appropriate in this case. This issue does not occur with Windows 7 View desktops.

If a user runs Adobe ConnectNow on a View desktop to share the screen with other users, black frames remain on the screen after the screen sharing begins.

When the PCoIP group policy setting, "Disable sending CAD when users press Ctrl+Alt+Del," is enabled, the Send Ctrl+Alt+Del option in the Options menu in View Client does not work. This group policy setting should disable sending CAD only when users press the Ctrl+Alt+Del keys in the View desktop.

If you use PCoIP connections, audio input works with USB devices only.

If you lock and then unlock the client system while playing a video in the desktop with multi-media redirection (MMR) enabled, playback does not continue. When connected using RDP, View Client stops responding. When connected using PCoIP, you can seek in the media player but there is no video or audio playback. Restarting the media player does not re-enable MMR, and View Client does not close when you disconnect and log off.

Workaround: You must manually kill the wswc.exe and vmware-remotemks.exe processes in Task Manager.

You must manually kill the and processes in Task Manager. When certain codecs are installed on the client system and MMR is enabled, View Client might crash when playing a video in Windows Media Player.

Workaround: Uninstall the codec.

Uninstall the codec. In Windows 7 desktops when connected using PCoIP in multiple-monitor display mode, if you choose Show On: Monitor Generic Non-PnP Monitor for any monitor other than the primary monitor in PowerPoint 2010, a black screen is displayed instead of a slide show.

Workaround: If you are using PowerPoint 2010 in a Windows 7 desktop, you must use Show On: Primary Monitor for a slide show.

for any monitor other than the primary monitor in PowerPoint 2010, a black screen is displayed instead of a slide show. If you are using PowerPoint 2010 in a Windows 7 desktop, you must use for a slide show. When connected to a Windows 7 64-bit View desktop from View Client for Mac OS X, audio does not work.

If you redirect a local USB drive to a desktop session, and disconnect or log out of the desktop session while writing data to the drive, an exFAT file system on the drive might be corrupted. You might see an error such as the following when you attempt to write to the USB drive: Error 0x80071AC3: The operation could not be completed because the volume is dirty. Please run chkdsk and try again.

Workaround: Before you redirect a USB drive to a desktop session, back up the files on the USB drive to another local drive. If the file system on the USB drive does become corrupted, you can try to copy any valuable data from the USB drive to another local drive, although this operation might fail. Reformat the USB drive, and restore the data from the backup copy.

Before you redirect a USB drive to a desktop session, back up the files on the USB drive to another local drive. If the file system on the USB drive does become corrupted, you can try to copy any valuable data from the USB drive to another local drive, although this operation might fail. Reformat the USB drive, and restore the data from the backup copy. For some newer USB printers, if the color setting for the printer on the local machine is different from the color setting in the Virtual Printer settings for the View desktop, the local client settings take precedence. For example, if the client computer setting is to print in color but the Virtual Printer setting is to print gray-scale, the document is printed in color.

When playing a video in a Vista desktop, playback controls are not visible if Windows Media Player is in full screen mode.

Multi-media redirection (MMR) does not play properly in a View Client PCoIP desktop when you connect a projector or external monitor to a laptop computer with certain ATI graphics cards. Sometimes it displays only a black box.

If you try to connect to an NLA-enabled Vista machine from an NLA-enabled Windows XP client, the connection fails with the error message An authentication error has occurred (Code: 0x80090303). Remote Computer: <IP.Address>. The same error occurs if you try to connect directly with RDP to the NLA-enabled Vista machine.

Workaround: You can connect from Windows Vista clients.

The same error occurs if you try to connect directly with RDP to the NLA-enabled Vista machine. You can connect from Windows Vista clients. If you are running View Client on Windows Vista build 6.0.6000, you might encounter the following problems: It is not possible to add a printer in the Control Panel. If you try to connect to a desktop using RDP, View Client hangs. The system log will include the error An internal communication error occurred. Redirected printing will no longer function for a single user session. Check the status of the Terminal Services Device Redirector in the System folder of Device Manager. Workaround: Upgrade your client system to Windows Vista SP1 or higher.

Upgrade your client system to Windows Vista SP1 or higher. If View Client is started from the command line using a command such as wswc.exe -serverURL <IP.Address> -domainName <domain_name> , the user is prompted for a user name and password. If the user waits about 15 seconds and then clicks Cancel , the wswc.exe process remains running until another View Client is launched interactively or from the command line.

Workaround: Manually stop the wswc.exe process.

, the user is prompted for a user name and password. If the user waits about 15 seconds and then clicks , the process remains running until another View Client is launched interactively or from the command line. Manually stop the process. View Client fails to connect to the View security server if a standard server FQDN with localized characters is specified during security server installation.

Workaround: Specify the IP address of the standard server during security server installation.

Smart Card

On Windows 7 client machines, View Client exits when the smart card removal policy is triggered.

If users remove their smart cards while they are logged in, the View desktop exits as expected. However, on busy Windows Vista desktops, the following informational message might be delayed for one or two minutes: Your smart card was removed, so you have been logged out of the View Connection Server.

View Client with Local Mode and View Transfer Server

When you first log in to a checked out local desktop, the desktop might display the following error: There are currently no logon servers available to service the logon request. This issue is most likely to occur for a Windows Vista or Windows 7 guest operating system on a full virtual machine from a manual or automatic pool.

Workaround: Below the error message on the guest desktop, click OK and log in manually. The error does not reoccur on subsequent logins.

This issue is most likely to occur for a Windows Vista or Windows 7 guest operating system on a full virtual machine from a manual or automatic pool. Below the error message on the guest desktop, click OK and log in manually. The error does not reoccur on subsequent logins. Occasionally with Windows 7 View desktops that have Windows Aero enabled, if you are using a laptop as a client system and you close the laptop, when you later open the laptop, the local mode desktop stops responding. Suspending the client system causes the local mode desktop to freeze.

Workaround: Resize the View Client window or minimize it and then restore it. The View desktop becomes locked and you can press Ctrl+Alt+Ins to log in again.

Resize the View Client window or minimize it and then restore it. The View desktop becomes locked and you can press Ctrl+Alt+Ins to log in again. If you set an SSO timeout limit for View users, and a user checks out a desktop for use in local mode, a checkout operation that takes longer than the SSO timeout value causes the user's SSO credentials to expire. For example, if the SSO timeout limit is 10 minutes, and a checkout takes 20 minutes, the user must log in again to connect to the local desktop. Note: By default, SSO is enabled with no time limit. An SSO timeout limit must be explicitly configured in View LDAP.

Workaround: Extend the SSO timeout limit.

Extend the SSO timeout limit. Do not reconfigure a powered off View Transfer Server using vSphere Client, for example to add memory. Reconfiguration will cause View Transfer Server's required SCSI controllers to be removed.

Workaround: Make sure that View Transfer Server virtual machines do not require reconfiguration after they are put into use. If reconfiguration is required, remove and re-add the View Transfer Server from View Administrator. This will require a reboot.

View Persona Management

View Persona Management features such as folder redirection, offline file population during logon, background download, and replication of local profile files to the remote profile repository fail to function properly if the Windows Client-Side Caching system is in effect on the local system.

Workaround : Synchronize the local Windows client-side cache of profile data and disable the Windows Offline Files feature. For instructions, see KB 2016416: View Persona Management features do not function when Windows Client-Side Caching is in effect.

: Synchronize the local Windows client-side cache of profile data and disable the Windows Offline Files feature. For instructions, see KB 2016416: View Persona Management features do not function when Windows Client-Side Caching is in effect. View Persona Management might not correctly replicate a user persona to the central repository if the desktop virtual machine is extremely low on disk space.

View Composer

If automatic recovery is enabled, and if a refresh operation fails, the affected desktops can be restarted and presented in a Ready state.

Workaround : To ensure that desktops are in a clean state after they were used, for a floating pool, use the Refresh on logoff setting. This setting ensures that a desktop cannot be reused if it was not refreshed after a logoff. You can also use View Administrator to locate desktops in this state and manually request a further refresh, which might succeed, depending on the original failure.

: To ensure that desktops are in a clean state after they were used, for a floating pool, use the setting. This setting ensures that a desktop cannot be reused if it was not refreshed after a logoff. You can also use View Administrator to locate desktops in this state and manually request a further refresh, which might succeed, depending on the original failure. When you provision linked-clone desktops that are customized by Sysprep, some desktops might fail to customize.

Workaround: Refresh the desktops. If a small number of desktops still fail to customize, refresh them again.

Refresh the desktops. If a small number of desktops still fail to customize, refresh them again. If you upgrade a virtual machine with an IDE controller from Windows XP to Windows 7, take a snapshot of the virtual machine, and create a linked-clone pool, the linked clones cannot be customized, and pool creation fails.

Workaround: Add a SCSI controller and a disk to the virtual machine. Next, launch VMware Tools and install a VMware SCSI controller driver on the virtual machine. Next, take a snapshot and create the linked-clone pool.

Add a SCSI controller and a disk to the virtual machine. Next, launch VMware Tools and install a VMware SCSI controller driver on the virtual machine. Next, take a snapshot and create the linked-clone pool. Do not change the log on account for the VMware View Composer Guest Agent Server service in a parent virtual machine. By default, this is the Local System account. If you change this account, the linked clones created from the parent do not start.

vSphere optimizes virtual machine cloning by using the SCSI data mover extended-copy feature. However, a side effect of this optimization is that linked clone pool provisioning can be slowed down by concurrent full cloning tasks.

Workaround: Do not concurrently provision a linked clone pool and a large full clone pool if the two pools are on the same SCSI array, sharing the same data mover. Similarly, do not configure a linked clone pool to share a SCSI array with a full clone pool that uses the delete-desktop-after-logoff policy.

Do not concurrently provision a linked clone pool and a large full clone pool if the two pools are on the same SCSI array, sharing the same data mover. Similarly, do not configure a linked clone pool to share a SCSI array with a full clone pool that uses the delete-desktop-after-logoff policy. Linked clones that use BusLogic controllers might become unusable when recomposed to a base image that uses an LSI Logic controller. Linked clones affected by this issue are unable to boot their operating systems, and the administration interface shows errors such as: View Composer agent initialization state error (-1): Illegal state (waited 360 seconds). There is no workaround. Changing SCSI type during a recompose is not a supported operation.

Miscellaneous

The vdmadmin -R option, which displays the first user of a desktop, works only on desktops that are earlier than View Agent 5.1. On desktops that run View Agent 5.1 and later, this option does not work, and the following error is displayed: "No user could be identified as being the first connected to IP address."

Workaround : To locate the first user of a desktop, use the Events database to determine which users logged into the desktop.

option, which displays the first user of a desktop, works only on desktops that are earlier than View Agent 5.1. On desktops that run View Agent 5.1 and later, this option does not work, and the following error is displayed: "No user could be identified as being the first connected to IP address." : To locate the first user of a desktop, use the Events database to determine which users logged into the desktop. On Windows 7, if you pin a View Connection Server or View Client desktop session in a jump list and reconnect to it with different connection settings, the item might appear under both Pinned and Recent servers in the jump list.

To ensure that non-English versions of virtual applications that are captured by ThinApp display the correct language user interface, during the ThinApp capture you must open the natively installed version on the capture machine before you start the post-scan operation.

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