VMware App Volumes 4 Installation

App Volumes 4 was released back in January and promises some heavily anticipated features and updates. Some great information can be found on VMware’s Tech Zone and blogs that outline many of the new features. https://techzone.vmware.com/blog/whats-new-vmware-app-volumes-4

https://blogs.vmware.com/euc/2019/11/app-volumes-beta.html

For me the big sell on moving to App Volumes 4 is the improved login experience, especially with multiple App Stacks. I’ve worked with many customers to design and implement App Volumes over the past 4 years and one of the main challenges I’ve seen is how best to limit the number of App Stacks a user receives. It’s widely known the limitations of App Volumes 2.X are reached when you start attaching more than 3-4 App Stacks. The login experience could go from a 15-20 second overhead for 1-2 App Stacks to a 30-60 second login after 3-4 App Stacks. I’ve had VMware engineers and support staff recommend keeping it less than 5 App Stacks per user/machine, while the documentation states a limit of 10. With this in mind most environments take a departmental approach. Typically creating a base or common App Stack and then 1 or 2 department specific App Stacks. For most of the customers I’ve worked with this was not a major issue but depending on their size and need to customize application deployments it could prove limiting. Many would ask if there was a way to provide users with individual applications through App Volumes. This could be safely implemented, but at a limited scale. Now with the new version 4 VMware is claiming there should no longer be a performance impact when attaching many App Stacks per user session.

* I want to mention I have yet to perform extensive testing to validate VMware’s claims, but hope to do that and update here.

Prep Work

The system requirements can be found here: https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-App-Volumes/4/com.vmware.appvolumes.install.doc/GUID-9940D8D5-C3FB-4C6B-8522-5691A1348E5A.html

The requirements are fairly standard for a Windows Server and SQL database. After setting up the Windows server based on the best practices outlined above I created a domain service account to perform the installation under.

Then proceed to download the installation media and license file.

App Volumes Manager Installation

First, mount the App Volumes ISO, or simply double click it within a modern Windows server OS.

From there navigate to Installation > setup

Run the Windows Installer called Setup. Click Next on the Welcome to App Volumes Installer Setup Wizard.

Accept the terms of the License Agreement and click Next.

Since we are only installing the App Volumes Manager at this time be sure to select the Install App Volumes Manager radio button and click Next.

You may notice a new installer actually starts, which is specific to the Manager. Click Next on the Welcome to the App Volumes Manager Setup Wizard.

Next you will have to choose either a local SQL Express Database or connect to an external SQL Server Database. SQL Express is great for POC/Pilot or even lab environments, but for production you should always utilize an external, and properly prepared, SQL Server Database. I already have a SQL Server configured with an empty database for App Volumes, so I have chosen the Connect to an existing SQL Server Database.

On the Database Server details screen fill in the appropriate remote database server name and authentication method. I experienced some unexplained GUI issues when I utilized Windows Integrated Authentication which caused me to go back and use local SQL credentials, shown below. I will follow up with another blog to outline those issues. I’m hoping it was something related to my database and configuration so don’t let me experience stop you from attempting Windows Auth for SQL, but should you run into issues I’d recommend first trying with SQL Auth instead. I am not a SQL expert so please consult with your DBA for any security or best practices related to the SQL configuration.

Under the Choose local or remote database server to use: enter the FQDN of your SQL server (A). Then select Server authentication using the Login ID and password below to enter the local SQL credentials (B). Utilizing the Browse button you should be able to see and select your App Volumes Database found on that server (C).

I chose to Overwrite existing database (if any) because I had a failed install before this (D). You do not need to select this option if it is a brand-new installation. Also be sure not to select this option when upgrading or installing additional App Volumes manager server as it will clear the database and all content.

Finally, if you do not have certificate validation configured for SQL be sure to unselect the Enable SQL Server certificate validation.

Click Next once complete.

Note: You do not need to create an ODBC System DSN for App Volumes as the installer will create the appropriate configuration. The System Data Sources that App Volumes creates will be called svmanager within the ODBC Administrator.

On the Choose Network Ports and Security options screen the default options should be selected. For some POC or lab environments it may be necessary to select the option to Allow Connections over HTTP (insecure), but this should not be done for production environments. The installer will open the appropriate Windows Firewall ports, if it is enabled. Click Next.

On the Custom Setup screen, you can choose the installation location or accept the defaults and click Next.

On the last screen of the setup wizard select Install.

The installation takes several minutes and does not require a reboot, although I have a habit of rebooting anyway once complete since this is Windows after all.

If all goes well, you should be presented with the Completed the App Volumes Manager Setup Wizard screen. Be sure to read the screen as a failed install looks fairly similar but would state that the install ended prematurely because of an error.

Click Finish.

Now that App Volumes 4 is installed we can move on to the initial configuration. I will cover this in the next post.

I hope you found this helpful. Thank you for reading.