NVIDIA GRID: Citrix HDX adds support for Relative and Absolute Mouse Modes to Linux Receiver

Update: 14th September 2016 – Receiver For Windows 4.5 released today now adds support for Windows in addition to Linux!

Just a quick blog to highlight the availability on the Citrix HDX/ICA protocol of a feature enabling Relative Mouse mode. This is a particularly interesting for many NVIDIA GRID vGPU and graphical users as it enables better behavior of certain gaming like applications, particularly those favoured in federal simulations (battle and flight-simulators) e.g Bohemia Simulations VBS 2 & 3. Before on certain application without using an addition gamepad device the mouse could behave strangely ending up with the user pointing their barrel at the ground or sky.

Optimising TCP for Citrix HDX/ICA including Netscaler

Marius Sandbu – NGCA (NVIDIA GRID Community Advisor)  aka Clever Viking!

The TCP implementation within Citrix HDX/ICA protocol used by XenDesktop and XenApp and also Citrix Netscaler is pretty Vanilla to the original TCP/IP standards and definition and the out-of-the-box configuration usually does a good job on LAN. However, for WAN scenarios particularly with higher latencies and certain kinds of data (file transfers), Citrix deployments can benefit greatly from some tuning.

Understanding Thin Clients for Citrix – Just Got A Whole Lot Easier!

Update (5th/Jan/2016): Sagnik who ran this project has now published a comprehensive overview of the official information available from Citrix, including some tips on using the new database and enhanced search functionality – essential reading – click here.

I’ve recently left Citrix and was pleased to see some of the projects that I worked on as Linux Receiver Product Manager come to fruition which have been a long time in the making. The Linux Receiver is quite different to many of the Citrix Receivers in that:

Understanding Citrix Ready Certification and Thin Client Performance

Update (27/12/2015) – Citrix Ready Thin-Client Certification Improved: https://virtuallyvisual.wordpress.com/2015/12/27/understanding-thin-clients-for-citrix-just-got-a-whole-lot-easier/

A few days ago a user (Vikash Jhagroe) posted this blog about the Citrix Ready HDX Certification program. This is in fact something the Citrix Ready team are looking to re-design to clear up the confusing current situation. Vikash has to some extent done a good job of explaining the situation, the information on-line is out of date (awaiting the Citrix Ready redesign) and there is a fair bit of background missing. When partial information becomes common knowledge, I usually find it’s best to be straight with users and give them all the facts.

Where to find open source components used within Citrix products

From time to time I get asked for source code for open source components that we use. There is a handy Citrix page where you can find the third-party attributions here:

• http://www.citrix.com/buy/licensing/open-source.html

Open source code we have to ship due to license restrictions/conditions/attributions is available alongside the products it is used in. For example for the Linux Receiver the only component that needs to be shared is FFMPEG which can be found in the Receiver download page

• http://www.citrix.com/downloads/citrix-receiver/linux/receiver-for-linux-1321.html

under “Additional Components” section.

Citrix Receiver 13.2 for Linux – What’s New and What Do You Want in the Future?

A few months ago I took over as Product Manager for the Linux and Android Receivers as well as retaining the roadmap for HDX Graphics.

Some weeks back I went through my first release of the Linux Receiver with the 13.2 release. So I thought I’d highlight what’s new, ask for feedback on where we are and also ask what you’d like to see in future releases.

The $100 Linux Receiver Question – What you want to see in future releases?

Did I really see a $165 Thin Client doing 55fps+ with Borderlands 2 with HDX 3D Pro, Citrix XenDesktop?

Back in May 2015, at Citrix’s Synergy 2015, I was involved with an HDX demo at Citrix Synergy 2015, the remit was pretty simple – to show really good HDX 3D Pro frame rates, good enough to satisfy gamers, on low-cost hardware using ONLY existing, shipping-today, fully-supported production ready products. We also want to show that HDX 3D Pro can run really w