Is anybody running OI on a Citrix server?

We're trying to run OI Net w/ two work stations on a Citrix Server. Will it need the NT 2000 Service Module?

Fred Dietrich

STAT! Systems, Inc.

Fred,

We do some limited support for OI through Citrix/Metaframe and we have some clients who are using OI on Citrix/Metraframe exclusively. Yes, you will need the NT Service (or whatever it is called at the moment.)

I don't know how much experience Sprezz has had but I believe Tony Marler has had a lot of successful experience in this environment.

dbakke@srpcs.com

SRP Computer Solutions, Inc.

We have a client running 6 users from a Citrix server.

At first there was very poor performance, compared to running direct.

After they improved the network it absolutely flies along.

They have the NT service, and whilst this is not such an important issue with Citrix, it is recommended.

This client also had the application residing on one server and the Citrix application residing on another. I suggested that they place the OI application on the Citrix server and this increased performance with multiple users by a large factor.

The more users that log on the better the performance increase.

There are some issues to be careful of however.

You need to be careful when using the REDRAW event as it can cause the window to be displayed incorrectly and with some annoying flashing.

Any program using local C drive ,eg temporary workspace needs to be parameterised as the local users workstation is regarded as another drive, starting from V (I think) and going backwards.

DLLs and the like need to be installed on the server and not on the workstation.

There are a few issues re installation of you OI app as well.

The user generally wont have access to the Citrix server, so some documentation and training from Citrix will be required.

Best of Luck

Colin Rule

Colin ..

I have a Citrix metaframe user which experiences a loss of focus on the client desktop when executing a Page Event. It cycles to the previous window and puts it on top of the supposed parent. If you click on the parent it restores itself, but the next Page Event repeats the process. We have a lot of tabbed templates which send the Page Event on click of the tab. Have you seen this?

TIA ..

Don Miller

C3 Inc.

Don,

I cannot recall this exactly, but I have some strange sense that I have seen it.

We use the Gotfocus on our tabs to send PAGE events to the window and it works OK.

If it is only this client who is having the problem then it may be a Citrix setting.

I am not that familiar with Citrix but I am pretty sure that there are a lot of settings that can be tailored for many of the problems that appear.

The Citrix web site has a lot of knowledgebase articles.

You may like to try running it as a Start dialog, or Start window or whatever, ie different methods of opening the window, eg not owned by the parent etc as Citrix may be refreshing the parent… dont know for sure, its just a guess.

Best of luck

Colin

Picking up this old thread as we have just got a new user who has seven Citrix servers and two main servers. Installed using OI 4.1.3.

1) I see that Don Bakke says one "needs" Revelation NT Service whereas A N Other (was it Colin Rule?) says it's recommended but "not such an issue".

Is the NT Service necessary or not? If so, why? If not, what are the issues?

2) I did some simple testing (due to time constraints) including record locking via same Citrix server. Station id was same for both users but locking seemed to work OK.

Are there any issues with OI 4.1.3 on Citrix? Is there any way to uniquely identify different workstations via same Citrix server? E.g. is there a simple way to identify different workstations and change @station to differentiate?

3) I think they are probably using "load balancing" and, seeing all the other issues, cannot envisage anything persuading them to stop using it. I see that the issue appeared to be something to do with the OIPI eval message. With the above set up I installed OIPI.LIC on the main server and it all seems OK (no OIPI eval message).

Are there any potential problems with Citrix load balancing with OI 4.1.3? If so, what and what can be done about them?

4) It turns out that each time OI 4.1.3 is run from a Citrix server, a oinsight.ini is created on that server. Sadly this includes OIPI Start/Stop options set to Yes - which I don't want as it slows logon significantly (and unnecessarily for those whose session doesn't use OIPI). Apart from pre-installing oinsight.inis on all the servers, is there any way to override the .ini "Yes" settinga and prevent OIPI32 from being launched?

Any help and advice on these and any other issues much appreciated.

Richard,

Here's my quick take.

Is the NT Service necessary or not? If so, why? If not, what are the issues?

Yes. We disabled NT Service initially because of some other system issues. My recollection is that logging into OI was very much slower. So from this point of view (and other warnings), it is essential. Others may have other experience to share.

Are there any issues with OI 4.1.3 on Citrix?

We are using it here and it works Great!

Is there any way to uniquely identify different workstations via same Citrix server? E.g. is there a simple way to identify different workstations and change @station to differentiate?

Briefly, Sprezz and Bob Carten have provided helpful information on this subject. Do a Search. I think you will find what you need.

3) I think they are probably using "load balancing" and, seeing all the other issues, cannot envisage anything persuading them to stop using it. I see that the issue appeared to be something to do with the OIPI eval message. With the above set up I installed OIPI.LIC on the main server and it all seems OK (no OIPI eval message).

Hmmm, to make load balancing work, I believe you must use UNC to call OI. However, when we did that earlier (prior to 4.13) we would get the OIPI eval message. So if you are using 4.13 and using Load Balancing under Citrix, then it looks like UNC is working properly under 4.13. Do you mind confirming this for me? You should be doing this for yourself as well .

Are there any potential problems with Citrix load balancing with OI 4.1.3?

We did not invoke the load balancing because of the above issue with UNC, i.e., if UNC, then OIPI eval message. But if UNC feature is fixed (no more OIPI eval messages), then we might revisit this matter.

4) It turns out that each time OI 4.1.3 is run from a Citrix server, a oinsight.ini is created on that server. Sadly this includes OIPI Start/Stop options set to Yes - which I don't want as it slows logon significantly (and unnecessarily for those whose session doesn't use OIPI).

Don't know about the oinisight.ini being created each time OI 4.13 runs. However, the slow logon might be related to not using the NT services as we experienced.

…is there any way to override the .ini "Yes" settinga and prevent OIPI32 from being launched?

Don't know about this because we use OIPI32.

HTH,

Ray Chan

Ray

Many thanks indeed for this - I'm sure it will be a very useful update for others as well.

When testing via Citrix at the client's data centre the log on with first and second PCs on same Citrix server was more than acceptable.

Don Bakke plus thread on SET_STATION seem to have covered this.

I'm sure they were running load balancing between the seven Citrix servers linked to two data/prog servers. On first test run I got OIPI eval message (probably as app was deployed via RDK in ver 4.0.3 and then had to have full dev 4.0.3 update and reinstall runtime engine - then ditto to get the runtime up to 4.1.3 due to RDK deployment shortcomings in 4.0.x and 4.1.x. Somewhere along the line the OIPI.LIC got replaced - so reinstalling the legit OIPI.LIC then cured. In summary, yes I guess 4.1.3 is healthy in this respect. I'll try to remember to confirm re load balancing when I next speak to client's IT and will post if my assumption is wrong.

We use OIPI32 - but found that it very significantly slows logon (pointless if user doesn't happen to use OIPI). Also problems if it's started and then no data displayed. Hence we only start OIPI32 as soon as a display is ready. Then set flag in spare field in @environ.set to prevent multiple start. On logoff see if OIPI32 running as to whether to stop32. Works well.

Regards

Richard

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