Analyzing Citrix Reconnect Times with ControlUp

A user was looking for inspiration on gathering data from ControlUp agents to analyze long connect/reconnect times for a Citrix Shared Desktop session. Members shared that ControlUp recently added a feature to measure Citrix session reconnect times with a breakdown of processes, and offered a script that measures reconnect stages. Another user mentioned working on a solution for measuring endpoint authentication and requested assistance from members with a working Imprivata setup. The conversation concluded with the user planning to reach out to the members for further assistance.

Read the entire ‘Analyzing Citrix Reconnect Times with ControlUp’ thread below:

Hi,

We are looking for some inspiration for the following task, and would like to see what data we can get from ControlUp agents.

We are experiencing (in our view) long connect/reconnect times for Citrix Shared Desktop session.

We would like to use ControlUp to help gather these times, and map out and analyze the time spent during the connect/reconnect.

We have 2 scenarios/Use cases we would like to look into.

Scenario 1:

This is the most commonly used scenario.

In this scenario the users taps his ID card, inputs a pin code and is automatically connected/reconnected to their Citrix Shared Desktop session.

Equipment used:

• “kiosk” type Windows 11 PC
• Imprivate OneSign Tap-in/Tap-out
• Windows Defender AV
• Ivanti Environment Management
• ControlUp for Endpoints
• Citrix Workspace 2503

Scenario 2:

In this scenario the users logs into a on-prem Citrix Storefront website and chooses the published Desktop or Application

Users could also use Start menu integration from the Workspace and start them

Equipment used:

• “Full” type Windows 11 PC
• Windows Defender AV
• Ivanti Environment Management
• ControlUp for Endpoints
• Citrix Workspace 2503

At the moment the average time spent from when the users have tapped their ID card and typed their pin, to when the have reconnected to their session and it is displayed on the monitor, is approx 18 sec.

During a recent update where we went from Workspace App 2212 to 2503 alone put almost 4 second on the reconnect time but have no way to see where in the process this time is spent.

We are looking for inspiration as to what logs,values etc we might need too look at to break down the process

We are only interested in the time spent on the endpoint from initial “tap-In” or click on application. The time spent on the VDA logon process is well documented using the logon analysis script from ControlUp.

We would be looking into something like the following time breakdown “chunks”

• Imprivata Authentication
• ICA file retrieval
• ICA/HDX Session connection time

Any further breakdown of these would also be interesting.

We should be able to gather all of this directly from the endpoint with no data from the VDA backed being needed.

As we see it ControlUp do not at the moment have any “turn-key” script solution to do this data gathering.

Hope that the community have some ideas to what we should be looking at.

Hi @member, very timely question… (even maybe better to ask in #…)

We just recently added “Citrix Session Reconnect time” columns to CU4VDI, that includes the breakdown you are looking fair, and a script that covers that as well

@member is the man behind this, and I am sure he can share the scripts

the Session Reconnect metrics feature itself maybe in a private build, but @member can give us the exact details

(actually, “..We should be able to gather all of this directly from the endpoint with no data from the VDA backed being needed.” we are getting this data from VDA, using the Citrix WMI data, I am not sure its available on the physical endpoint. so I strongly suggest getting this “pre-windows” logon times from the VDA)

(but maybe @member knows better)

The reason for wanting to pick up the data from the endpoint is that there is a lot going on, on the endpoint before it actually connects to the Citrix Backend to request the ICA file.

As an example, Imprivata authentication is performed, and then the Imprivata client connects to the Citrix installation in order to get the ICA file.

I believe that we from the VDA only have the possibility to track what is going on from when the endpoint contacts the Citrix Infrastructure, but I might be wrong.

Let’s see what @member and @member have to say…

Hi @member, I’ve been working with another ControlUp customer on measuring reconnects and I created something for them to measure their reconnects.

As per what @member mentioned, the CU4VDI is coming with the ability to measure some of the stages of a reconnect by collecting information from what Citrix sends to the VDA.

The current end result is we can measure from when the Citrix Storefront server is contacted (eg, ICA file retrieval) to when the session is “reconnected” to the VDA.

This means we have information from these two stages that we can supply to you today:

• ICA file retrieval
• ICA/HDX Session connection time

I understand you want to measure from the endpoint authentication (which I don’t currently have a solution) to the connection to Citrix. I think this may be possible but I need some help and you might be able to assist me. I need a working Imprivata setup to investigate if we can pull out markers for the Imprivata authentication piece.

Thank you for the replies, I will reach out to you @member and see what is possible

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