A few weeks ago, one of our customers experienced the problem that some App-V applications were not started until the second start. This seemed to be caused by the registry staging of the App-V application. With App-V Registry Staging, data from the application is copied to the following area of the registry when the application (Publish AppVClientPackage) is released.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\AppV\Client\Packages\<PACKAGEID>\Versions\VERSIONID\REGISTRY

When the action is complete, an empty key RegistryStagingFinished is generated.

As of Citrix XenDesktop Version 7.8 it is possible to use App-V packages (.appv files) directly from the directory. Therefore it is possible to refrain entirely from using an App-V Infrastructure with a Publishing-and-Management server. What you may be missing however are the App-V “Connection Groups”. With XenDesktop 7.11, Citrix integrated “Isolation Groups” into the product. The term means really nothing other than an App-V Connection Group, mixed however with a little Citrix XenDesktop magic in order to simplify greatly the use of Connection Groups. Isolation Groups can only be used with App-V packages directly imported via the directory. Packages that come from  an App-V infrastructure (App-V Management server) cannot be placed into a Citrix Isolation Group. It's also not necessary, since Connection Groups can be defined with an App-V infrastructure and then synchronized on the respective end device upon application launch.

The architecture of a XenDesktop 7.x environment is based upon the use of internal certificates. For internal use, for example for the connection of the StoreFront Server with the Desktop Delivery Controller, one would prefer not be forced to use certificates that need to be changed every year. The standard setting of Microsoft CA for web server certificates is exactly one year. Additionally we will show that a Microsoft CA can be installed using PowerShell.
The Microsoft CA can be attached to every Windows server system via Windows rolls. Certificates can be very easily created with the CA that are valid for one year, for example. In accordance with new requirements almost all data paths in terminal server environments today are being encrypted. Thus even communication with the Citrix STA should occur with encryption. Currently the Microsoft CA offers certificates for two years as standard. It is possible however to create one's own template in order to generate longer multiyear certificates. Here we will describe how to achieve this. First the installation of Microsoft CA with PowerShell. A few settings must absolutely be confirmed. This configuration is good for the creation of a quick certificate. This can also be done in a test environment and thereafter the certificates can be imported into the production environment onto only those servers where they are needed. However no CA should be installed for the entire infrastructure of a company in such a manner. A CA for email encryption requires careful planning. The root certificate of the installation will be replicated automatically in Active Directory. It is thus available after some time on all domain members (server/client). It is recommended to keep the validity period of the root shorter, in the event of critical security problems.