Typical StoreFront Architecture

Typical StoreFront Architecture

For more information, please refer to Citrix eDocs:

• Use the SSL Relay (XenApp 6.5 & Below Only)

• Use SSL on XenDesktop & XenApp 7.5 Controllers

• Secure your StoreFront environment

Decision: Routing Receiver with Beacons

Citrix Receiver uses beacon points (websites) to identify whether a user is connected to an internal or external network. Internal users are connected directly to resources while external users are connected via Citrix NetScaler Gateway. It is possible to control what a user sees by restricting applications due to which beacon they have access to.

The internal beacon should not be a site that is resolvable externally. By default, the internal beacon is the StoreFront service URL. The external beacon can be any external site that will produce an http response. Citrix Receiver continuously monitors the status of network connections (for example, link up, link down or change of the default gateway). When a status change is detected, Citrix Receiver will first verify that the internal beacon points can be accessed before moving on to check the accessibility of external beacon points. StoreFront provides Citrix Receiver with the http(s) addresses of the beacon points during the initial connection process and provides updates as necessary.

It is necessary to specify at least two highly available external beacons that can be resolved from public networks.

Decision: Resource Presentation

StoreFront displays resources differently than Web Interface. Instead of having all accessible resources appear on the home screen, first time users are invited to choose (subscribe) to the

resources they want to regularly use after they logon. Before a user can launch an application, they must first choose which resources should be placed on their home screen. This approach, deemed “Self-Service”, allows users to restrict the resources that they see on their home screen to the ones that they use on a regular basis. The resources chosen by every user for each store are recorded by

the subscription store service so that they can be displayed on the Citrix Receiver home screen from any device that the user connects from.

Administrators should determine which applications should always be displayed to users on their home screen or the featured tab. These applications will vary for each deployment and should be

defined during the Assess Phase of a Citrix Assessment. In general, these applications are common applications such as Microsoft Word and any other applications that every user in an environment

may need. StoreFront can filter/present these resources using Keywords.

Using Keywords is a very simple way to prepopulate a user’s home screen. To add applications to the home screen, add KEYWORDS:Auto to the application or desktop description in XenApp or XenDesktop. Another option that can be used to organize resources is using the keyword KEYWORDS:Featured. Unlike the Auto keyword, which places certain resources on the home screen, the Featured keyword only places resources in the Featured category

The resource will also appear in another category if a Client Application folder has been specified.

In addition the string KEYWORDS:prefer=”application” can be used to specify that the locally installed version of an application should be used in preference to the equivalent delivered instance if both are available.

For more information please refer to Citrix eDocs – Optimize the user experience and Configure application delivery.

Decision: Scalability

The number of Citrix Receiver users supported by a single StoreFront server depends on the resources assigned and level of user activity:

For an optimal user experience, Citrix recommends that no more than ten XenDesktop, XenApp, App Controller and VDI-in-a-Box deployments are aggregated into a single store.

Synchronization Database – If users connect to multiple StoreFront servers within an environment, their personalized settings (application subscriptions) are immediately stored on the StoreFront server and replicated to other StoreFront servers. The Synchronization Database on each StoreFront server needs to be large enough to accommodate user and application subscriptions, about 3 KB per user per app.

Decision: Multi-site App Synchronization

Moving between multiple locations would benefit from synchronization of their application subscriptions between multiple deployments. For example, a user based in Location 1 can log on to the StoreFront deployment in Location 1, access the store, and subscribe to some applications. If same user would travel to Location 2 and accessed a similar store provided by the Location 2 StoreFront deployment, the user would have to re-subscribe to all of their applications once again.

Each StoreFront deployment maintains details of users’ application subscriptions separately by default. By configuring subscription synchronization between the stores, it is possible to ensure that users only need to subscribe to applications in one location. The interval for the subscription synchronization will vary from site to site due to the distance between sites. The recommended interval should be less than the time needed for a user to travel from one site to another. For more information on how to use PowerShell with StoreFront 2.5, please refer to the Citrix eDocs article – To configure subscription synchronization.