I'm looking for some reassurance, help, guidance before I go insane. Please excuse my venting, as I have wasted months of valuable time trying to get this working so my frustration level is at an all-time high. I understand the app volume add-on was an acquisition, but the lack of documentation, tools, etc that come with it is down right embarrising for what VMware charges for it. I get the concept, and have been excitied about implementing it to get rid of ThinApps, App-V applications, and RDS, but the inconsistecy of this solution is making me have second thoughts. I am currently working in a test environment with View 6.2, UEM 3.7, and App Volumes 2.9. Our linked-clone pool is setup with a basic Windows 7 image with nothing installed except Office 365 (because it won't work as an app stack). I used the Windows 7 optimization guide, downloaded the Horizon tool for Windows 7 and all seems to work well. Office 365 was installed using this guide: How-to configure Office 365 Pro in a non-persistent VDI environment | SvenHuisman.com and the pool is configured without persistent disks or persona, but does utilize UEM. Now, on to the problem.
Default App Stack:
- Adobe Reader
- Java / Flash / Silverlight / Quicktime
- Basic ERP client software
- Chrome
- Firefox
- Webex Productivity Tools
- Cisco Jabber
Admin App Stack:
- VMware vSphere Client
- FileZilla
- mRemoteNG / Putty
- SolarWinds IP Address Tracker
- UEM Management Console
- Other misc utilities
All the app stacks were installed on a clean image with nothing but VMware tools and the App volume agent. Both app stacks were created multiple times to see if an install was corrupt but the result are the same.
Issues:
- Whenever an app stack is attached (computer or user), Office 365 will stop working. It may take a week, a day, an hour, etc. It just will not launch and give bizzare messages. Sometimes a reboot will work, sometimes a refresh or recompose is necessary. Removing the app stack hasn't proven to make a difference if a reboot doesn't help. The messages range from "Run the repair installation" to even times where the .exe is missing.
- If no app stacks are attached, Office 365 and the VM works flawlessly and does not crash or stop working.
- If just the default app stack is attached to the user, strange performance behavior will happen. For example, Chrome will sometimes not load a webpage, will perform very slow, or when a new tab is loaded you will get the "Oops...he's dead Jim" message and nothing will work unless you close and restart Chrome. Other applications will have bizzare issues that can't be re-produced. However, if I attach the app stack to the computer, these issues won't appear. I'm assuming because of some of the services that are installed with Adobe and Chrome?
- If the default app stack and admin app stack are attached, the VM will randomly crash and reboot. I have looked through the ESX logs, VDM logs, App Stack logs, and even event viewer and there's nothing specific that comes up. The machine does a complete shutdown and is started back up by the server.
I'm sure there's other issues that I'm forgetting about, but the main thing is Office 365. I can't seem to pinpoint what app stack is causing the issue. For example, I thought it was the Admin stack so I removed that and ran for a couple weeks with no issues on the default stack. My colleague had the same setup and now his started crashing. I guess my biggest complaint is I can't seem to find any type of log to see what is going on when this VM shuts down, or when Office 365 stops working. I feel like I'm just throwing darts blind folded and because the issues are consistent, it takes me 2-3 weeks just to find out it doesn't work. If anyone has experienced anything like this, please let me know. I would love to open a VMware support ticket, but because I can't pinpoint the issue I know it will be a huge waste of time (given my past experience with VMware support). I'm also tired of playing the "wait for the next release" game, as we bought this in December 2014 because it was supposed to change everything and I feel like VMware pushed this product down our throats without fully integrating it into the Horizon stack (off the soap box now). I will happily provide logs, screenshots, examples if anyone wants to take a stab at this. Thanks for letting me vent, and thanks for any help or guidance on this issue. I feel better...for now