| VMware App Volumes 4, version 2103 | 23 March 2021 | Build 4.4.0.79 Check for additions and updates to these release notes. |
What is in the Release Notes
The release notes cover the following topics:
The VMware App Volumes 4, version 2103 includes new features, bug fixes, and known issues.
What's New
- App Volumes Command-Line Capture Program - A new option is added to the installer beyond the App Volumes Manager and agent. Now, admins can select "App Volumes Tools" when installing on a Windows 10 machine intended for command-line capture. The new appcapture.exe command can be used to package applications without the App Volumes Manager console. This command enables customers to automate packaging with silent installers and package in both the VMDK and VHD formats simultaneously. It also provides other useful tools to convert between VHD and VMDK and works with the MSIX app attach formatted packages.
- Allow package delivery to any operating system - A new global option, similar to the operating system check box in App Volumes 2.x, is added under Advanced Settings which disables the check to ensure that the same operating system is used to package and deliver applications. While App Volumes Manager enforces operating systems to be similar for optimum application compatibility, many applications can work across similar Windows 10 and server versions if the architecture of the operating system is the same and the application supports being transported.
- The default Import Storage Groups interval was changed from 15 minutes to four hours to allow the job to finish for a larger number of packages or slower storage. If you prefer to override the default with a shorter interval for your environment, you can optionally set this back to 15 minutes.
- On the Managed Storage Locations page, a storage can now be marked as read-only so App Volumes Manager skips writing to that storage when updating a package or an AppStack. Since App Volumes now writes additional metadata in order to track updates made to packages, this feature is added to accommodate deployments where the underlying storage used for package replication is read-only on the target App Volumes instance.
- Security updates
Internationalization
App Volumes documentation is available in English.
Resolved Issues
User Utilization and Computer Utilization graph windows on the dashboard in the App Volumes Manager Admin UI included users and computers in the Disabled status. As a result, the count for Total Users and Total Desktops was inaccurate and hence the graph was misleading.
This issue is resolved. The graph windows now exclude users and computers in the Disabled status. [2404274]When automatic application import is enabled for a storage group, multiple Import Applications jobs can be scheduled for different storage locations. The jobs might run at the same time which results in the applications taking a longer time to import. This results in errors which can be viewed in the ACTIVITY -> System Messages tab of the App Volumes Manager UI. The applications eventually get imported. [2722418]
When certain App Volumes background jobs such as Import Applications take a long time to complete, volume replication does not occur across multiple manager instances and end users are unable to receive the application packages. [2728853]
Invalid session cookie issue occurs intermittently at end user login and can be seen in the ACTIVITY -> System Messages tab of the App Volumes Manager UI. When the issue occurs during login, volume attachments might fail and the following error message is displayed on the agent computer: Volumes were not mounted due to an error on the server. [2689736]
.msi installation fails with the error The system cannot open the device or file specified when a drive letter is assigned to a disk used for capture or to a Writable Volume and the .msi package is run using the drive letter path. [2697719]
When an end user with a UIA+Profile or UIA-only Writable Volume logs into an agent computer and an older version of Chrome which is already installed on the base image gets updated to a later version, then on subsequent user logins the following error is seen and Chrome fails to run:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe
The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect. Please see that application event log or use the command-line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail.[2703435]
Application packages and Writable Volumes with printer definitions might cause built-in Windows 10 Printers (Fax, Microsoft Print to PDF, Microsoft XPS Document Writer, and OneNote for Windows 10) to appear twice in the Control Panel’s Devices and Printers applet. [2694244]
When the ArcGis application is launched with App Volumes, the application takes very long to start. [2694800]
Text is missing from many screen elements in an uncommon use case: Attach an app package that contains fonts. Disconnect the current session. Logon as a different user. [2698151]
After upgrading to App Volumes 4, version 2012 and later, the custom folder goes missing. [2722083]
Known Issues
Writable Volumes (2.x) are not automatically created for newly added members of an Active Directory group. [2811942]
Workaround: Create the Writable Volume manually for the user.
Shellstart.bat is not triggered after a Writable Volume gets attached. This impacts the Outlook (.ost) file redirection when natively installed Microsoft Office is deployed with a UIA-only Writable Volume. Any command added to shellstart.bat is ignored. [2749874]
App Volumes Manager does not bring agent computers online when they are running inside a linked clone desktop pool. This issue affects the master image virtual machine and linked clone pool virtual machines. [2749372]
When creating Writable Volumes for a group with many users before user login (Delay check box is not selected), the Create Writable Volume page times out with a Server Timeout error. However, the background job for creating Writable Volumes continues to run and Writable Volumes are created for the group. [2722421]
Workaround: To continue performing further operations, refresh the App Volumes Manager Admin UI.
When many users are logging into their desktops simultaneously, Writable Volumes might not get created for a few users and they might not be able to log in to a desktop. This issue does not occur if the users already have an existing Writable Volume. [2115623]
Workaround: The users must log in again or have an administrator pre-create the Writable Volume for the user.
A Writable Volume move or copy operation might fail when bulk operations are performed on many volumes. [2115593]
Workaround: Retry the move or copy operation.
Invalid session cookie error messages from user session logoff might be seen in the ACTIVITY -> System Messages tab of the App Volumes Manager UI. [2646276]
When the "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion" registry key is enumerated on a virtual machine which has App Volumes and the Guest Introspection security feature enabled, the virtual machine crashes. [2720312]
When a UIA+profile Writable Volume is attached, excluded programs fail in various ways when attempting to create or access files in C:\Users\<UserID> or any of its subfolders. [2721859]
NOTE: An excluded program is a program whose executable is in a folder which is excluded in snapvol.cfg or the program's executable itself is excluded in snapvol.cfg.
App-V packages do not load when App Volumes agent is used either with a UIA+profile or Profile-only Writable Volume. [2434176]
Sometimes, the applications that are packaged using App Volumes versions older than 2.18.2 have many redundant firewall rules. These rules can impact the end-user login time on agent computers where the application package is deployed.
This issue is fixed in App Volumes 2.18.2 and later. [2624048]Workaround: If you are migrating an application package created in an App Volumes version earlier than 2.18.2 with such an issue, repackage the application after migrating to the target version.
A user-initiated reboot during a package update, prior to the reboot requested by App Volumes as part of capture complete, results in App Volumes deleting any service present on the package. [2724792]
svdriver does not load after installing App Volumes Tools on the virtual machine which has secure boot enabled. As a result, package capture times out with the following error messages:
ERROR: disk-identify event not signaled after 300 secs
ERROR: program failed in install mode CmdNew (Error: 0x0)[2771263]
Workaround: Disable secure boot on the virtual machine that has App Volumes Tools installed.
