VMware App Volumes 2203 Release Notes

VMware App Volumes 2203 | 05 APR 2022 | Build 4.6.0.102

Check for additions and updates to these release notes.

What's New

Global Packaging and Delivery: Multi-instance Assignment and Marker Synchronization
This feature completes the set of multi-instance management feature, first released in VMware App Volumes 4, version 2111. Administrators can now configure a new target instance and optionally enable synchronization of markers and assignments. This capability replaces the need to App Volumes Entitlement Sync Fling . Administrators can now control global application packaging and delivery from one single console.
Apps on Demand: Command-line Delivery
App Volumes agent now provides two command-line options app deliver and app run that can be used in scripts for delivering and running applications. They can also create their own shortcuts or even leverage VMware Dynamic Environment Manager to manage shortcuts and file type associations to invoke applications. If the application is not on the system and the user or machine is entitled to the application, the application is automatically delivered and launched for the user in real time.
App Volumes API Guide and Reference
The APIs and documentation are now publicly available on VMware {code} for VMware App Volumes 4, version 2203.
Maximum number of disks supported per PVSCSI Controller
Up to 64 disks, including an operating system disk, can now be added to each PVSCSI Controller when using vSphere 6.7 and later. Customers on earlier versions of vSphere are still limited to 15 disks per controller. In earlier versions of App Volumes Manager, administrators had to add more controllers (up to 4) to get more than 15 disks. Now, one controller can support the same quantity thus avoiding the overhead of adding more controllers.
Prohibit the end-user Modification of App Volumes and Base Image Applications
Applications residing in the base image and delivered in application packages are intended to be managed by administrators. End users must not be allowed to modify such applications. This feature is particularly important when using a UIA-based Writable Volume wherein the users can potentially uninstall or update an application and inadvertently save this application state permanently in the Writable Volume. This feature prevents modifications of such applications by end users.

For more information about the VMware App Volumes 4, version 2203 features, see the VMware App Volumes Administration Guide at VMware Docs.

Internationalization

App Volumes content is available only in English.

Resolved Issues

Application continues to remain in the "Deleting" status on the source instance and gets deleted when the background job for synchronization runs in the next interval. [2939216]
Import Storage Group job fails when corrupted package metadata is imported from the datastore. The job is retried three times and then fails completely. As a result, the other background jobs get queued up increasing the pending job count. [2927483]
Due to the issue related to the high number of snapvol_operating_systems records for the AppStacks and Application Packages, the volume imports and replications are slow and the App Volumes Manager admin UI is slow to load the "Volume (2.x)" page. [2916968]
Changes to the "Delivery" mode setting on the Edit Package page in the source App Volumes Manager instance is not synchronized to the target instance. [2932478]
Unable to register an additional App Volumes Manager server when using HTTPS within the same App Volumes Manager instance and the following error is displayed: Failed to connect Manager Service with guid <> to "user@host:443". [2898903]
Invalid session cookie issue occurs intermittently at end user login or logoff 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. [2646276]
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]
During package update, the following message is displayed on the agent computer Timed out when loading assigned volumes, please retry or contact your administrator. However, this message does not affect the update process. [2920311]
Some of the shortcuts of on-demand applications appear as blank icons on the Desktop or in the Start menu until these applications are delivered to the end-user. [2921339]

Known Issues

App Volumes Manager installation fails with the following error: Unable to install App Volumes Manager with region language (Control Panel setting) except English when the language setting on the virtual machine is Arabic. [2884143]
Workaround: Change the language to English and then install App Volumes Manager.
In the "Synchronization View", applying any filter does not display the "Disabled" assignments and filtering with the "Status" field does not return any results ("Enabled" or "Disabled" assignments). Hence, assignments in the "Disabled" status are not displayed in the Synchronization view. As a result, managing the synchronization progress of the assignments is difficult when there are a large number of "Disabled" assignments. [2946144]
Workaround: To view or manage the "Disabled" assignments, sort by “Status” in the descending order.
On the Entity (Users/Computers/Groups/OrgUnit) details pages, assignments that are synchronized from a source instance can be unassigned from the target instance. However, removing these assignments results in a difference in the assignments between the source and target instances. Assignment resolution on the target instance can result in an unexpected set of attached applications or packages. [2945877]
Workaround: To restore the assignments on the target instance, use Synchronize button for that specific target instance. To synchronize all the targets registered for a source instance, you can use Synchronize Targets button. For more information about the Synchronize and Synchronize Targets functionalities in the App Volumes Manager admin UI, see VMware App Volumes Administration Guide at VMware Docs.
Even after unassigning an application that is synchronized, deleted assignments might remain in the Synchronization View (Assignments table) on the Application details page and the Assignments page in the App Volumes Admin UI. However, these assignments which are in the "Disabled" status do not accurately display the state of assignments on the target instance. This issue occurs only if application synchronization fails while synchronizing the assignments of the application. For more information about the Synchronization view, see VMware App Volumes Administration Guide on VMware Docs. [2942256]
Workaround: Navigate to the Application details page in the App Volumes Admin UI, display the Synchronization view, and click Unassign. This operation deletes the assignments again.
When a database failover occurs, App Volumes Manager displays a maintenance page with the appropriate database error message. The App Volumes service fails to recover and continues displaying the maintenance page even after the database is back online from the failover. [2691524]
Applications packaged on Windows 11 are shown as packaged with Windows 10 in App Volumes Manager. [2841689]
App Volumes is unable to capture the GroupWise Messenger application. The capture fails due to an internal error in App Volumes. This failure is presented as a message displayed immediately by the GroupWise installer: "Class not registered". [2924188]
An MSIX application delivered as an on-demand package to an end user fails to launch in the first attempt. [2947214]
Workaround: For the application to launch successfully, user must click open the shortcut again.
Explorer.exe opens instead of the actual MSIX application for an MSIX package when the app run command is used in the target path of the application’s simulated shortcut. [2947387]
Workaround: For the application to launch successfully, the end user must click open the simulated shortcut again.
On Windows 10 1607 and Windows Server 2016, folders on App Volumes are occasionally changed to zero-length files. Sometimes this makes the applications in these folders unavailable. Other times, the applications in these folders are still accessible. [2937254]
When a remote printer is defined on a UIA+Profile Writable Volume and the printer is attached to its print server through a USB interface, the printer definition on the Writable Volume might get deleted on the next non-persistent logon. [2845852]
Workaround:

On the system volume, add the following two scripts to %SVAgent%\Config\Custom\uia_plus_profile:
```
OnPreLoadApp.bat: sc config spooler start= disabled net stop spooler OnPostEnableApp.bat: sc config spooler start= auto net start spooler
```
If you already have the same script names on the Writable Volume, add the spooler commands to the scripts.

When a script is present on a Writable Volume and in the system volume at %SVAgent%\Config\Custom\uia_plus_profile, App Volumes agent runs the script present on the Writable Volume and ignores the script on the system volume. To ensure that the App Volumes agent runs both scripts, you can add the following to the script on the Writable Volume:

if exist "%SVAgent%\Config\Custom\uia_plus_profile\%~nx0" ("%SVAgent%\Config\Custom\uia_plus_profile\%~nx0")
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 into 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.
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.
When a Writable Volume and FSLogix Office Container are deployed together in a VDI, the FSLogix Office Container VHD is not created on an SMB file share. This issue occurs only when the Cloud Cache feature is enabled. [2791414]
Workaround: Disable the Cloud Cache feature of FSLogix Office Container.
Application installers that create data at a sub-path of HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\NetworkProvider registry key might impact application behavior and the application might not work as expected. The symptoms vary and are dependent on the application. A common symptom is that when the application is captured, the modified registry data at the sub-path of HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\NetworkProvider is created on the base volume instead of in the application package. As a result, the application does not behave as expected. For example: In one of the scenarios, the single sign on functionality did not work for an application. [2871141]
Workaround: Before deploying the application package, create the application data on the VDI image and roll out the updated image. Deploy the application package, test the application, and ensure that the application behaves as expected.