When you create an application pool from a list of installed applications, Horizon automatically displays the applications that are available on all the Linux host machines in the farm. You can publish one or more applications from the list as an application pool. Each published application can support multiple user sessions at the same time.

Prerequisites

  • Install the application on all the Linux host machines in the base farm.
  • Create a farm of the Linux host machines. See Create a Manual Farm of Linux Virtual Machines or Create an Automated Instant-Clone Farm of Linux Hosts.
    Note: Only virtual machines running RHEL Workstation 7.8, 7.9, 8.1, 8.2, or 8.3 or Ubuntu 18.04 can be configured as multi-session hosts for published applications. vGPU capabilities are not supported for published applications.
    Note: In this release, virtual machines running Ubuntu 20.04 can support published desktop pools but not published application pools.

Procedure

  1. In Horizon Console, select Inventory > Applications.
  2. Select Add > Add from Installed Applications.
    The pool configuration wizard appears.
  3. In the Select Applications page of the wizard, configure the required settings.
    Setting Description
    Application Pool Type

    Select RDS Farm and then select a Linux-based farm from the drop-down menu.

    Note: To create a Linux application pool, you must base the pool on a farm of Linux host machines that are enabled for multi-session capabilities. Horizon does not support the creation of Linux application pools from a virtual desktop pool of single-session Linux machines.
    Select installed applications

    From the list of installed applications, select the application that you want to publish.

    If you select multiple applications from the list, a separate application pool is created for each application.

    Pre-Launch

    Select this option to configure an application so that an application session is launched before a user opens the application in Horizon Client. When a published application is launched, the application opens more quickly in Horizon Client.

    If you enable this option, the configured application session is launched before a user opens the application in Horizon Client, regardless of how the user connects to the server from Horizon Client.

    Note: Application sessions can be disconnected when the Pre-launch Session Timeout (Applications Only) option is set when you add or edit the Linux-based farm.
    Connection Server Restrictions

    You can restrict access to the application pool from certain Connection Servers by clicking Browse and selecting one or more Connection Servers. The default value is No Restrictions.

    If you intend to provide access to published applications through VMware Workspace ONE Access and you configure Connection Server restrictions, VMware Workspace ONE Access application might display applications to users when those applications are actually restricted. VMware Workspace ONE Access users will be unable to start these applications.
    Category Folder

    You can specify the name of the category folder that contains a Start menu shortcut for the application pool entitlement on Windows client devices. To configure this setting, click Browse. The default value is Disabled.
    Client Restrictions

    Select whether to restrict access to entitled application pools from certain client computers.

    You must add the names of the computers that are allowed to access the application pool in an Active Directory security group. You can select this security group when you add users or groups to the application pool entitlement.

    This setting is disabled by default.
    Entitle Users After Adding Pool Select this option to open the Add Entitlements dialog box automatically after the pool is created.
    Multi-Session Mode

    Select Disabled.

    Note: Linux application pools do not support enabling multi-session mode. If you specify a setting to enable multi-session mode, that setting has no effect.

    Linux published applications can only be configured in single-session mode. For example, if a user opens a published application on client A and then opens the same published application or another published application based on the same farm on client B, then the session on client A is disconnected and reconnected on client B.
    Click Next to proceed to the next page of the configuration wizard.
  4. In the Edit Applications page of the wizard, optionally edit the following settings.
    Setting Description
    ID Unique name that identifies the pool in Horizon Console.
    Display Name Pool name that users see when they log in to Horizon Client. If you do not specify a display name, it will be the same as ID.
  5. Click Submit to create the published application pool.

What to do next

Entitle users to access the pool. You can also view the number of entitled users that are using a published application in the User Count column in the application pools page.

If you must ensure that Connection Server starts the application only on Linux host machines that have sufficient resources to run the application, configure an anti-affinity rule for the application pool. For more information, see Setting Up Published Desktops and Applications in Horizon.