NetScaler SmartControl:
SmartControl allows administrators to define granular policies to configure and enforce user environment attributes for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops on Citrix Gateway. SmartControl allows administrators to manage these policies from a single location, rather than at each instance of these server types.
SmartControl is implemented through ICA policies on Citrix Gateway. Each ICA policy is an expression and access profile combination that can be applied to users, groups, virtual servers, and globally.
Storefront Aggregation
A core functionality of StoreFront is the ability to aggregate and de-duplicate “common” application and desktop resources from multiple Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops (CVAD) Sites. This functionality is commonly referred to as multi-site aggregation. Duplicate applications and desktops are identified based on matching Application Display Name and Application Category properties. This functionality has been available in the console as of version 3.5 and was previously a config file edit.
Connection multiplexing is a method of reusing connections to avoid the overhead on the server that comes with establishing new connections for each request. Connection multiplexing support in Citrix ADC ensures that server connections are efficiently reused, which results in dramatically reduced SSL/TLS load on back-end servers.
Q: What is the connection multiplexing feature of the NetScaler appliance? A: The connection multiplexing feature is the core of the NetScaler appliance functionality.
What is NTFS Stream All files on an NTFS volume consist of at least one stream - the main stream – this is the normal, viewable file in which data is stored. The full name of a stream is of the form below.
<filename>:<stream name>:<stream type>
The default data stream has no name. That is, the fully qualified name for the default stream for a file called “sample.txt” is “sample.txt::$DATA” since “sample.
Mostly, all the companies that use Citrix NetScaler Gateway, want to customize their NetScaler Gateway URL, like changing the logo, background image, Titles, etc. All of this can be done with a theme and Citrix has a direct way of doing this, by creating something called a portal theme. You can go to this option by navigating to Netscaer – Citrix Gateway – Portal Themes. Create a theme, modify it as per your requirement and apply it to your NetScaler Gateway VIP.
What is GSLB? Citrix ADC appliances configured for GSLB provide disaster recovery and ensure continuous availability of applications by protecting against points of failure in a WAN. GSLB balances the load across data centers by directing client requests to the closest or best-performing data center, or to surviving data centers if there is an outage.
In a typical configuration, a local DNS server sends client requests to a GSLB virtual server, to which are bound GSLB services.
NetScaler NSIP shows a white page on the browser while using a custom theme: Note: Below steps work only when using a custom theme.
/var/netscaler/gui/admin_ui - folder will have files and folders required to load the GUI admin portal when you connect to NSIP via the browser. When you upgrade your firmware to the next version, files and folders in this admin_ui folder will be upgraded as this is a system folder, which is created by NetScaler.
Photo by Oğuzhan Akdoğan on Unsplash
In any organization, it is the Citrix team’s responsibility to check the Citrix license usage. We do not have a license usage monitoring and notification feature directly available in all the Citrix versions. This monitoring and reporting feature is available in Citrix Cloud. Citrix Director shows the information but we have to login to the Director portal to see this alert. But in some environments, the Citrix team may not login to the Director portal every day.
Interview question: All the services assigned to Netscaler vserver are up. But still, vserver is showing as “DOWN” state. Why?
This article contains the probable reasons for the status of a virtual server being marked as DOWN on NetScaler.
Status of NetScaler Virtual Servers
The virtual servers on a NetScaler appliance can have any of the following state:
UP DOWN OUT OF SERVICE When the status of the virtual server is marked as UP, it is operational and ready to service requests.
Responder Responder: When users request a webpage, you may want to provide a different page depending on the user geographical location, browser specification, or languages the browser accepts and the order of preference. You might want to drop the connection if the request is coming from an IP range that has been generating DDoS attacks or initiating hacking attempts.
Responder supports protocols such as TCP, DNS (UDP), and HTTP. With responder enabled on your appliance, server responses can be based on who sends the request, where it is sent from, and other criteria with security and system management implications.
