Is Getting Started with Windows Server 2019 and Citrix Cloud Apps and Desktops Service Even Easier? Let’s Have a Look…

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Yesterday I wrote a blog post, which you can find here, talking about Windows Server 2019 with Citrix Apps and Desktops 7 1808 (Current Release), which received a bit of buzz online. One online protagonist (who shall remain nameless) reached out to see if Citrix Cloud Apps and Desktops Service with Windows Server 2019 worked as advertised, and was just as easy to implement. To which my thought was, I don’t see why not, Citrix Cloud is Agile, DevOps oriented, evergreen and even more leading edge in the development cycles than its on-prem brethren, it should be a snap!

Then I thought to myself…Writing a Windows Server 2019 with Citrix Cloud article would seem somewhat boring or passé, what would make it more interesting? Deployment in Azure with NVIDIA graphics accelerated NV instances for GPU-intensive applications on Windows Server 2019, and throw in some single-user Windows 10 LTSC 2019 or 1809 (formerly HDX 3D Pro) for good fun. Well, that blog post may come at a later time, but for now I simply didn’t have enough time as there are a few more steps required. Microsoft has not yet released images for WS 2019 or Win 10 LTSC 2019/1809 in the Azure Marketplace, so I would need to upload custom images to my Azure subscription. For now, I’ll start with a simple blog post demonstrating just how easy it is to get Windows Server 2019 stood up, with apps and desktops published via Citrix Cloud Apps and Desktops Service. You’ll also get to see a bit of the Workspace web experience, which as many of you already know, takes the place of StoreFront for CR and LTSR traditional deployments.

To get started, we will need even fewer components (reference the previous post for more details):

  • Virtualization platform
  • Windows Server 2019 ISO
  • Valid e-mail address to request a Citrix Cloud trial

I’ll spare you the obligatory introductory overview showing how to Install and Configure Windows Server 2019 from an ISO, you can find that in my previous post. From that template I have deployed a new server named WS19CC01 (Cloud Connector 1) which will be used as my single server for this basic deployment. Again, for production deployments, Citrix and I would recommend multiple Cloud Connectors, and the VDAs should be deployed on separate systems. However, for basic evaluations it absolutely works to deploy all components on a single system. Here’s a great diagram showing the Citrix Cloud architecture with the Cloud Connectors and VDAs:

For more details, see: https://docs.citrix.com/en-us/citrix-virtual-apps-desktops-service

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