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Announcing the Completed Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7

General support for VMware Horizon 7 ends April 30, 2023, impacting all versions up to and including VMware Horizon 7.13. Read this blog to understand why and how to upgrade to Horizon 8 now: “Top 8 Reasons to Upgrade to VMware Horizon 8.”

The entire Reviewer’s Guide for View in Horizon 7 is now available! Posted as eight slim sections, this white paper series walks you through the setup and exploration of the View component of Horizon 7. Using easy-to-follow diagrams and screenshots, it examines the major features of View, including setting up desktop pools, provisioning end users, creating and using instant clones, all about Smart Policies, and much more.

Each section contains visual aids and practical exercises about the following topics:

Overview

The Overview starts the series by introducing the View component of VMware Horizon 7, discussing benefits, features, and architecture; and describing how View and other Horizon 7 components interoperate. See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Overview.

Horizon 7 architecture

Installation and Configuration

The Installation and Configuration section walks you through the installation process and initial configuration processes. When you finish this section, you have a working deployment that you can use to explore the main View features. See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Installation and Configuration.

Preparing VMs for Desktop Pools

The Preparing VMs for Desktop Pools section describes how to build a virtual machine, and how to use it as the master image for multiple desktop pools. You can then use this virtual machine in subsequent guides to create full-clone pools, linked-clone pools, and instant-clone pools. See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Preparing Virtual Machines for Desktop Pools.

Instant Clones

The Instant Clones section introduces VMware Instant Clone Technology, which improves and accelerates the process of creating cloned virtual desktops. This section describes how to create an instant-clone desktop pool, as well as how to update it to use a new master image.

When you use Instant Clone Technology, the desktop gets deleted when the user logs out, and a new desktop is created using the most current image on which the instant-clone pool is based. This requires less storage and expense to manage and update than other types of virtual desktops. See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Instant Clones.

Desktop Pools

The Desktop Pools section shows you how to automate the process of making many identical virtual desktops, including how to create full-clone desktop pools, linked-clone desktop pools, and session-based RDSH desktop pools.

See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Desktop Pools.

Publishing Applications

The Publishing Applications section shows how to quickly install and deploy published applications with VMware Horizon 7. Publishing applications simplifies management of line-of-business applications, allows the delivery of Windows applications to non-Windows devices, and can potentially provide licensing advantages. The Published Applications feature supports a variety of remote-experience features, including HTML Access, client-drive redirection, access to locally connected USB devices, file-type association, Windows media redirection, content redirection, printer redirection, location-based printing, 3D rendering, smart card authentication, and more. Users can launch an application, save files, and use network resources from a remote RDSH server, just as if the users had the application installed on their local computers, tablets, or phones. See more in Quick-Start Guide: Publishing Applications with VMware Horizon 7.

Smart Policies

The Smart Policies feature of VMware User Environment Manager is included with VMware Horizon 7 Enterprise Edition. Smart Policies give you granular control over the user’s desktop experience, based on who the user is, as well as variables such as client device, IP address, pool name, and more. You can enable or disable clipboard redirection, USB access, printing, and client drive redirection. You can also customize the user experience based on user context and location. Smart Policies can be enforced based on role, and evaluated at login and logout, and disconnect and reconnect, and at predetermined refresh intervals. With all these capabilities and fine-grained control, you can use one desktop pool to address many different use cases. See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Smart Policies.

Provisioning Users

The Provisioning Users section explores the process of entitling users to desktop pools and application pools, as well as how to connect to virtual desktops and published applications from a variety of client devices. This section shows how to entitle users when creating a pool, or after the pool is created. See more in Reviewer’s Guide for View in VMware Horizon 7: Provisioning Users.

JMP

Horizon 7 includes JMP, the just-in-time management platform, which allows desktop or RDSH server components to be decoupled and managed independently in a centralized manner, and reconstituted on demand to deliver a personalized user workspace when needed.

JMP provides several key benefits, including simplified desktop and RDSH image management, faster delivery and maintenance of applications, and elimination of the need to manage full persistent desktops. To find out more, see Jump (JMP), Radio & a Pony: Your Journey to Modern Workspace Management.

Now that all eight sections of the Reviewer’s Guide series are available, you can explore them:

To comment on this paper, contact VMware End-User-Computing Technical Marketing at [email protected].

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