Part 2 | Installing VMware Horizon View 5.x Replica Server – Step-by-Step guide

To provide high availability and load balancing, you can install one or more additional instances of View Connection Server that replicate an existing View Connection Server instance. After a replica installation, the existing and newly installed instances of View Connection Server are identical.

VMware Horizon View series:

• Part 1 – Install VMware View 5.x Connection Server
• Part 2 – Install  VMware View5.x Replica Server
• Part 3 – Install VMware View 5.x Security Server
• Part 4 – Install VMware View Composer
• Part 5 – Install VMware View 5.x Transfer Server
• Part 6 – Install VMware View Agent

The installation of View Replica Server is pretty straight forward.The hardware and software requirements are the same as the first View CS Standard installation.

Table.1

Supported Operation Systems

Table.2

In addition there are few more prerequisites:

1. You must be logged as a user who has administrator role defined at the View Administrator portal or a member of a group with administrator role. (For more info at Point 8)
2. The View Connection Replica Server must reside on the same LAN network as the View Connection Standard Server. Replication of the LDAP database is not supported through a WAN.
3. View Connection Replica Server must not be installed on the same physical or virtual server as any other View Infrastructure component (Connection Standard Server, Security Server, Transfer, Composer, View Agent or View Client)

Let’s begin with the installation

First of all you must have downloaded the installation media accessible from the View CS server. If you do not have it, you can download it from the VMware download page

1. Run the View Connection installer.In our case we are going to use VMware-viewconnectionserver-x86_64-5.2.0-987719, but the guide is compatible also with installation of View 5.3.x and to some extends to VMware Horizon View 6.x.
2. Welcome Wizard where you can verify the version which you are going to install.Click Next to continue…
3. License Agreement. Read and select I accept to continue and click Next
4. Select the destination folder for the installation. We recommend to use the default unless you don’t have a good reason not to. Click Next to continue…
5. Since we have already installed Standard Server (Spep-by-Step) if we need a second Connection Server member of the same View Pod we must choose Replica.
6. Now you must enter the hostname or the IP address of one of the existing View Connection servers in the Pod. Using hostname is recommended. Also this is the server which replicated LDAP database our new Connection Replica Server will use.
7. It is possible to get warning message like this bellow. If you have it you will not be able to continue until find the reason it appears. In our case we get the warning because the user run the installation was logged in after it has been added to the View Administrator group. To resolve the issue you must log out and log in again and run the installation again. Also it is possible to appear if you don’t have sufficient permissions on the server or on the View infrastructure.
8. If you have Windows Firewall turned On, we recommend to leave the default option. You are also provided with information what modification will be made on the Windows Firewall settings. If you use physical firewalls and Windows Firewall is not in use, you should choose Do not configure Windows Firewall. Click Next to continue…
9. The last step before the installation begins is to confirm by clicking Install…If the installation is successful you must get screen like that

We recommend reading the readme file. It doesn’t contain only information about the installation but for the version of Horizon View 5.x in general.

If you use Windows Firewall and chose the automatic Windows Firewall configuration after installation completes you can verify what is changed on its configuration. Here are the results:

Outbound rules

Inbound Rules

The newly installed services are:

Even it is not required, we recommend rebooting the server and verifying that all the services are being run automatically.

To be sure that the installation is fully successful you can login to the View Administrator console from the shortcut on the server desktop or using https://ViewCSReplica_address/admin using an ID from member of the domain group defined during the installation (Step…)

View Administrator supports the following browsers:

• Internet Explorer 8
• Internet Explorer 9
• Internet Explorer 10 (from a Windows 8 system in Desktop mode)
• Firefox 6 and later releases

With installed Adobe Flash Player 10 or newer.

Logged to the Replica Server you can manage all resources as you are logged on the ‘primary’ View Connection Standard Server. Also if the Standard Server crash the Replica Server will remain fully functional.

References:

VMware Horizon View Installation

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Nikolay Nikolov

VDI Engineer

Nikolay has 9 years work experience in IT and 5 of them in the Virtualization technologies mainly based on VMware products. Currently works as VDI Engineer at MSD IT Global Innovation Center and he is an ex-member of VMware CoE at IBM. He holds VCIX6-DCV, VCIX6-DTM and VCP on DCV, DTM, NV and Cloud, Nutanix NPP certificate and also Master Degree of Computer Systems and Networks. Honored with vExpert 2015/2016 by VMware and Nutanix Technology Champion 2016/2017.

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