eG Monitoring
 

Measures reported by CtxALOSLayerTest

An OS Layer is a virtual disk layer containing the operating system such as Windows, basic VM tools/drivers and App Layering drivers. Typically, a single OS Layer is maintained in the environment to manage the number of machine configurations such as pools, silos, delivery groups. This simplifies the environment and reduces management time/complexity and the costs associated with OS and app management. The OS layer is necessary for creating Platform layers, App layers and Layered images. Updating OS Layers is a simple operation with built-in version control. When you create a new version of the OS Layer, the latest version of the layer is copied, and this copy is marked as read-write. A special virtual machine called a Packaging Machine is created on the environment and the copy of the OS is attached. The machine is then booted with this new writable version of the OS, and you can update the OS Layer as needed. The OS Layer acts as a base layer for pools/delivery groups within the environment and for creating App and Platform layers and images, therefore, the OS Layer should be always ready for deployment to avoid delays in delivery of operating systems and applications to end users. This is why, administrators must track the status of the OS Layer at regular continuously. The Os Layers - AL test can help administrators in this regard!

This test continuously monitors the OS Layers created using the to the target Citrix App Layering Manager and reports the current status of each OS Layer. In addition, this test reveals the number of images, collections and desktops that are currently using the OS Layer. This test also helps you to determine the OS Layer that is widely used by the App and Platform Layers. Using this test, administrators can find out the OS Layer that is famous among the end-users.

Outputs of the test: One set of results for each OS layer managed by the target Citrix App Layering Manager.

Descriptor: OS Layer

The measures made by this test are as follows:

Measurement Description Measurement Unit Interpretation
Status Indicates the current status of this OS Layer.  

The values that this measure reports and their corresponding numeric values are listed in the table below:

Measure value Numeric Value
Deployable 10
Editing 30
Others 40

Note:

By default, this measure reports the Measure Values discussed in the table above. However, the graph of this measure is indicated using the numeric equivalents only.

The detailed diagnosis of this measure reveals the name and current status of the OS Layer, name of the template that is being used by each OS Layer, whether the OS Layer is imported or not, name of the operating system, maximum layer size and time stamp at which each OS Layer is created and last modified.

Total_layersize Indicates the total size set for this OS Layer. GB

 
Maximum_layersize Indicates the Max Layer size set for this OS Layer. GB

 
Collections_used Indicates the number of collections that are currently using this OS Layer. Number

Compare the values of these measures across OS Layers to identify the OS Layer that is frequently used by images, collections and desktops.
Desktops_used Indicates the number of desktops that are currently using this OS Layer. Number

Compare the values of these measures across OS Layers to identify the OS Layer that is frequently used by images, collections and desktops.
Images_used Indicates the number of images that are currently using this OS Layer. Number

Compare the values of these measures across OS Layers to identify the OS Layer that is frequently used by images, collections and desktops.
No_applayers Indicates the number of App Layers that are currently using this OS Layer. Number

 
No_platformlayers Indicates the number of Platform Layers that are currently using this OS Layer. Number