New Citrix Project 10/5/09

It has been a while since I created a blog entry. I have started a new LoadRunner project using Citrix. We get quite a few of these projects every year, and we always hope that the more that we do and learn, the easier this kind of testing will get. I guess, in a way, it has. But it seems that it will always be a little aggrivating.

 I find the lack of good LoadRunner/Citrix technical tips and tricks on the web to be a little strange. Surely others are doing this kind of stuff. Today I had the most insane moment while doing research to clear away a slight snag I had come across. In all my searching of Google, what helped me out was and article I WROTE back in 2007 and located on this web site! Well, at least I had the forethought to write the article. Perhaps I knew my future self would need the help.

Fortunately for me, this project is not using the latest Citrix client, XEN Desktop or anything like that. It is straight old Citrix, and so far everything seems to be working OK. We had the usual configuration changes, ICA file changes, and user id permissions as we normally do. But this is easily cured with knowledgeable Citrix administrators, and the folks at this client are very good and very responsive. I think that is what really makes an engagement smooth,

I did have an issue worth bloggins about. I was using the servers for Citrix servers, that had previously been used for Load Generators for another project. After a load test using them as LoadRunner 9.1 Generators, we re-purposed them as Citrix servers. I put the latest 32-bit Citrix Agent for LoadRunner in hopes that this time it would actually work. Howeer, I noticed that while recording in Vugen the application would lock up sometimes. I was able to deduce that anytime I stopped using keystrokes and used the mouse a little, that is when the lockup would occur. I could not determine a real cause, but I remembered the LoadRunner 9.1 Generator Agent was still on the Citrix server. So I uninstalled it. Afterwards, the application lockups ceases. So there could be some conflict between the Citrix Agent and the Generator Agent.

I just upgraded their LoadRunner version to 9.51 and will get the chance to see how well Citrix works on the latest version. My fingers are crossed.