Login VSI 1.0 Issues with VMware View 3.1
I have used Login Consultants Login VSI 1.0 tool for a number of desktop virtualization research projects and I recently fired it up again for some VMware View 3.1 RDP over HTTP/HTTPs traffic profiling for QoS and Cisco WAAS/WAAS Mobile.
Login VSI does not natively support/use the VMware View client (it launches an RDP/ICA session directly from the launcher application). For my purposes all I needed was a few clients to run the Login VSI test scripts via the VMware View client. I did not really need the launcher for my purposes other than to create the required profiles on the VMware View Agent VM.
I used the VMware View client application to setup a session (via the VMware Connection Server) to a VM that had the Login VSI target deployment configured. Once my test user logged in the test script ran perfectly right up until the script tried to print a MS Word document to PDF. View redirected the Microsoft Office XPS Writer installed on the VMware View client machine to the View session running on the VM and hosed to whole thing.
Here you see the status of the test run and the pop-up is pushing the print job to the local View client using the XPS writer vs. the PDF writer installed on the VM.
The script selected the XPS writer as it seemed to think the redirected printer was more important than that actual default printer setup on the VM (Login VSI sets up a PDF writer and makes it the default).
After a little poking around I realized that the ThinPrint installation that comes with VMware View was the culprit and that it is not so easy to keep ThinPrint from taking over printer redirection for these sessions. I combined through a variety of documentation and support sites (very very poor info on ThinPrint and VMware View configuration) and found a few registry hacks but none of them really worked, at least not for me.
To get this testing done I simply went into the MS Vista machine that I was using as the VMware View client and deleted the XPS printer (the only printer installed on that client). All is now good in the world.
Here you can see that the PDF writer installed by the Login VSI target installer is selected and the script continues to work.
The test runs to full completion using Login VSI 1.0 with a VMware View 3.1 Client.
If any of you find a real good way to go in via GPO, the registry via TPautoconnect (I have tried a boatload of switches and set the “ConnectToClient” to DISABLE and all of that stuff) or something else that might work better, please fire over a comment.
Also, if anyone from Login Consultants reads this – I love the tool but please make an uninstall option so I can back the agent and launcher stuff out. 
Shannon
Comment from Mark Plettenberg
Time June 17, 2009 at 16:10
Hi Shannon,
Good to see that you are using and tweaking Login VSI to you’re own needs! To be totally honest (as one of the developers of Login VSI) we did not implement an uninstall option by design, this because we advice to use Login VSI in a “Test environment” that could possibly break under the benchmarking stress. We do not want people to re-use that same environment as a production one after the benchmark.
But if there is enough interest for a uninstall option we will definitely add it to Login VSI 2.0 that we are currently developing. If you have other cool ideas / opinions for Login VSI 2.0 don’t hesitate to contact me you’re input is appreciated!
Regards,
Mark
Login VSI development team