App-V

[Incognito]

I have a report of some software freezing on startup when used with App-V. But I don't really understand enough of what it is or what it does to advise. Is it actually a virtual machine, or just a network drive? Is the application actually running on the client?

Application virtualisation. Think of it as the application itself being sandboxed. This involves packaging the application using whatever toolset you are using, i.e. App-V or ThinApp. An application will invariably write out to an O/S at time of install / execution whether that be system files, config files or registry, what virtualising the app does means that those changes aren't written out to the O/S and are contained within the application 'bubble' or 'sandbox' where the app has access to registry entries / COM objects / files etc that it requires. Most apps can be virtualised, but the harder ones are apps which call out to other applications because you are effectively breaking out of your bubble.

With App V, you have two methods of delivery, streaming or cached locally which in laymen's terms details how your application is delivered. Streaming, very self explanatory, streams the 'blocks' needed to run the app straight away and only delivers additional data as required. Allows you to execute large apps prior to the full install package being downloaded. Cached locally prestages the application on a desktop before runtime.

Streaming and/or execution successfully depends on if your application has been sequenced properly. Sequencing is the App-V terminology for 'packaging' which involves not only capturing the install state, but also the correct execution state as well. It should have been tested correctly and to be honest if you haven't got a clue about App-V you're maybe not the best person to troubleshoot this without hitting the books.

[stek]

Sounds a bit like AIX Application WPARs (Workload PARtition) - sort of like Solaris zones but the partition only runs for the application in question and only while it's running. No virtual OS (as such), no logins, just a VM for the app to run in with no fancy bits and nothing else. The app stops, the partition does too.

This is Unix though with a hardware Hypervisor, I don't know how it works on Windows with a software Hypervisor...

[VectraMan]

I have a report of some software freezing on startup when used with App-V. But I don't really understand enough of what it is or what it does to advise. Is it actually a virtual machine, or just a network drive? Is the application actually running on the client?

From the Wikipedia:

App-V sequencer is the component which packages an application for virtualization and streaming. It analyzes the application for the resources that it requires and creates the SystemGuard runtime environment that it will require

How does it do that? How does the sequencer know what files the application might load from its installed directory? That sounds to me like it wouldn't work for a great number of applications.