Stefanos Cloud

Citrix has announced to its investors that they are going to be acquired by private equity firm "Vista Equity Partners and Evergreen Coast Capital" for the amount of 16.5 billion USD. Citrix Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CTXS) (“Citrix”), today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement under which affiliates of Vista Equity Partners (“Vista”), a leading global investment firm focused exclusively on enterprise software, data and technology-enabled businesses, and Evergreen Coast Capital Corporation (“Evergreen”), an affiliate of Elliott Investment Management L.P. (“Elliott”), will acquire Citrix in an all-cash transaction valued at $16.5 billion, including the assumption of Citrix debt. Under the terms of the agreement, Citrix shareholders will receive $104.00 in cash per share. The per share purchase price represents a premium of 30 percent over the Company’s unaffected 5-day VWAP as of December 7, 2021, the last trading day before market speculation regarding a po

Case You cannot connect to any Internet resources via TCP/IP from your local endpoint. Solution Carry out the following checks: - First-off confirm that you have no Internet connectivity at all. To confirm this, open your operating system terminal and type the following command. If this ping fails, this means that you have no Internet connectivity. ping 1.1.1.1 # You can change the above public IP with a known Web server of your choice. 1.1.1.1 is a public IP address of the Cloudflare CDN free DNS servers. - If the above public IP address ping fails , try to ping your local network gateway. This is provided by your core router and if provided by your ISP, it is usually set to 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.1.254. ping 192.168.1.1 # Change private IP to the one corresponding to your local network gateway - If the above private IP address ping succeeds (and the public IP address ping fails) , then your issue can be isolated to the router onwards. If you have other networking devices which exist

Case When troubleshooting Citrix Workspace App for Linux connection issues , in many cases you need to generate and collect Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops logs at the VDA server level (in case of Linux VDA, see https://docs.citrix.com/en-us/linux-virtual-delivery-agent/current-release/configuration/tracing-on.html and https://support.citrix.com/article/CTX220130 ). When the issue points to client or local endpoint, then generating and collecting the Citrix Workspace App (CWA) for Linux client logs is mandatory. Solution Before starting any log collection, ensure that you are running the latest version of Citrix Workspce App for Linux client from https://www.citrix.com/downloads/workspace-app/linux/workspace-app-for-linux-latest.html . This will ensure that all known issues from previous releases are fixed. If the CWA for Linux client is running inside a custom Linux OS image, check with the image vendor that the latest CWA client is included. How to collect logs in Citrix Workspace

Case You need to invite a large number of external users as guest users in Azure AD. Solution Follow the procedure below to invite a Azure AD guest users in bulk: - Navigate to the Azure AD management portal and go to "Users" section. - Click on "Bulk Operations --> Bulk Invite". - Download the .csv template, fill it in with your guest user information and upload it. - Edit the csv file in Excel by following the example on the first line. - After uploading the file, the import procedure automatically starts. You can click on the active link to check the status of each operation until it completes with an output message. Note that you can use a similar process to add/create Azure AD users in bulk, by initiating the process from the same menu in the Azure AD management portal. After adding the users/guest users you can click on each user's name to edit their properties such as assigned roles, groups, apps and devices. Same configuration can obviously be perfor

Case When you try to authenticate to Microsoft 365 via any client such as Microsoft Outlook, you encounter the following error ID 135011. Error states that "your organization has disabled this device". By clicking "Continue" you receive the following verbose information. Solution In most cases, this issue is resolved by navigating to the Azure AD management portal and in the "Devices" blade identify the device which reports the issue. If the disable has a Disabled status, simply set it to Enabled. If issue is not resolved by the above action, then further troubleshooting can be carried out as per the instructions in a separate KB article . https://stefanos.cloud/kb/how-to-resolve-microsoft-365-authentication-error-id-135011/

I am happy to announce that the Stefanos Cloud Podcast has been released and will be updated with new content on a weekly basis. The Stefanos Cloud podcast utilizes AI-driven Natural Language Processing (NLP) and ports the existing Hybrid Clouds Blog posts into audible posts. The following topics are covered: - Microsoft Azure - Microsoft 365 - Microsoft Power Platform - Microsoft Powershell - Citrix Cloud and on-premise VDI and networking technologies - Windows Server Hybrid administration - Enterprise Mobility and Security - Linux - Devops technologies - Cloud computing news and events - Cloud computing courses - My technical books The Stefanos Cloud Podcast is available on the following podcasting platforms: - Anchor FM: https://anchor.fm/stefanoscloud - Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3jRHtV8UsVfE1uERILFmbH - Apple podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/stefanos-cloud-podcast/id1609632725 - Google podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy

Introduction Power BI is a cloud-based suite of business analytics tools that lets anyone connect to, visualize, and analyze data with greater speed, efficiency, and understanding. It connects users to a broad range of live data through easy-to-use dashboards, provides AI-infused automated insights, embedded and interactive reports, and delivers compelling visualizations that bring data big and small to life. Power BI comprises three components: - A Windows desktop application called Power BI Desktop. - An online SaaS ( Software as a Service ) service called the Power BI service. - Power BI mobile apps for Windows, iOS, and Android devices. Comparison of Microsoft Power BI service plans The available retail pricing plans are described in the following article: https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/ . The following plans are available for purchase via the CSP channe, available either in monthly or annual subscriptions: - Power BI Pro - Power BI Premium Per User - Power BI Pro for

Case You have purchased Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops (VAD) on-premises licenses alongside Microsoft RDS licenses for your VDI infrastructure and you need to activate and/or manage additional licenses without extra cost for a limited period. These extra licenses are called "overdraft" licenses in Citrix terminology and "overallocated" licenses in Microsoft RDS terminology. Solution Citrix overdraft licenses You first need to run the following command on the Citrix VAD on-premises licensing server to determine the number of licenses you have installed and the number of overdraft licenses. udadmin -list -a Let's assume that you have total of x installed licenses, of which y are overdraft. As per Citrix licensing FAQ, any overdraft license must be turned to regular purchased license within 30 days of overdraft status being enabled: https://docs.citrix.com/en-us/citrix-virtual-apps-desktops/manage-deployment/licensing/licensing-faq.html     (see “Overdraft licens

Case In Citrix Workspace App Linux client (previous name Citrix Receiver) you receive the following error when you try to connect to the Citrix Storefront or Citrix Gateway server: Your account cannot be added using this server address. Make sure you entered it correctly. An SSL connection to the server couldn't be established because the server's certificate was not trusted. A similar error may be encountered in other local clients, other than the Citrix Workspace App. Solution The most likely cause of this error is that your Citrix Storefront or Citrix Gateway server is using a self-signed certificate or a public CA certificate whose root CA certificate is not trusted by your local endpoint. In order to establish trust with the server SSL certificate root CA, you need to ensure that the full certificate chain is imported into your client. The SSL certificate chain includes the intermediate and root certificates which must be present in the local endpoint SSL certificate store

Case You have issued a TLS certificate by utilizing a Windows Server Certificate Authority (CA) template. You need to either manually or automatically renew the issued certificate before it expires. Solution Manually - You can use the Microsoft Management Console (MMC) certificates snap-in (computer store). You should right-click the expiring certificate and choose "All Tasks --> Renew certificate with new key". - You need to ensure that the Windows Server CA template corresponding to your certificate (usually the Computer template or the Web Server template) have "enroll" permissions configured for the Active Directory computer object of the server from which you are attempting to renew the certificate inside the computer management MMC. - To configure the above permission, open the Windows CA management console by navigating to the CA machine and running the certsrv.msc command. - Then expand the certification authority node, right-click on the "Certifica

Case You need to configure an Azure Media Services (AMS) account via the Azure Management Portal. All configuration steps can obviously be carried out via Azure Powershell, Azure REST API and Azure CLI as well. This post focuses on configuration via the Azure Management Portal. Solution Azure Media Services introduction Azure Media Services is a cloud-based platform that enables you to build solutions that achieve broadcast-quality video streaming, enhance accessibility and distribution, analyze content, and much more. Whether you're an app developer, a call center, a government agency, or an entertainment company, Media Services helps you create apps that deliver media experiences of outstanding quality to large audiences on today's most popular mobile devices and browsers. The Media Services v3 SDKs are based on Media Services v3 OpenAPI Specification (Swagger) . How to configure Azure Media Services in Azure Management Portal Follow the process below. - Navigate to Azure Med

Introduction When planning your on-premise to Azure migration there are a lot of technical and business factors which need to be taken into account. First off, you need to assess your existing on-premises infrastructure and make decisions as to whether or not to migrate everything to Azure or keep a hybrid infrastructure with Azure Arc and/or Azure Stack. A first good step in assessing your on-premises infrastructure is to run the Microsoft TCP calculator and review the generated report. This will help you gain insights into the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of your on-premises infrastructure and assist you in deciding the extent at which you will be migrating resources (full cloud vs hybrid). Using the Microsoft TCO calculator Navigate to the TCO calculator homepage at: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/tco/ and sign in with your Microsoft account by using the top-right icon. After being logged in, there are three steps to follow: - Define your workloads - Adjust assumptions

Case You need to perform an assessment of your overall Azure spend and minimize costs. Solution There are various ways to minimize your Azure cloud costs, as outlined in the list below. - First off, you need to carry out a business and technical assessment throughout your organization and understand your workflows and workloads and how these workloads are or can be served by Azure resources. Use Microsoft Assessments free tools to help you on this path. - Run Azure Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) calculator to have better understanding of your on-premises components and generate an insightful report comparing your on-premises costs vs equivalent Azure resource costs. - For SQL Server workload migrations, run the Azure online wizard for choosing the proper SQL implementation option on Azure (IaaS vs PaaS) . Consult the following page for a comparison matrix of SQL-based service options in Azure . - Use Azure Migrate to analyze your environment and get intelligent recommendations for yo

Introduction Cloudflare offers a wide range of security, SSL acceleration, VPN and application gateway services via its robust worldwide mesh of datacenters and Content Delivery Network (CDN) hops. The free Cloudflare CDN services can be managed via https://dash.cloudflare.com/ . Cloudflare offers a lot more than just a CDN. An overview of Cloudflare services can be found at https://www.cloudflare.com/ (see products and solutions). Cloudflare uses the WARP protocol for secure VPN-based access for the last mile. Cloudflare's free public DNS service can be setup on any routing gateway device (L3 or higher) which can function as DNS server/resolver. Details about the free public DNS service is are available at: https://1.1.1.1/ . Some handy applications available are the following: - Cloudflare WARP client download - Cloudflare DNS cache purge tool - Cloudflare free public DNS service - Cloudflare free DNS family protection service Cloudflare free public DNS service Free public DNS

Case Microsoft has announced in 2021 that they are deprecating TLS 1.0 and TLS 1.1 support from Office 365 and Microsoft 365 products and services: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/prepare-tls-1.2-in-office-365?view=o365-worldwide . As a result all software vendors developing client applications which interface with Office 365 via the Office 365 API, the Microsoft Graph API or via SMTP Auth need to update their code base to support TLS 1.2 at minimum. For the vendors and applications which still cannot officially support TLS 1.2 there may be an interim solution. Read this article to find out how you can enable legacy TLS protocol version support for Office 365. Solution First off, you will need to enable the "AllowLegacyTLSClients" property of the Exchange Online organization via the Get-TransportConfig Powershell cmdlet. This also assumes that you have enabled SMTP Auth for your mailbox . After connecting to Exchange Online with Powershell , run the