Introduction

2X ApplicationServer & LoadBalancer Console is an easy-to-use centralized GUI Application that allows configuration of 2X ApplicationServer and 2X LoadBalancer. 2X ApplicationServer enables you to publish individual applications to your users’ machines seamlessly, while 2X LoadBalancer is an automated load balancing/tunneling solution for Terminal Services & Citrix that enables you to distribute user sessions across terminal servers in such a way that the best performing terminal server is always selected to handle the incoming connection.

What is 2X VirtualDesktopServer?

2X VirtualDesktopServer is an application providing vendor independent virtual desktops and applications, accessible from anywhere. 2X VirtualDesktopServer allows you to publish full desktops and applications in a virtual environment with improved desktop manageability, security and performance.

Features

New Publishing Wizard

2X VirtualDesktopServer now incorporates a Publishing Wizard which will guide you through each step needed to setup Virtual Desktops, Published Applications and Published Desktops in the shortest amount of time.

Application Publishing

With 2X ApplicationServer, instead of giving your users a full desktop on your terminal servers, you can give them only the applications they need. These applications can be pushed directly to the users’ desktop.

Deepnet Security

Deepnet Unified Authentication is a single integrated platform for provisioning, managing and verifying all types of authentication, form-factors and user credentials. 2X VirtualDesktopServer provides this two-factor authentication using SafeID, FlashID, MobileID, QuickID, GridID, SecureID (RSA), DigiPass (Vasco).

Native RDP Connections

Using the 2X VirtualDesktopServer Client you can now connected to a machine running Microsoft Terminal Server using a Remote Desktop Protocol connection. Administrators can easily configure desktop connections and publish applications using one tool.

Embedded Desktops

With your 2X VirtualDesktopServer Client you can now use Embedded Desktops. This allows you to load a number of different Virtual Desktops inside one application. Switching between the different desktops is as simple as clicking on a different tab.

Multiple VDI Providers

2X VirtualDesktopServer now supports virtual desktops published from VMware, Sun VirtualBox, Microsoft Virtual Server, Virtual Iron, Parallels and Microsoft Terminal Server. Virtual desktops are load balanced over the available machines while automatically releasing unused resources.

Seamless Windows capabilities

With Seamless Windows, applications running from your terminal servers will look like local applications for your users. This facilitates the introduction of server based solutions like terminal services as the remote applications co-exist with local ones and users cannot even tell the difference between them.

Greater Compatibility

2X ApplicationServer & LoadBalancer Console is compatible with Windows 2000 Server, Windows 2003 Server and Windows 2008 Server. This means you do not need to upgrade your entire infrastructure to the latest Windows Server platform if all you need is application publishing with Seamless Windows capabilities.

Cross Platform Support

2X ApplicationServer is an RDP based Application Publishing solution that supports both Linux and Mac OS X clients, all with Seamless Windows capabilities. Now it is easy to bring Windows applications to all your Linux and Mac desktops!

2X Client Gateway Service

2X Client Gateway tunnels all traffic needed by 2X applications on a single port. Now you need to open only one port on your firewall and the clients will be able to launch the published applications through the 2X Client Gateway Service.

Increased Terminal Services performance

During the login sequence, the user (using default settings) connection request is forwarded to the terminal server reporting the best performance index. This ensures that the users will never be connected to a terminal server that is using all its resources (CPU, memory, etc), optimizing user experience across the terminal server farm.

Enhanced Security

When used in SSL Gateway mode, the 2X LoadBalancer provides end-to-end SSL encryption to your terminal servers. This not only greatly enhances security but also gives you a firewall/proxy friendly solution with true SSL/HTTPS capabilities.

Reconnection capabilities

When a session gets disconnected from one of the terminal servers and the user attempts to reconnect, the 2X LoadBalancer queries all terminal servers for a disconnected session from that particular user or IP address and reconnects the user to the appropriate terminal server (some conditions apply).

Universal Printing

Printing has been one of the difficulties for administrators of server-based computing systems. 2X Universal Printer solves this issue and printing from application via RDP sessions is not different than printing form any other application. Universal Printing installs a universal driver on the Terminal Server that works with any printer.

Multiple Farms

2X Clients have the facility to connect with Multiple Farms and publish seamless applications or published desktops from multiple farms simultaneously.

Single Sign On

Single Sign-On is a module that automates the log-in process when connecting with the 2X Client Gateway and the Terminal Servers. Single Sign-On eliminates the burden on users of having to remember, and periodically change many individual passwords, in order to access applications and data.

Web Portal

2X ApplicationServer Web Portal allows users to launch published applications and desktops from multiple farms which are accessed through a web portal according to their filter settings.

How does 2X ApplicationServer work?

2X ApplicationServer extends Windows Terminal Services by using a customized shell and virtual channel applications using the Microsoft RDP protocol. Due to these extensions, a new Client is required (although it uses the same RDP protocol as mentioned above) on all computers that will be accessing the 2X ApplicationServer.

How does 2X LoadBalancer work?

2X LoadBalancer works by acquiring information from the Terminal Servers or Citrix Servers with the aid of the 2X Terminal Server Agent installed on each server. This information includes system resources and the number of sessions running on the server. With this information, 2X LoadBalancer will be able to load balance both desktops and seamless applications.

The 2X LoadBalancer can be configured to use either ‘Resource based’ or ‘Round Robin’ load balancing methods. Resource based load balancing forwards the connections to the server with the highest available resources. The Round Robin method uses a round-robin schedule, where each terminal server participates in turn, irrelevant of the status of each terminal server.

The 2X LoadBalancer offers the facility of reconnecting sessions.

How does 2X VirtualDesktopServer work?

2X Virtual Desktop Server extends a number of different virtualization technologies (VMware, Sun VirtualBox, MS Virtual Server, Virtual Iron, Parallels and MS Terminal Server) to allow the publishing of virtual desktops to the 2X ApplicationServer Client. When a client requests a virtual desktop, the system finds a guest on one of the least loaded hosts, starts or restores the guest and, using Microsoft RDP protocol, the virtual desktop is presented to the user.