The key to delivering your comprehensive digital workspace of the future is finally here – the Citrix Workspace app!
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step” – Lao Tzu.
As we began our development efforts of creating a comprehensive, fully integrated workspace experience solution that changed how workers did their jobs, this was one of the quotes that always came to mind. That first step into the transforming how people work — by giving them access to everything they need to work — is the Citrix Workspace app.
Today, Citrix is delighted to announce the release of Citrix Workspace app for Desktop and web platforms, with mobile versions releasing shortly! This will be marked as the birthdate for Citrix Workspace app. Please join me in congratulating the whole Citrix team that worked tirelessly over last few months to make it happen. Congratulations to you, as well, as it begins the new era for business transformation.
We’ve built Workspace app based on more than 25 years of Citrix Receiver success. However, the Workspace app itself is more than just a simple rebrand. Not only does the Citrix Workspace app to provide that single pane of glass that end-users need to access everything they need to be productive, but it provides IT with the proper tools to still maintain security.
With the Workspace app launch today, that vision becomes reality. Citrix Workspace app powers secure access to SaaS solutions through the introduction of a Citrix Workspace browser embedded in Citrix Workspace app. Citrix Workspace app works with the Citrix Workspace platform to deliver the new enhanced user interface and single sign on access to Windows, Linux, SaaS/Web, Mobile applications through the respective service feeds in Citrix Workspace. Citrix Workspace app will start running with these capabilities as the service feeds get productized throughout this month.
As with any cloud release, our engineering teams will be rolling out the various new services gradually over the next few weeks. For Citrix admins using Citrix Cloud services, you’ll gradually see the new Citrix Workspace U/I change over the next few weeks based on your cloud services entitlements. For on-premises customers, since Workspace app is built upon the foundation of Citrix Receiver, it is fully backwards-compatible with your existing on-premises Citrix StoreFront. We encourage on-premises customers to upgrade to Citrix Workspace app between now and the end of August to ensure you can capitalize on the latest enhancements in our future Citrix releases. Our goal is to make the shift from Citrix Receiver to Workspace app as seamless as possible, which is why I’ll go into details below on some of the things we’re doing to ensure this change doesn’t impact your users.
What’s Changing:
- First, the current icon for Citrix Receiver will change from black to the blue Citrix Workspace app icon. The icon will look the same, so users will know what to look for, however the new color will indicate that it is now Citrix Workspace app.
- Second, the name will change from Citrix Receiver to Citrix Workspace app.
- As mentioned above, Citrix Cloud services customers can expect to see a change to the UI over the next few weeks based on their Citrix Cloud services as the new UI is rolled through the Citrix Workspace platform.
Preparing our Customers for the Citrix Receiver to Citrix Workspace app upgrade
The Receiver name and icon are well known by millions of users and people are trained to look for the name/icon to get their work done. This is why we surveyed many of our customers to ensure that Citrix was providing the appropriate resources to aid in the transition. We published a blog post back in early July that not only announced the technical preview of Citrix Workspace app, but also, a preview of the assets we’re putting together to help organizations with this transition. Our select customers who have previewed Workspace app mentioned that it would be helpful to have at least a few weeks to prepare for the change, which is why we are:
- Pausing Citrix Receiver auto-update for desktop clients in order to mitigate potential help desk calls from users who may be confused by the new app icon and name change. While users will get the same experience they’re used to with Citrix Receiver, this is just a simple proactive measure to prevent any confusion from users when they log in and see a different app and name. Auto-update will be reenabled coinciding with the next XenApp and XenDesktop release. This will allow Citrix admins to have time to communicate the change.
- Preparing an end-user communication kit. This simple kit we’ve put together will feature a series of emails you can leverage to communicate your end-users of the upcoming change, as well as a high-resolution icon imageto update your internal documentation.
- Implanting a product splash screen — when the users install or upgrade to the Citrix Workspace app, they will get an in-product splash screen at first launch explaining the change — with a link to an end-user FAQ page for them to find out more information.
Get started by downloading Workspace app today
Before we give you the details on downloading, please note that Citrix Workspace app has simplified versioning based on YYMM format, which makes this release of Citrix Workspace app 1808 with the MSI version as 18.8.x.y.
As I mentioned, our mission when we embarked on building the Citrix Workspace app was to provide a unified workspace experience unlike anything else available in the market today. This is aimed at being that one-stop-shop for how end-users get their work done.
However, don’t just take my word for it, get started by trying out Workspace app today, which is currently available within our Citrix Workspace app download page.
Finally, watch the Citrix blogs and the our website for more resources and communications from us on the new Citrix Workspace user experience as you continue your journey with the new Citrix Workspace.
