Since we announced the Citrix ITSM Adapter service, we’ve added even more capabilities that accelerate innovation, enhance our customers’ IT productivity, and address critical business challenges. We are excited to share the new features and functionality in our 22.9 release, including:

  • New automated workflows that help reduce total cost of ownership (TCO)
  • The ability to import more Citrix DaaS information into ServiceNow
  • Extended alert and events monitoring capabilities that allow admins to better filter and process Citrix DaaS notifications

Let’s look at the enhancements in the 22.9 release of the Citrix ITSM Adapter service.

Automatically Approve User Desktop and Application Requests

We’ve developed a new workflow that allows admins to preconfigure approval of end-user requests for desktops or applications. As shown in the image below, admins can make Citrix resources available for requests, choose to enable them for automatic approval, and designate the AD group, Delivery Group, or Application Group that can receive automatic approval.

In this example, the configured settings will automatically approve application requests from users in the “soak-mcs-dg” Delivery Group. With this setting configured, the approval process is quick and fully automated, saving manual IT labor and supporting greater productivity for end users.

Auto-approval settings for Citrix application or desktop requests.

Automatically Deprovision Idle VDIs

If you are searching for the ability to deprovision an idle VDI, look no further! In a previous release, the Citrix ITSM Adapter service introduced a VDI deprovisioning service that enabled IT admins to set up deprovisioning policies based on a defined number of idle days. Based on the policies, the ITSM Connector would generate a deprovisioning list where the IT admin or operator could manually check each record and execute the deprovisioning task.

With the 22.9 release, we are excited to launch a fully automatic deprovisioning setting for idle VDIs. With just a simple configuration to existing deprovisioning policies in place, the Citrix ITSM Adapter service can automatically deprovision idle static desktops in two ways: completely removing the desktop or removing the user from the desktop and keeping it available for new user assignments.

Settings to enable the automatic deprovisioning of idle VDIs.

Employee Separation Workflow

In many organizations, Citrix admins manage their Citrix DaaS and VDI environments through Active Directory (AD) groups. The best practice is to specify AD groups to connect to Citrix Delivery Groups so the users in the AD group inherit appropriate permissions, including Citrix resources.

Typically, in employee offboarding scenarios, the admin needs to remove the user from their associated AD groups to restrict access to Citrix resources. But suppose the user is actively using a Citrix session when the admin removes the user. In that case, the assigned VDIs might not be removed in time, and they might continue to have access to the session, resulting in increased security risk and avoidable costs.

With the 22.9 release of the Citrix ITSM Adapter service, we’ve introduced a new Employee Separation workflow for admins that can be leveraged to be an organic (and effective) part of your overall employee exit process. In scenarios of employee separation, the Citrix admin can simply specify the user ID, and the backend ITSM Adapter service will automatically end all launched sessions, remove permissions, and unassign associated desktops in one step! This workflow enables IT to perform quick offboarding operations, removing the time-consuming task of creating a ticket to request manual offboarding of a user within your organization.

Citrix ITSM workflows in ServiceNow are editable and can be duplicated or linked to other workflows. The trigger to activate workflows can also be adjusted, for example, by monitoring an offboarding table.

Export Citrix DaaS License Information into ServiceNow

This new feature allows you to integrate your Citrix DaaS license consumption information with your ServiceNow instance for view in a single location. To enable this, you can create a license importing policy. Once the policy successfully runs, your Citrix DaaS license information will be imported to a table created by the Citrix ITSM plug-in in ServiceNow.

Information about daily active user count and daily historical records are kept in the table and readily available for access. The developers in your organization can then leverage several methods to access this table, such as querying the tables in script, using the Table API, or configuring a business rule. With this data, you can seamlessly develop new workflows, update your license dashboard, or export the data as a report.

Monitor Citrix Cloud Connector Events via Citrix Cloud Notifications

Citrix Cloud notifications provide information about issues or events that might interest administrators, such as new Citrix Cloud features or problems with a machine in a resource location. These notifications may be shared from any service within Citrix Cloud. For example, the Citrix Cloud Connector will send notifications in scenarios where maintenance has failed, an update has failed, or if the Connector has been offline for a few hours. Failures with the Citrix Cloud Connector may result in serious outages, so we know it’s critical that the right admins receive notifications at the right time with the right information, so issues are quickly addressed to ensure business continuity.

A Cloud Connector Warning with incident details.

For greater visibility across your Citrix environment, we integrated Citrix Cloud Notifications with the ITSM Adapter service in ServiceNow to deliver critical updates and warnings to help admins avoid last-minute hassles and address issues more effectively. By configuring the Citrix Cloud Notification policy through the ITSM connector, the ITSM Adapter service will register with the Citrix Cloud Notification service and receive all notifications immediately. Additionally, you can configure filters to scan the notification’s title, description, severity, and priority to find what you’re looking for easily. Please refer to our product documentation for more information on configuring Citrix Cloud Notification policies.

Defining a Citrix Cloud Notification policy in the Citrix ITSM Adapter service.

Get Started Today!

Get started and try these new features today! If you are a Citrix DaaS Premium or Premium Plus customer, you are automatically entitled to the Citrix ITSM Adapter service. If not, contact Citrix Sales to upgrade your Citrix DaaS entitlement or to request a trial of the latest 22.9 release enhancements.