Sessions - Sessions by Users Report

In this modern era, one of the key challenges in monitoring large desktop environments is to keep track of the user activity on the physical desktops in an IT infrastructure. Using the Sessions by Users report provided by eG Enterprise, administrators can figure out at what times the specified user logged in, which desktop the user accessed, how much CPU/memory was utilized by the user, and the applications/VMs used by the user. The Sessions by Users Report also permits administrators to customize the view by specifying the measures to be displayed in the report and computations to be performed on the measures (such as Avg, Max, Min etc.).

To generate the Sessions by Users report, do the following:

1. From the eG Reporter interface, select the Sessions by Users option from the Sessions sub node by following the menu sequence: REPORTS BY FUNCTION -> Domain-specific Reports -> Physical Desktops.

   

   Figure 1 : Generating a Sessions - Sessions by Users Report

2. When Figure 1 appears, select a criterion for analysis from the Analyze By list box. Using this report, you can analyze the user session details of the Physical Desktop Group components that are included in a zone. This way, you can assess the impact of the user sessions on the Physical Desktop Group components of a particular service/segment/zone, and accordingly take decisions. The options provided by the Analyze By list box are discussed hereunder:

   • Component: Select this option to choose the component(s) from across all the managed components in the environment.
   • Service: If you want to generate a report for one/more components involved in the delivery of a service, select the Service option from Analyze By, and then pick the required Service from the drop-down list that appears
   • Segment: If you want to generate a report for one/more chosen components that belong to a segment, select the Segment option from Analyze By list box, and then pick the Segment from the drop-down list that appears.
   • Zone: To generate a report for one/more components that are included in a zone, pick the Zone option. A Zone drop-down list will then appear, from which you would have to select the zone to which the components of interest to you belong. A Sub zone flag also appears. Indicate whether the components present within the sub-zones of the chosen zone are also to be to be considered for report generation, by setting the Sub zone flag to Yes.
3. By default, Physical Desktop Group option will be chosen from the Component Type list.
4. In the Components list box, all the components pertaining to the chosen Component Type will be listed. Select the component for which this report is to be generated. If the Components list consists of too many components, then viewing all the components and selecting the ones that you need for report generation could require endless scrolling. To avoid this, you can click the button next to the Components list. The Components pop up window will then appear using which you can view almost all the desktops in a single interface and Select the ones for which the report is to be generated. You can narrow your search further by using the Search Components text box. Specify the whole/part of the component name to search for in this text box, and click the icon next to it.

5. Next, choose the User whose session usage needs to be tracked. By default, All option is chosen from this list indicating that this report is generated for all users logged into the physical desktops of the chosen physical desktop group component.

   Note:

   If the number of users to the zone exceeds the value configured for the MoreUsers parameter of the [CITRIX_USER_REPORT] section (in the {EG_INSTALL_DIR}\manager\config\eg_report.ini file), then a text box will be displayed instead of the list box for the User field. In the case of the text box, you will have to specify (and not choose) the name of the user for whom the report is to be generated. To generate a report for all available users, specify '*'.

6. The Organize By list box appears only when All option is selected from the User list. To generate this report for a particular thin client user, select the Users option from this list. To generate a thin client report for all users who belong to active directory groups, pick the Active Directory Group option from this list (see Figure 2).

   

   Figure 2 : Selecting the Active Directory Group option

   Note:

   The Organize By list box will appear only if the Report by OU and security group flag in the SETTINGS FOR AD USERS REPORT (see Figure 7) is set to Yes. Selecting the Active Directory Group option from this list box alone will not ensure you of generating an active directory group-wise user report. To generate the active directory group-wise user report, you need to configure the domains of the active directory groups in the first place. To know how to discover the domains and configure the Active Directory Groups for which this report is to be generated, refer Section Procedure for discovering the domains of the Security Groups.

7. By default, the Show Details flag is set to Yes indicating that the report will be generated for each user session initiated on the physical desktop available within the target physical desktop group. If this flag is set to No, then the sessions initiated by each user will be consolidated while the generating the report.

8. Then, specify the Timeline for the report. You can either provide a fixed time line such as 1 hour, 2 days, etc., or select the Any option from the list to provide a From and To date/time for report generation.

   Note:

   For every user registered with the eG Enterprise, the administrator can indicate the maximum timeline for which that user can generate a report. Once the maximum timeline is set for a user, then, whenever that user logs into eG Reporter and attempts to generate a report, the Timeline list box in the report page will display options according to the maximum timeline setting of that user. For instance, if a user can generate a report for a maximum period of 3 days only, then 3 days will be the highest option displayed in the Timeline list - i.e., 3 days will be the last option in the fixed Timeline list. Similarly, if the user chooses the Any option from the Timeline list and proceeds to provide a start date and end date for report generation using the From and To specifications, eG Enterprise will first check if the user’s Timeline specification conforms to his/her maximum timeline setting. If not, report generation will fail. For instance, for a user who is allowed to generate reports spanning over a maximum period of 3 days only, the difference between the From and To dates should never be over 3 days. If it is, then, upon clicking the Run Report button a message box will appear, prompting the user to change the From and To specification.

9. In addition to the settings discussed above, this report comes with a set of default specifications. These settings are hidden by default. If you do not want to disturb these default settings, then you can proceed to generate the report by clicking the Run Report button soon after you pick a User. However, if you want to view and then alter these settings (if required), click on the icon. The default settings will then appear in the More Options drop down window (see Figure 3). The steps below discuss each of these settings and how they can be customized.

   

   Figure 3 : The default settings for generating the Sessions - Sessions by Users report

10. Specify the start time and end time for report generation against the Time period field (see Figure 3).

    Note:

    By default, the Timeperiod is set to 24 hours. Accordingly, the From and To parameters in the [timeframe] section of the eg_report.ini file (in the <eG_INSTALL_DIR>\manager\config directory) are set to 00:00 and 24:00 respectively. If need be, you can override this default setting by configuring a different timeframe against the From and/or To parameters.

11. If the timeline specified for the report needs to exclude the data collected during the Weekends, then set Exclude weekends to Yes(Saturday,Sunday). If not, select No.

    Note:

    By default, the weekend constitutes Saturday and Sunday. To override this default setting, do the following:

    • Edit the eg_report.ini file in the <eg_install_dir>\manager\config directory.
    • In the [measure_group] section of the file, the exclude_weekend parameter is set to Saturday,Sunday by default. You can modify this by setting the exclude_weekend parameter to a comma-separated list of other days of the week - say Friday,Saturday.
    • Save the file after making the required changes.
12. By default, the Show Resource Details flag is set to Yes indicating that the resource utilization of each user session will be reported in the generated report. If you do not wish to generate the resource utilization in this report, then set this flag to No.
13. By default, the Show Client Details flag is set to Yes indicating that the IP address from which the user has initiated the session will be reported by the generated report. If you do not wish to track the IP address of the user, then set this flag to No.
14. If you wish to exclude one/more users from the scope of generating this report (for e.g., users used for simulation activity), then, specify a comma-separated list of users in the Exclude User text box. You can even exclude users based on wild card patterns. For example, specifying *john* in this text box excludes all the users with the name containing john.

15. In large environments, reports generated using months of data can take a long time to complete. Administrators now have the option of generating reports on-line or in the background. When a report is scheduled for background generation, administrators can proceed with their other monitoring, diagnosis, and reporting tasks, while the eG manager is processing the report. This saves the administrator valuable time. To schedule background processing of a report, you can either select the Background Save - PDF option or the Background Save - CSV option from the Report Generation list. In this case, a Report Name text box will appear, where you would have to provide the name with which the report is to be saved in the background. To process reports in the foreground, select the Foreground Generation - HTML option from this list.

    Note:

    • The Report Generation list will appear only if the EnableBackgroundReport flag in the [BACKGROUND_PROCESS] section of the eg_report.ini file (in the {EG_INSTALL_DIR}\manager\config directory) is set to Yes.
    • The default selection in the Report Generation list will change according to the Timeline specified for the report. If the Timeline set is greater than or equal to the number of days specified against the MinDurationForReport parameter in the [BACKGROUND_PROCESS] section of the eg_report.ini file, then the default selection in the Report Generation list will be Background Save - PDF. On the other hand, if the Timeline set for the report is lesser than the value of the MinDurationForReport parameter, then the default selection in the Report Generation list will be Foreground. This is because, the MinDurationForReport setting governs when reports are to be processed in the background. By default, this parameter is set to 2 weeks - this indicates that by default, reports with a timeline of 2 weeks and above will be processed in the background.
16. Click the Done button once you have made the necessary changes in the More Options drop down window.
17. Finally, click the Run Report button to generate the report.

18. If the option chosen from the Report Generation list is Foreground Generation - HTML, then, a report depicted by Figure 4 will appear upon clicking the Run Report button.

    

    Figure 4 : The generated Sessions by Users report

    The generated report consists of the Session Details section (see Figure 4) that displays the session related statistics, resource statistics along with when and to which physical desktop the chosen user logged in and the duration of every session. Using this report, users who are not effectively using the desktop resources made available to them can be identified easily.

19. If a specific user is chosen from the User list and the option chosen from the Report Generation list is Foreground Generation - HTML, then, a report depicted by Figure 5 will appear upon clicking the Run Report button.

    

    Figure 5 : The generated Sessions by Users report for a chosen user

20. Besides the Session Details section, the generated report consists of a Summary section (see Figure 5) that displays the average and maximum duration for which the specified user accessed the physical desktop, and the values of the resource utilization measures aggregated at the desktop-level.

21. To view a graphical representation of the performance of certain key session related metrics such as login time, applications accessed, active/idle time, session start-up details, resource usage during the session, etc., you can click on the icon. Figure 6 then appears.

    

    Figure 6 : The Summary of a user's session

    

    Figure 7 : A series of graphs depicting the resource utilization of the user in the session

    Figure 6 and Figure 7 offers an extensive analysis on the Summary of a user session including the Active and Idle time, logon duration, session activity of the user, resource utilization of the user and the processes that drained CPU and memory resources over the chosen period of time. Besides being visually appealing, the graphics also help rapidly detect problem areas.

22. Click the icon to view the detailed diagnosis of the resource (CPU and memory) utilization of the individual processes (see Figure 8) on the physical desktop.

    

    Figure 8 : The detailed diagnosis of the resource utilized by the user session

23. Clicking on a component in the COMPONENT column of Figure 4 and Figure 5 will lead you to Figure 9 which displays the Operations Report - Application report.

    

    Figure 9 : The Operations Report - Application report that appears when a component is clicked

24. In addition to the above, this report also enables you to figure out how the measures displayed in the Session Details section performed during the period for which the user was accessing the physical desktop. To achieve this, just click on the value of the measure against a User in the Session Details section. A graph depicted by will then appear.

    

    Figure 10 : The graph of a user-configured measure

25. Using the graph of Figure 10, administrators can determine whether the physical desktop has experienced any spikes in resource usage during the user access. If so, then, this could indicate that the user was performing resource-intensive activities on the physical desktop, and could warrant a thorough investigation.  
26. On the other hand, if the Background Save - PDF option is chosen from the Report Generation list, then clicking on the Run Report button will not generate the report and display it in this page for your benefit. Instead, a message indicating that the report is being processed in the background will appear. This will be accompanied by a link that will lead you to the page that lists all the reports that are being processed in the background, and their current status. If background report generation fails for a report, you can regenerate that report using this page, or can even delete that report if need be. On the other hand, if background processing successfully completes for your report, then, you can view a PDF of the report by clicking on the icon in that page.