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I am really excited to be revisiting Smart Checks which is part of the Smart tools suite of products in Citrix Cloud. I will make this post simple as the tool itself is intuitive and simple to use.I will also highlight the new custom checks features! I have blanked out certain names in some screen shots as the machines do not wish to be identified.
Adding your Site
Log in to Citrix Cloud from your Delivery Controller browser and go to Smart Tools/Manage and choose Smart Check.
Once in add your site to the cloud.
The process is easy. Download the agent.
The agent will install.
You will be informed that the agent is installed to your Delivery Controller.
Nice green tick clearly letting you know you should proceed.
Enter your admin details that administer your site and the site will be added to your Cloud subscription.
Now I can see my site in Smart Check. That was easy!
Performance Checks
We can drill in to the site. First we will go to Perform Check.
Choose the checks you wish to perform. You have 4 standard checks:
You can choose to run all checks or individual checks manually.
Once you click the Perform Checks Now you will see Smart Check go to work.
You will now see any issues highlighted.
Drill in to the alerts by clicking on anything highlighted. This is all very intuitive so far. One of my checks highlights a VDA is in Maintenance mode. It is a production machine so let me rectify that. Thanks for letting me know Smart Tools!
You also have LTSR checks. As this environment is 7.13 it rightly points out I am not compatible.
Agent Install Part 2
Remember the initial agent install process? Now you can install the agent from within the Smart Check console to your other identified Delivery Controllers. No need to go through any manual process.
Custom Checks
This next part has been a long time coming and great from a support aspect. Citrix have an initiative to bring all the tools out there under one umbrella and have been working closely with Carl Webster to achieve this. The idea is to bring your own custom checks and add them to Smart Check. The Citrix Community will also be adding custom check blueprints over time.
The VDA health Check (Health Assistant) is a welcome addition.
Simply click the blue + icon and you will add this as a performance check in Smart Check.
Once clicked you are informed it is added.
Navigate back to Smart Check and your site and go back in to perform checks.
Once you click on this you can choose the machines the check will performed against.
Simply run the checks for your analysis.
You are also able to schedule your custom checks. This applies to the standard checks also. Go to the Configure link.
You can choose the frequency of the checks (daily/weekly/time etc) and what machines they are run on.
Optimise your environment
Another Custom Check that is currently available is the Citrix Optimiser Check.
Everyone loves a bit of optimisation so let’s see how this works. Once chosen run the performance checks choosing the new Citrix Optimiser check. I chose one of my VDA machines. The check highlights that my machine is not optimised.
I am advised to download the Citrix Optimiser and run this on my VDA. I even get a nice link to the article and download for the Citrix Optimizer tool . More on this tool can be found in a previous blog on optimization here: http://wp.me/p8leEE-bs
Adding to this you now have custom checks that can handle the following servers/services:
Manual Checks and Insight Services
If you choose not to install the agent, you can still use Smart Check to perform manual health checks. Smart Check analyzes Call Home and Citrix Scout data and displays potential issues or applicable updates. For Smart Check to discover your Site, the following requirements must be met: Diagnostics uploads from your Site using Call Home or Citrix Scout must exist. You must use the same Citrix account that's associated with those diagnostics uploads to access Smart Tools. Customers can control automatic discovery of XenApp and XenDesktop Sites from Call Home or Citrix Scout diagnostics uploads in Citrix Insight Services.
You can also enable Smart Tools access when you install a Delivery Controller. A browser window opens and navigates automatically to a Smart Services web page, where you enter your Citrix Cloud account credentials. (If you don't have a Citrix Cloud account, simply enter your Citrix account credentials, and a new Citrix Cloud account is automatically created for you.) After you're authenticated, a certificate is silently installed in the Smart Tools Agent directory. More on this cab be found at this link: https://docs.citrix.com/en-us/xenapp-and-xendesktop/7-15-ltsr/manage-deployment/cis.html There really is no reason you should not be proactive!
Conclusion
I am super excited by the cleverness of Smart Tools especially coming from a support area. This allows you to gain valuable insights in to your sites health and make corrective actions. You can keep on top of your environment and get those valuable changes implemented before you have to become reactive to problems. This tool will only get better over time. The addition of custom and manual checks is a great move and the Insight/Taas functionality has also been migrated over. All in all a great one stop shop tool for analysis. Told you I would keep it simple. Carpe Diem! Love the Citrix Cloud!