Thursday, February 19, 2015

RunVirtual Key may finally be the answer in App-V 5 SP3


RunVirtual enables App-V packages to run on locally installed applications e.g. add-ons

Set the new registry subkey’s value to the PackageId and VersionId of the package, separating the values with an underscore.

Syntax: <PackageId>_<VersionId>

Example: 4c909996-afc9-4352-b606-0b74542a09c1_be463724-Oct1-48f1-8604-c4bd7ca92fa

The application in the previous example would produce a registry export file (.reg file) like the following:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\AppV\Client\RunVirtual] @="" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\AppV\Client\RunVirtual\MyApp.exe] @="aaaaaaaa-bbbb-cccc-dddd-eeeeeeee_11111111-2222-3333-4444-555555555

SP3 finally seems to have this all covered off.  Imagine there are 3 different addons for 3 different users.  One app can only have a relationship with one GUID string so a connection group is required.

According to the SP3 doc link below the users will only get the individual App-V packages in the connection group - the ones they are entitled to and not the ones they are not supposed to have.

FINALLY !

references
http://stealthpuppy.com/app-v-5-0-delivers-internet-explorer-plugin-nirvana/
SP2 related - it still wasn't *total* nirvana when this was written though.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn858703.aspx

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn858700.aspx#BKMK_runvirtual_reg_key

http://www.tmurgent.com/TMBlog/?p=2211

http://virtualvibes.co.uk/everything-you-need-to-know-about-app-v-5-0-sp3/
http://virtualvibes.co.uk/connection-groups-2-0-in-app-v-5-0-sp3-more-manageable-more-flexible/
http://virtualvibes.co.uk/runvirtual-comes-to-the-user-in-appv-5-0-sp3/


Another reason why you need SP3.

Sequence an addon in SP2 - say a lovely ActiveX control with a shortcut to launch IE pointing to the relevent website.  Deploy, test and marvel at your wonderful package.

Now close your IE session and start a normal IE session which is just running normally.  NOW try your lovely package - ain't gonna work is it? cause it gives you a some kind of IE session spawned from the original.  Your ActiveX control is no where !  SP3 might sort that out for ya.