Horizon View with Unidesk Network Flows and Operations

One of my customers recently asked me a question about his VDI environment.  I had given him a copy of my View 5 network flows diagram, but he was curious about what those flows actually do during day to day operations.  This struck me as a pretty important question, as the diagram is useful by itself when planning a new deployment, but when troubleshooting a problem it doesn't really help you to know where to look.  So, I typed up some explanations of what the system is doing on the back end during some common front end operations.  Since that's useful info, I figured that I should probably post it here in case it can help anyone else.

External User Connections


  1. The External View Client initiates the TCP 443 connection to the Security Server.  This connection is used until the user selects the desktop to which they want to connect
    1. After the user initiates the TCP 443 connection, the Security Server connects to the Connection Server
    2. The Connection Server authenticates the user to the Domain Controllers
    3. The Connection Server determines which desktops the user is entitled to and passes that information back to the Security Server
    4. The Security Server presents the list of desktops to the user
  2. After the user connects to a desktop, the Security Server establishes the TCP 4172 connection to the VDI Desktop and then the UDP 4172 connection.  The TCP 32111 connection is used when USB redirection is enabled and the TCP 9427 connection is used for Multimedia Redirection.

Internal User Connections


  1. The Internal View Client initiates the TCP 443 connection to the Connection Server.  This connection is used until the user selects the desktop to which they want to connect
    1. After the user initiates the TCP 443 connection, the Connection Server authenticates the user to the Domain Controllers
    2. The Connection Server determines which desktops the user is entitled to and passes that information back to the View Client
  2. After the use selects a desktop, the View Client establishes the TCP 4172 connection to the VDI Desktop and then the UDP 4172 connection.  The TCP 32111 connection is used when USB redirection is enabled and the TCP 9427 connection is used for Multimedia Redirection.

Desktop Creation/Maintenance


  1. The VDI Administrator establishes the TCP 443 connection to the Unidesk Manager where commands are received.
  2. The Unidesk Manager communicates with the CachePoint Servers on TCP 61616 to relay appropriate commands (information about what Layers they need and what desktops they run, etc.)
  3. The Unidesk Manager and/or CachePoint Servers communicate with the vCenter Server on TCP 443 to issue appropriate commands (vmdk file copy operations, VM power operations, changes to VMX configuration files, etc.)
  4. The vCenter Server uses its various connections to the SQL Server and the ESXi Servers to fulfill those commands.
  5. The Unidesk Manager communicates with the View Connection server on TCP 390 to perform any View related operations (adding desktops to Pools, querying the list of desktop pools, setting maintenance mode on desktops, etc.)
  6. The VDI Desktop communicates to the CachePoint Servers and the Unidesk Manager on TCP 61616 to relay information about the desktop’s current state (if it is available after a maintenance operation, who is logged into it currently, etc.).

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